How to Turn Anger and Joy into Power with Poet and Speaker Neelam Patel and Executive Coach Jamie Lee

In this episode, I talk with Neelam Patel, who left a 22-year tech executive career to follow her passions for poetry, dance, and performance. We dive into the risks and rewards of creative self-advocacy, how joy and anger can guide personal transformation, and what it really means to rebuild a life around authenticity. If you’ve ever felt the pull between convention and creativity, this conversation will inspire you to reclaim your own voice.

Featured in this episode:  

• Neelam's Instagram account @dancewithneelam
• Neelam's website: tailoredpoetry.com
• Neelam's book: Burning It Down: Dancing Through the Rubble
• Jamie's 1:1 executive coaching practice: https://www.jamieleecoach.com/apply

Timestamps:

1. [00:00] — Introduction and Neelam’s background: Jamie Lee opens the episode, introduces Neelam Patel, and they discuss Neelam’s journey from tech executive to poet and artist.
2. [04:21] — Tech career and personal transformation: Neelam describes how improv and creative pursuits influenced her growth (and promotions) in the tech world.
3. [10:47] — Risky conversations and work-life negotiation: Neelam shares stories of honest, risky conversations at work, including advocating for her creative needs.
4. [34:36] — Anger as an ally: Neelam and Jamie discuss the power of anger, addressing repression, shame, and channeling anger into advocacy.
5. [48:04] — Life after “burning it down” and current work: Neelam gives an update on her creative career, including her dance residency and ways listeners can connect with her (Instagram, website).

Enjoy the show?

• Don't miss an episode, listen and subscribe via Apple Podcasts or Spotify.
• Leave me a review in Apple Podcasts.

Connect with me

• Book a free hour-long consultation with me. You'll leave with your custom blueprint to confidence, and we'll ensure it's a slam-dunk fit for you before you commit to working with me 1:1.
• Connect with me on LinkedIn
• Email me at jamie@jamieleecoach.com

Transcript

0:00  
Welcome to risky conversations. My name is Jamie Lee. I'm an executive coach for smart women who hate office politics, and I help them get promoted, get better paid, without throwing anyone under the bus. And this podcast is called risky conversations, because everything that's worthwhile is on the other side of a risky conversation, and today, I have my good friend Neelam Patel on the podcast, and she and I met just a couple of months ago, but we feel like kindred spirits, don't we?

0:36  
Neelam, yes, we do. Feel like I've known you for a minute. We connected so well, and we had so many laughs together. It feels like we've known each other.

0:46  
And, you know, I was thinking about this, I've had several executives on my podcast, and either it's about like moving forward with diversity and equity, or it's burning it all down, and like quitting the corporate life altogether. And when I learned that Neelam has this amazing book of poetry called burning it down, dancing in the rubble, I immediately, immediately had to buy a copy. And immediately I thought, Oh, my God, I love this. This is so fun. So my vibe. And Neelam, who is a former tech executive, let me tell you a little bit about her. She is no stranger to self expression and self advocacy is also self expression in my world. Neelam is a poet, a dancer, an actress, and she graduated from Rutgers University with a BS in computer science and from theater labs, honors acting conservatory. Neelam has written, performed and produced four one woman shows based on her poetry, while holding down a demanding day job. We want to hear all about that in 2020 she took the plunge and left a 22 year career in high tech to pursue her creative passions. During this time, she generated her debut collection, burning it down, dancing in the rubble, and she spoke at South by Southwest when she's not writing custom poems ordered through her website, tailored poetry, you can find Neelam performing improvisational dances in public and practicing her newly found swimming ability. And you and I, we did some improvised dancing when we first did, we first met in Detroit, of all places, just this August, you and I attended a retreat by our mutual mentor, Simone gray soul. She called it together because the revolution, the the change, the radical change the radical change that we need to see in our broken world does not happen in isolation. It happens all of us together, and Neelam and I had the wonderful fortune of dancing our way through downtown Detroit. We filmed it.

3:19  
Absolutely, we did. You were such a good sport to do some random dancing whenever I felt inspired, and that was so fun.

3:29  
And it's really rare to meet people who are so alive, so alive with joy, curiosity, exuberance, like and living in the moment, as you do, so I just immediately, I'm like, this is a really cool person. And you were a tech executive 22 years in high tech, you know, I just had this flashing thought in my mind, like some people listened, and they're like, oh my gosh, she's living my wildest dreams right now, burning it all down and pursuing my creative passions. And I'm just curious, maybe you can tell us a little bit about your personal journey. What? What was it like when you were a tech executive?

4:21  
Yeah, so I would say it's a burning it down, but it was a slow burn that was happening. So I would say I started out in tech right out of college, because I, as you said, I had a computer science degree. And what was interesting was that I was pursuing both. There was a time when I was frustrated in my day job, maybe in my late 20s. So I got some career coaching, and I was told, you know, you have a lot to say in public. So I started out doing open mic poetry here and there, and then I started taking acting classes, like I said, it was like this gradual build to finding things that felt more like home. And in the end. It seemed that the more im and I loved improv, so I took a lot of improv acting, improv dance, improv movement, and the more improv I took, the more quickly I got promoted in my day.

5:11  
That is a pull quote. That is a pull quote, the more improv classes I took, the faster I got promoted. How? Wait, why?

5:24  
It was, first of all annoying, because that wasn't my goal, right? Like, and I know I sound a little bit what's the word like, like, I have this privilege, like, oh, I accidentally got promoted, but it was true, and that's actually, then that path actually led to me, me to some risky conversations, which I'd love to bring up to your audience. They might find it interesting, but yes, so in improv, you're in the moment. And also, because I loved it so much, I was just trying to honestly get my day job over with, and so I would just be very clear in my mind about what needs to get done when and improv had a lot of joy in it. It's like living in the moment. And you kind of get practice in just saying the thing that's on your mind, just saying it like that, that sense of direct, like being direct and so and I was, I think the other reason too is, unlike a lot of people, because tech and that entire industry didn't really call to me in my heart in the first place. I was sort of maneuvering it. I was smart enough to, like, figure it out, that I didn't have a lot of stakes in it, that I must be successful in this career, and when you dropped that need, you know, you're just like, I need to get out of here so I can go to happy hour with my acting friends, and we can talk about our show, whatever. Then you kind of have this different attitude. You're there to connect with people. You're there to have as much fun as you possibly can in this kind of tedious job. And I think that when you have something else that you are passionate about, the other things kind of fall into line. And you know, when I said I was annoyed by it, of course, I'm grateful and grateful to be able to express a different part of me that I didn't know was available to be, you know, taking on more projects, taking on more leadership, taking on more difficult conversations within the job. And so that was cool. And I think it was a just a different level of expression, and it comes more naturally, right? And improv, you do things that come what's the next thing? What's the next thing? Rather than turn it into a big thing, you know, you end up in the rooms, and then you end up getting promoted, if that makes sense. And I don't want to make it sound like I took it for granted, but it was not something I desired, as you know,

7:42  
what was your role? What did you do?

7:45  
Okay, so I always started out as a liaison between the tech team and the end customer. So my first job was at Microsoft, where I basically learned my lessons of how to exist in the tech world. And I was a program manager on Expedia, so I would we didn't have direct customers, like I did most of my life, but we had the general consumer was our customer, so I represented them, or we had usability tests, and I would talk to those people who took those tests and then translate everything into these very tedious requirements documents you know about how the system should work, what that then translated into when I moved from Seattle to the East Coast, to Washington DC, where there was a lot of government contracts and other kinds of contracts where you are working directly with clients. I was that liaison. So I had the tech team building things, and I was the front face of the customer. I was always brought into the customer rooms. Many jobs, they would send me straight to the client site on day one. And I was so comfortable with that. I love ambiguity. I love not knowing the data. I love showing up and and learning from being present. And so I

8:52  
that's your gift. You're comfortable with ambiguity like I just did a four day style and retreat with a Zen master, and and in the Zen tradition, we talk about this, don't know. Mind, you know, where are you before thinking, before you're planning and worrying and strategizing and ruminating, it's like you don't know. And where you don't know, there's so much that's possible, and there's this beauty, there's this aliveness that's there, and that's where you're tapped into it, because so many people I talk to that I've coached uncomfortable. They're uncomfortable with ambiguity, uncomfortable with uncertainty, but you were able to dance with it, and you're able to dance with it with a sense of joy, not dread, not perfectionism. I think that that was the that was your magic, and that still remains your magic. What do you think about that?

9:42  
That's interesting because I didn't look at it that way. I have started to reframe it. I mean, now I have that where I think more and more that that's my magic, and listening to you say that, I'm like, oh, that even applied way back then, when I was going to those client sites and in the workplace, there's a lot of shame around not knowing that. Process, not knowing the steps, not, I mean, quite frankly, caring, you know. So then as an executive, it was great, because then whenever there was something ambiguous, just send Leela min right. And then when I start doing something that's working, another like junior level executive has to come in and document what did I do that worked, and make it repeatable and make it measurable so that we can hire a team to do it. And you know, I did kind of get excitement and enthusiasm from making myself not needed anymore, which is, again, very risky for most people. Like, well, then what will we do? What will my job be? Won't I get laid off? And it's like, well, then it will get boring. So I gotta go find another problem, another creative problem to solve. But by then, I've created. I've collected so many skills and things I didn't have before because I had to do it.

10:47  
Yeah, so what were some of the risky conversations? What was the riskiest conversation you engaged in in your tech career?

10:58  
Why would they Yeah, I would say, because I was so, I mean, I really didn't like working in that particular industry or in tech. And so the positive side of that was that once I found something I liked, which was expressing myself, that became so important, and then somehow, is following my intuition, created a one woman show, and then I did it again and again. And so I would have rehearsals and I would have things, so the risky things I would do that were non negotiable for me. So it wasn't something that I was like, I'm going to take this risk. It was that I have to do this, which is, when interviewing for new jobs, I would at the HR stage. Usually during your first interview, you're doing the screen with the HR team, before you've met the hiring manager who has that decision making capability, I tell them, hey, look, on Wednesdays, I have rehearsals at three for the next three months, I've already negotiated my current like, if I had a current job, like, that was already okay with that, with that job. So I would say to the new job, like, Hey, I already have this understanding with my current manager. This is what I need. And my show goes up on this date, and then after that, these are my available dates, because I still take theater classes, and this is what I have. So I want to tell you, as the HR person, so that I'm not lying like integrity is so important to me. I'm not lying to the hiring manager, and I don't want to waste their time. And I know the HR job is to not waste anyone's time, you know, with client candidates that are not going to fit, I don't want I didn't do it because I didn't want them to look bad. I did it out of integrity. Now the standard advice is, you get the offer and then you negotiate. You get the offer, and then you tell them. And I do. I even now in my bones, after all these years, do not feel good about that, because this was not negotiable. If you're can't work with me. And guess what? Every single time I've done that, I've gotten the offer which I was didn't know that would happen. If anything, one of the interviews were the one that I kind of scaled the most in terms of my my jump in role. They that interview, I was so confused, because the entire time we talked about my one woman show, he was so fascinated by what the heck were you doing? What's your business plan? How do you do this? Why are you doing it? How did you come to do it? What is important to you, you know? And because I think I had already proven that I could do the work I was recommended and nominated by my bosses to go take this kind of higher level role. So I would say that was risky, but in my body, it didn't feel risky, because I was comfortable, like I have something that's working and it's important to me. So you know, do we want to explore this or not? And to this day, I have received this comment from many, many, many people, which is, do not give people career advice, and here I am on this podcast, and also try not to train people on what you do, because most people need some understanding of what the company does and who the clients are and who your peers are before going to a meeting. And I really don't need any of that, you know, to be successful and earn the earn the clients trust, which is really, apparently all that really matters, you know, in the roles that I've had, because then people feel okay to tell you things that they wouldn't tell other people, and the only way you can solve a problem is to understand the truth of it. Wow.

14:20  
My mind is blown because your story is so Counter Point, such a counterpoint to conventional advice, conventional way of going about things. And I think you can tell me what you think about this, but I think the beautiful thing about what you did was you did not tie your self worth to the job. You did not tie this significance like you needed the job and you needed the job to prove your worth, and otherwise you would feel ashamed and embarrassed and you're not good at like none of that was ever there because you already had a thing. Thing that ignited your sense of purpose and passion. So the job was just

15:06  
actually would have to add to that. Because, yeah, life is nuanced. Everything is nuanced, right? So I could say that I had a deep shame that if I ever left as an, especially as an Asian, South Asian woman left that career, I would be without value as a family member. So, like, having a tech job was kind of like my check mark that I'm still a valid human. But all that being said, the way I treated the job, I 100% agree with you. It was like, How do I get this over with so I can go do what I love? So from a heart perspective, everything you said matches that. It wasn't energetically important to me, but deep, deep, there was definitely shame of like, well, if I don't have that title of walking into spaces that, hey, I have this tech job, although my friends, a lot of them, would forget that I had a tech job because I was performing so much. And I show up, as you can tell, in this conversation, more energetically as an artist than I do as like, you work in tech, you know? Oh, I forgot. I'm like, You're my best friend. Like, come on, one of my best friend, you should remember that I have a day job, you know. So I would say, yes, that I didn't care. I just didn't care, and because it didn't matter to me, and the check mark of having it in whatever form was somehow important to me, and it was giving me a stable paycheck, and all the things that I could feed my art from. So there was that. So I think, I think I would say 90% of what you said is true, and yet, you know, I would be remiss if I don't talk about the guilt, the shame, the fact that, who am I to be an artist when I'm an Indian woman like I want to be a doctor, lawyer, engineer, you know, like that shame kind of still lived very loudly in my system.

17:01  
Shall we talk about your poetry now? Sure, down dancing in the rubble. It's you could just tell it's an antidote to this guilt and shame that you just reference it and the guilt and shame so many women, so many women of color, experience in their careers, may I ask you to read some selections? Sure, it would be my honor. Yeah, and people can go buy the book. Where can they go? By go to buy the book.

17:34  
It's on Amazon, so you can get it there. And I will be updating my website. Tailored poetry.com to give an alternative to Amazon to buy from. So that should be coming soon.

17:45  
I would just like to preface and say that if there's any woman who just felt like she was too much, felt too much was too loud, whatever, whatever, too whatever. Yeah, this, this book of poetry, will speak to you because it did to me. I'm like, Oh, she gets it.

18:05  
Okay, I'm gonna shut up. Actually, the corporate world, you have those confines that everything feels too much, yeah, okay, so I have a poem called aggressive, like the spring. Should we start there?

18:18  
Let's do it. I love that one. I love that one.

18:21  
Okay, so I'll just start reading it aggressive, like the spring. Be aggressive like the spring with unmatched ecstasy. Spring penetrates straight into winter time, using the strength of her own volition, force. Cherry blossoms celebrate, sprouting into a full rally. A welcoming committee of yellow trumpet daffodils bursts out into the open. The Purple Iris rises into her light her dignity. Each flower forces color into plain sight, unworried whether Earth's Canvas can handle her palette, her pleasure pushing pushing out from all the places that once enclosed her, so that she may witness her own blooms, smell her own scent, sing her own songs, swing in the open air be seen. Glory to the springtime. Glory to the ambitious woman. Glory to the aggression that causes colorful gardens, lush landscapes, whole countries.

19:39  
Oh so good. Glory to the ambitious woman. Glory to the aggression that causes colorful gardens, lush landscapes, whole countries I love that I get chills because you, in this stanza, you completely reframe what it means to be seen or perceived as aggressive, right? Because our when we are aggressive, we we are most of the time we're aggressive from this place of wanting to wanting to serve, for lack of a better word, wanting to give, wanting to be generous. Sometimes we're like, too generous, according

20:18  
to generous, I agree, yeah, yeah.

20:21  
Because when I think about gardens, lush landscapes, whole countries, and I think about, you know, the Earth, the lands, you know, covered in green flowers, it's, it's, it's just full of life and and generosity, that's, that's what I see. That's what I and it's just beautiful. Thank you.

20:42  
Thank you. Yeah, and as you're saying that, I'd love to add that, you know, I think a lot of times for me I'll speak, from my personal experience, it was like, Oh, I'll be too much if I say something, or if I move forward, or if I interrupt, or, you know, the flow. And there's examples in nature of aggression, like who told the cherry blossoms to come out, you know. And so if you can look at it that way, I'm sure there's other framings, but that really helped me to see like that. And it's and there is, there is a nuance where, like, we sometimes are assertive, and we think that's aggressive, but really, aggression is also okay. How do you How does one create a country, you know? And so there is a volatility of interruption, right?

21:22  
The volatility of interruption. And I love that we're we're reading this poem just as we're entering winter in the Northern Hemisphere. It probably is beginning spring in Australia, New Zealand. But yes, so good. Okay, let's talk about joy and pleasure as a way to orient. Because what I'm hearing is that in your very successful tech career, you use joy, you use your pleasure as a way to orient into sales conversations

21:58  
I did, and I love that you've framed it that way, because I'm looking at it that way now from the outside. So thank you. I feel like we took this Rubik's Cube and looked at it a different way. So I'm having fun in this conversation.

22:10  
I mean, your poetry did that too, with aggression, and seeing spring is something that's almost violent and aggressive.

22:18  
Yes, yes, yes. So I did orient towards joy. So I would say, you know, I probably, I want to preface by saying, all of my ways of orienting into the world do come with a downside that I have to manage, which is process, remembering steps. People ask me why I did something, and I have to be like, Well, my intuition said so, and I had to, like, reprogram how to answer those questions, and there is a lot of a lot of frustration there for people around me or myself. So, you know, there's no one correct way to be I really did depend on my process people a lot. And so I would say, because my brain, I actually have a slight version of dyscalculia where I can't there's a part of my brain can't contain steps in sequential order. Part of my brain can't hold values of numbers. And so in a sense, you know, because I came in with that sort of blankness of not knowing the next step or what step we were on, I was fully present to the energy in the room. And those kinds of things turn me on. And so meaning like, oh, what's going on, or how do I understand what's happening? A lot of times, because I don't know the sequence step. I'm not locked into, Oh, we're in the requirement stage, over in this stage. Next is this, of course, I knew it. I'm intelligent, but because I was more locked into the present moment, and that sort of gave me joy, like, because anything can happen, right? Like that moment before the curtain opens when you see a show, I love that moment because, like, oh, what's going to happen? Anything, anything I don't even know. You know, it's just a black, blank stage. And so because of that, and every moment has that right, every moment has that potential just to be like, okay, curtain drawn, what's what's here right now? And so because of that, people felt their guard down in front of me, because I didn't have an agenda. I wasn't trying to close a deal. I was trying to see what's up, you know, and, and there's a sense of what people might think is lackadaisical about that, like, well, don't you care? Don't you need to make your numbers? Well, actually, it didn't, you know, I was, like, really curious about what was, what was going on for the person on the other side of the table, right? If they're frustrated, I'm locked into that frustration. I did have to learn energetic boundaries, because I would take on a lot, but at the same time, it just happened automatically and and because, okay, here's a great point that I think you you were alluding to before that I'm walking in now is because I was doing things that I was actually passionate about right? I walked into work with a sense of joy already, so people were curious about me, like, what? That's probably

24:49  
why you got that job where you were asked questions about your your one woman show right during the interview. That's because people can sense, oh, this person experiences joy. They're locked into. Something that's really fulfilling.

25:01  
They want some of that, you know? And I realized later, I'm like, now I realized they weren't really because I was like, oh my god, what is my business plan? What is I don't even know. I did terrible in that interview. They were just like, that's how they orient, right? They orient to things, to business plans. And so they were curious about me, and that was the language they used to, like, go and explore that. And so, yeah, I remember there was one time at the end of the work day we let them the it was at Network Solutions. I worked there as a project manager, and the elevators would close at the end of the day, right? We're all leaving around the same time, and the elevators had a mirror for some reason, on the doors, so we all like looking at ourselves. And someone was like, you know, like, they usually you don't talk in the elevator, but someone's like, why is new? I'm the only one that looks happy in this, you know, because I was like, end of the freaking work day to get out of here. It was before covid, right? So you had to, like, commute home, make dinner. And so I was like, because I'm off to take an acting class, that's why. But before that, I was one of them, you know. Like, I wasn't always this way, you know. So, yeah, there's, there is the joy, whatever that is. And I'm learning that fiercely now is to do things for joy, which I've recently started doing again in this, like, post burn down, if there is a such thing, and I don't really believe in before and after. So, you know, things are still burning down. Things are being developed, you know, like, it's a process. But yes, I think orienting towards your joy feeds your skin cells. And people

26:30  
observe orienting towards your joy feeds your skin cells.

26:34  
I think so because, because, where else is it right? Like, where are they noticing it right? Like, I think something's lighting up in my cells. I imagine,

26:41  
Oh, I love that. I love that. So why'd you leave

26:50  
the so to be vulnerable? Like, I really didn't like working in tech

26:56  
me either from the

26:58  
first day, like I worked at Microsoft, and I think there was a part of me that I could not vocalize, yeah, that said, I hate this. I want out. I hate it. I hate coming to work every single morning. I hate it. I hate it, hate it. And I think, and because I was so happy go lucky, right? Like I was being honest about the things that really hurt my soul, I wasn't being honest. To be like, this sucked. I was like, oh, but okay, but I can, like, go meet some new people at this thing, right? Like, there was some escapism happening with my joy back then. Now I'm more integrated. But I was not being honest with myself. I couldn't say the words out loud to be like, you know, my parents immigrated from India for me to take this job that I can do, I can use my brain and do, even if it was really hard, I didn't know I had this. Didn't know I had this brain thing. And I was like, writing these detailed requirements, like, it was, it was really hard, and I didn't know that. That's why my soul was hurting. So I was like, literally trying to get something done that I could not do. And I would make mistakes and try again and try again and somehow be good enough, right? Like, my 80% was, like, good enough and to get the job done, but it was not easy. It was not simple. And so with that kind of it's not even just working against a grain. I was trying to do something that made me feel stupid all day, but no one could tell, because I show up. I didn't show up like a bumbling idiot, right? But I felt this like backflow of, why can't I get it like I just don't get it, like I get that I'm getting promoted.

28:24  
I remember feeling that way. I remember feeling that way when I worked at the hedge fund. I remember feeling that way when I worked at tech startups.

28:31  
Yeah, because there's people that are just like you, that understand, and you can tell something's clicking, and they get it and they understand. And I'm, you know, I mean, I was a star in a lot of the companies I worked for, but deep down inside, and it was not imposter syndrome, it was my brain does not understand, like even thinking about it now, I just feel that sense of, oh my god. But now that I see that, and I'm like, wow, you know, I did have,

28:59  
wait, wait, wait, this is a really important point. How do you know that you didn't have imposter syndrome? What is the difference between imposter syndrome and just knowing at soul level that it was not the right fit for you?

29:13  
I didn't know at the time. I know now that it wasn't imposter syndrome like at the time. I just everyone

29:18  
because no one could tell. Does that mean that at that time, you experienced imposter syndrome?

29:24  
Yeah, I just felt stupid all the time. I did, and I felt, um, I think it took a while. It was not until, like my last when I started getting leveling up to SVP and all of that, I started understanding where I live and what I do and what I'm not good at, and all of that started coming into place. And then that's when probably I realized, like, this is really just not for me. Like, we're making a lot of compensations and adjustments and things to make this job just kind of work. You know what I mean? Like, it was, it got to a place to, like, jump to the answer, and then come back to this. Is it got to a place where I'm, like, I. I'm just trying to make this thing look pretty, and it's just not what I want, you know, like, it's like, it's like, you have a meal in front of you that is very hearty, and people would want it like, getting paid this much money to do work that is, like, I wasn't even working, like, 40 hours a week, right? Like, the more I got promoted, like, it got got easier and, and I'm like, putting hot sauce on it, and I'm putting this on it, and I'm putting that on it, and I'm making it digestible, and I'm bringing these pretty drinks and decorating them, and I'm like, but I don't like the meal.

30:32  
Got it. There's your answer. There's your answer. You don't want it. You didn't want it. And you, when you became really honest with yourself, you knew what to do. You knew what needed to be done.

30:44  
And and the way the universe works, and I don't want to go into it, but things got politically and personally more and more harmful in the day job. Because I think a lot of times when things don't work out, you know, the universe is like, you don't want to eat this. It makes the food even worse. You know, it taste, it becomes indigestible. So both things, you know, I was getting more and more honest and and then, and in my, in my last kind of role, I had a great boss. He, I think his role was, yeah, his role was president of the Americas, part of our business. And he could see right away. He's like, Neelam, keep doing what you're doing, which is what many bosses said, that we don't understand what you're doing, but keep doing it. Meaning I was using my intuition, and also, anytime you have to submit your numbers, I then ran the sales team as well for the Americas as well as customer relationships, and I was told like, you can't do spreadsheets. Like we're not going to have you do spreadsheets,

31:41  
because we have an SVP without doing spreadsheets, but it

31:45  
would make me miserable. My numbers were wrong. I would and my team would come into my office and they would be like, Hey, what's up? And they could see it in my eyes, even if I was like, Hey, what's up, I'm available. Like, are you working on an Excel right now? And I said, Yeah, so, like, I'm going to talk to you tomorrow about this subject. I said, Can it wait till tomorrow? They're like, yes. I'm like, Okay. And then at some point, we worked it out, and he's like, I think there's something going on with your brain. Like, he's like, because he was tested for something dyslexia or something so I got lucky that I was matched with this boss who saw it, understood it, and then I realized, Oh, my brain doesn't hold values like 220 like 220 like, I have to think a second, like 200 is more than 20. I know this. This because I'm intelligent. I can remember things, but then I have to start again. Which one is which? You have to count my fingers. And so with those things going on, you know, we realized I was, I was really good at getting I was really successful in my job. Like I could, I could pitch things to get us into conferences. But if a if a proposal came in in Excel format, like answer this question, what is your company's mission? I would answer it in Word, and we would have my operations manager put it back into Excel so we can submit it. But as soon as it was for some reason, like the sequential blocks, I just can't compute that. I know we're going deep into my brain issues, but which may not relate to a lot of people, but sometimes you're just not meant to do things, even if your your brain works that well, that way. And I think it might be harder for those people, because it's less painful for them to realize there's something even better and more interesting for them in this in this one lifetime we've got right.

33:21  
Thank you for sharing that. And you know, when I asked you, what do you want to talk about on the podcast, you said you anger is an ally, because everything that you just shared with me, there's plenty reason to feel anger, irritation, if not rage. You know, I get irritated by like the smallest things. I'm a highly sensitive person. My brain is just like that, and so anger is an ally. I love that, because for so many women, I've even had to coach women through this. We feel that anger is not an okay emotion for us to have Express, right experience, like we're like, oh, we're not supposed to be angry. We're not supposed to express it. Then we get labeled difficult, and B, I, T, C, H, and unlikable. And, you know, people get threatened. People literally feel threatened by angry women, women, so, especially women, yeah, so tell me more. And maybe you can tell us how anger as an ally apply to this particular phase in your life, or maybe beyond, you know, tell me more about anger as an ally. What does that mean to you?

34:36  
It means like, it's so it's such a it's, I mean, I could do 10 podcasts on anger. And first of all, like even hearing you say, it is so satisfying. I'm sure your listeners feel the same way. For you to say, Oh, I feel angry, I feel irritated, I'm sensitive. It's like, yes, yes, yes, I want more, right? We crave this. And so there is a like, we crave more joy, but we don't know that our bodies also crave. Anger, because it's real.

35:01  
Bodies crave, I crave my irritation.

35:05  
No, I wouldn't say that. If you're already irritated, you crave to know that you're irritated, not suppress it. That's what I mean.

35:13  
Oh, you mean. We crave acknowledgement, yes, yes,

35:17  
yes, that, yes, that, yes, that. That made me angry. That made me it's like because then we can reclaim ourselves, you know, no, I don't think living in anger is is satisfying. It's very exhausting. I've done it, yeah, but wait, I

35:32  
think I want to be a little bit more precise. I think what you're saying is to be angry is only natural and human and inevitable as long as we exist in this earthly realm with all the you know stuff going on, right? But to deny and to repress that anger is where it really sucks. Is really harmful, yeah, if we think of it, yeah,

35:58  
the image that came up as you were saying that this is not I'm literally just realizing it as I'm saying it. So it may not be 100% clear, but anger is in the air anyway, yeah, like and joy is in the air anyway, sensuality is in the air anyway. Name a feeling, sadness is in the air anyway. Yeah, grief. What's that? Grief? Grief? Oh, so much grief to talk about when you leave a day job. But I but all that is in the air anyway. And so if you're like intention with it, we're actually creating more of it, more of that like, because then it's like, hard to feel that happiness and the joy of your intention with one of the other things, especially anger. Yeah. So one, one example, I'll start with, like, slight examples, right? I think those kind of name the thing, which is, you know, when I was doing this book cover with the very talented designer, as you can imagine, like, we've got me and asari, we've got water, we've got the skyline of New York City in the back, and, you know, all these things. And I was very specific about the colors I wanted, what I wanted, how I wanted to have it. And there was a point where I'm like, Did this person not read my email about what I asked for? Because he gave me a design that was like, some, some lady who was like, very much like, like, like, in some pose that she's done. And for me, my entire messages were always in the process. You know, the light is in the middle of the tunnel. We're fine where we are, and there's no other there's another side, but there's no like we're done. And I wanted that to be clear, to be like we all live in this imperfection. And I remember getting so anyway, he doesn't understand me. People don't understand me. I'm an artist. No one understands me, right? So I got privately really angry, and I said some not nice things about this person, and out loud to myself, but I got to say those words nasty. Do I? Do I want to say them on the podcast that I said this about him? No, because I don't believe they are truths. They're not absolute truths. They were. Anger is a one way street. Anger wants to be angry. They anger wants to murder, right? But anger wants to call people to be people want to anger. Want to call people, you know, curse words that are not nice about, yeah, but would you want to go in a newspaper and say, This person is this? That's my end of my judgment, no, but, or maybe, like, depending, but in that moment, if we don't allow the viciousness of anger to be vicious, it will come out in different ways. For me, it came out as politeness, like before I like,

38:30  
made friends. This burns. This burns because I can 100% relate when I'm like, you're like, living inside and you say, Okay, thank you. Sure. Next time.

38:40  
Like And if anything, it's even more because now I'm so embarrassed of this disgusting anger, yes, oh, can I get you a present? Can I make you dinner? Like, Let's cover it up. And now the anger is like, way over here, no one knows. I'm upset, even me. And so instead, just to be like that, like that, you know. And let it be ugly, and it's beautiful, because then what I did next was I created a spreadsheet and it said, or columns in a Word document, and it said, it said, what I saw, like, like, let's say I said this color and and what my vision, what I forget what the columns were. But then it's like, what I need and why, you know, there were certain things. And then I sent it to him, and he wrote back, and he said, I've never gotten a more clear vision statement or clear instructions from anyone before. And I think artists like designers are used to people being like, make it a little more rocky. You know? It's like, oh, okay, you know. And I got very specific about what and why, and so what I learned was in my body, was something I'd learned about in like theory, that anger, one of many, many ways of looking at anger, is an expression of unmet needs. Anger is an expression of unmet needs, expression of safety, need for whatever it is you need, and there's no judgment. Like, some people need someone to text them at 6pm every day. Some people need this. Some people need that whatever you need is unmet, and there's no judgment as to what that need was. So my need was to be seen and heard, and for like, I had just spent, like, a year writing this book, and now there was going to be a cover that made no sense to me. I was pissed, right? And so I needed it to represent who I was. I needed this to be authentic. I needed him to know that. And I can't work alone. I'm not the designer. I don't have that skill set. It would take me, like it would take me another lifetime, to learn how to do what he did on whatever app he used to make this happen. So we got to work together, you know? And then pardon was like, whoa. So that means I can carry my weapons around with me in the moment, have anger, and then talk about what I need. Like, oh, you know. And then the more you can hold the more you can engage with people in a way that feels like you're honoring yourself, yes, right? And without being like, Oh, can I make you dinner? Oh, let me buy you a gift card for all the hard work you did. It's like, whoa. Like, there was some anger in there. I don't even remember what it was, because I'm consciously not aware except, but I'm literally ashamed of my anger, right?

41:07  
And you're, you're, you're trying to repress the shame or make up for the shame with guilt. And yeah, guilt has you buying gift cards that you really don't want to.

41:18  
It's like, yeah, yeah, yeah. I love that, because the guilt is, like, they don't even know why you get but you're like, Oh, I wanted to kill them. No, I'm not that person. I'm not one of those people who think like that. I'm not one of those people who get angry. But we all contain all of humanity, so we can't be like, not like, one of those people. Because whatever it is that those people have, we have a little bit of that inside of us too.

41:41  
Yeah, yeah. So anger is an ally. Anger is an ally when we can channel it, acknowledge it, and not get carried away by its negative tendencies. We can use it as an instigator for positive action, for self advocacy, for grounded, empowered self advocacy, right? Being specific and clear without blaming. So that's really beautiful. I love that.

42:07  
But the anger doesn't look like blame when you do it privately, right? It looks like you're like, lashing out at the person, but you're not. You're not doing it to them. You're getting it out of your system. I'm going

42:18  
to be totally honest and vulnerable, and I am going to confess that every once in a while I kick bathroom stall walls.

42:27  
Yes, thank you. Let's get going with that,

42:31  
because I'm angry at what you know, somebody said, usually, my life partner, kick that wall. Girl, kick that wall. And then I know he's partly right, but I don't want to acknowledge it. Yeah, because you don't

42:43  
want to punch him. But here's the thing, what I learned was that if I don't do that, the risk is not just that I get a little polite and I end up money on gift cards. It's that the anger has to go somewhere. My therapist taught me this, and it will go inside. You will hate that you're angry. You'll hate that you're an angry person. You'll hate something about it goes inside. And if enough of it goes inside, that's some deep depression, right? Like you really hate yourself. And so, yeah, they say anger is an important step towards healing depression, but I don't love that, because then it's like, you go into this deep let me just get angry all the time. There's no fix to it. It's just that. It's the allowing it said, like, every once in a while I need to kick the door, like I

43:27  
get into a pillow, or I scream

43:30  
into a pillow. I even bite things.

43:33  
And you write poetry, and I write poetry, yes,

43:38  
the physical act of getting it out is is more embodied is more channeling than just

43:43  
writing the poems. I just randomly opened a page in your book, and I just opened to divine infinity, and it says you were born innocent. Guilt is a disguise for something else, your anger, your fear, maybe your regret. You are free to feel through all your rises and your falls, keep writing the infinity sign as it continues and continues, carrying all of you for as long as you need. This is so good. It is such such amazing synchronicity. We're just talking about it randomly open the page. It's just, how did you do it? How did you do it? Okay, so you burned down your career.

44:23  
I burned down my career and and, like they say, like a lot of coaches say, you don't have to do that. It's not recommended. But you know, in

44:32  
certain it was the right thing for you. You're an unconventional person, and it had an unconventional solution. Was the right solution for you?

44:41  
Yeah, it came with the hardships that people will warn you about, but that's what I needed.

44:46  
That's what you need. Okay, okay, um, what would you like to do? Would you like to tell us more about it? Would you like to read another poem for us? What would you prefer?

44:55  
Um, let's see we can Okay, let me know maybe what your audience might like. Can do another poem about, like, when I was in the stage of balancing artist and day job. Yes, yeah, okay. We can do that. Do it, and then if we have time, we can fast forward to present day. Yes, let's do that. Okay, so this is called artist with a day job.

45:18  
Some of the people listening are artists with a day job, great,

45:22  
yeah, yeah. So you've been here, artists with a day job, I spend my days walking in grids, mechanically crossing cubicle intersections, shepherding a chaos of information into order so that pointed decisions can be made like the right angles in which I step. I gain altitude by siphoning specifics, distilling details, patterning a process that works like it should, engineering some movement forward. And at night, I never rest. Instead, I listen for beauty in the opposite direction, taking the facts of reality, the splash of morning in my coffee creamer, the squint of my eyes at high noon, evening, slower rhythm and night's special glow. Mix it together without any notion of sequence, throwing out the diagram, swirl together all the days of the week cut apart different months into strange shapes with the craft scissors of my intuition Usher distant particles to compress close together until they become a new seed. I add rain water, which is my fresh, squeezed desire, the sweat of my attention, a scoop of Miracle Grow extra dirt I collect, breaking down mountains of standards and rules of love, so messy anything fresh might emerge, Maybe in neon green, every single element destined never to return to its first form, transcending into something new, never again to be the same.

47:14  
Wow, you start one place, and then you're you're in somewhere completely different, transcendent, never again to be the same. It kind of talks about the direction you were headed.

47:29  
Yeah, it's so funny. Reading it now is so cool. So thank you for the opportunity. And maybe others who are listening, who are artists with day jobs, feel this way. One of the things that calls me into the art form is that it's not that the art pieces and ingredients are never going to be the same because you create something new with it. It's yourself. You're not the same. On the other side of creating something, whether it's scribbling a poem on a piece of paper and then throwing it out, or whatever, you're just not the same person once you've entered that portal.

48:00  
So tell us about where you are now, sure.

48:04  
So it's been four or five years since I've burned it down, my life has looked completely different since then, after I burned it down, is when I started putting that book together, and had a nice campaign to get that published, and then I decided to move to New York and make some new connections there. I loved introducing myself as a poet. In all the tech networking events, it was just this place of, you know, people are doing a lot of cool things and getting together. And in my journey, I also got the chance to speak at South by Southwest, and that was really just this kind of cool experience. And then, and it was cool because I got to really talk about authenticity and poetry and how to show up as yourself even when it's scary, and that kind of thing. It was really cool. And so now I'm working on creating that into a public speaking career so that I can find ways to my secret goal, of course, is to bring poetry into the workplace. And so I do custom poems. So I'll be interviewing whoever hires me about what their challenges are, and see what poems I can write to help create that middle ground, that nuance, that middle place, is really where I thrive. And so I love to open up that space. And dance has always been my first love. I don't think we've talked about dance yet. We did. We talked about improvisational dance in Detroit, which you and I worked on together, which was so fun, so I can't stop myself from dancing. There was a guy I once dated that was observing like Neil, and you live in a binary state of life, which is either you're dancing or you're stopping yourself from dancing. And so it's just a lot of dancers will say this, I have to move. I have to move. And so recently, after going through a period of time, I left New York City to move home to my father's house, because unfortunately, my mom passed away last year. So. Suddenly out of the blue, unexpected. So there was shock. It was grief. So one of the interesting things about having burned down my career, of course, I don't have a regular salary, but I have that flexibility to say what's important to me in this moment is to show up with my dad during the hardest year of his life and the hardest year of my life. And so we did it together, as awkward as it was, as difficult as is, to live in the house I grew up in, and waking up and not having mom here, it's been a difficult year. And as I was coming out of the grief, I was making a goal to do one thing joyful every day, which was a huge step for me. I was like, if I'm joyful, what if I forget my mom? What if I'm not honoring my mom, you know? And so it was just real cycle that I came a little bit out of. And in doing that, I applied for residence, artist residencies. And there was an artist residency for poets that I really liked in a very serious way. Applied for, like, here my credentials. The Washington Post wrote about my poetry. Here's this and put it together. Spend a lot of time working out, you know, how I would fit in. I thought I was a shoe in. And then after I submitted that, I still had, like, 45 minutes, 30 minutes left, and I had started putting together the dance residency application. It was at the same place. There were three residencies happening at the same time, musicians, dancers, writers and and so kind of in a feat of joy. I call it mischievous energy. That's what it feels like. But really, I think it's just joy. It feels mischievous to a South Asian woman who grew up, you know, very conservatively, like, Oh, I'm doing something bad. But really it was like, Oh, wow, wouldn't it be so fun? And the woman running it is a contemporary dancer. She's actually a post modern dancer, and she's a legend in her work. So I'm like, What are the chances that she would have someone who's not been trained? You know, I wasn't. I was spending a lot of time in corporate America, not really working on my dancing. And I certainly didn't learn to dance as a kid. So I don't have that background of knowing ballet, tap, all the things, but in what I was applying with so much joy, it almost was like, when I put that application together, I said, Hey, I live an improvisational life, like any kind of choreo, like I've kind of worked against it, and I live in the silence until there's an impulse to move, then I move my body to dance, and otherwise I don't. So choreo really isn't where I live. That's really hard for me. And she was inviting anyone who made it to the residency be part of a choreographed piece. So I was like, you know, being honest again, just like the corporate life, when I was like, hey, look, I've got rehearsals on Wednesdays. I'm like, hey, look, I've got this thing, and I'm a deep, deep improvisational worker. And I got in to the dance one, and I got rejected from the poetry one. And as soon as I got that I was like, Oh, thank God, because right now in my life, I want to be in a room full of dancers, because I just immediately connect like dancers when they talk about, oh, is your foot here or here? Like it turns me on. I love listening about my body, learning about my body, learning how it moves. And I just got back about two weeks ago, and it was definitely a breathtaking experience. And it feels like one of those miracle things. But at the time, I had promised myself to dance every day. I had, like, created this dance studio. I, like, cleaned out my baby sister's room to put in a dance floor, like, just over the carpet, like, kind of, you know, my way of doing it. And so I was already like, Okay, I'm a dancer. I'm dancing every day. I'm doing something joyful every day, and wow, wouldn't it be cool if, and I'm still processing the beauty of that experience, excellent.

53:29  
So I hear that you're in flow.

53:34  
I am, I am. And what's really interesting is my brain is starting to wonder, okay, I've not made a decision yet. I'm one of those people who talk about who talk about things before. I know, but it's starting to wonder, okay, so if I were to move back to New York or move to Philly or stay here, what if I filled my day with part time consulting work, and what I used to do in like a small chunk, like 10 hours a week, 20 hours a week, and do it on my own terms, so I'm not getting locked into being overgenerous in the workplace.

54:07  
Got it so anyone listening to this who needs somebody who can be in touch with the moment and help connect customers to solutions, and you need that somebody who's got that, like, that touch of magic, you know, to bring a room alive, please reach out to Neelam.

54:28  
That's right. That's right. Companies have hired me to onboard when clients are really angry, not just confused, but they're like, We want to break the contract, and then they become loyal customers. Because whatever the solution is, I can figure out why the customer is confused and hear your solutions. So onboarding, you know, where you have to sell to the customer after you've already sold to make them feel comfortable that this is a good decision. I really thrive there, but yeah, I would love to do a little bit of consulting, just to see what it's like to. Go into the workplace on my own terms, you know, after having burned it down. And yes, of course,

55:05  
this rebuilding, rebuilding from after burning it all down.

55:09  
Yeah, and it doesn't mean I have to do this forever, you know, I do plan to have a very creative life at the dance residency. I created a nine minute piece about facing your emotions, and I'm going to create a full concert piece out of that. So that is my, still my. It just changed the balance of time. Now, you know, cool.

55:27  
Where can people go to learn more about you and the work you will be doing?

55:33  
Yes, so I have, since I just got back from the dance residency, I haven't created much, but there is an element of dance in my on my website and on my Instagram. And so my Instagram is where I'm alive the most. So you can go to my Instagram. It's dance with Neelam. And that's dance with N, E, E, L, A, M, dance with Neelam. One word, all, one word, yeah. And my website is tailored poetry. And so if you're looking for speakers to talk about staying in the present moment so that we can have better outcomes. Well, you know, people are so stressed about outcomes that really the thing that gives us better outcomes is being present. And that's what I talk about. You can find more about my speaker real, and see my speaker real. I mean, on tailored poetry.com

56:19  
I talk about being present, being curious, being engaged in a moment. All the time with my clients, we're trying to negotiate through sticky situations, so you're the person who like embodies it, lives it to the max.

56:30  
Yeah, so that, like on the way to a business conference, we had to stop to dance and record it. And you did an amazing job with your creative vision for that as well

56:40  
new and thank you so much for your joyful genius and for your time and sharing your experience with us.

56:48  
It's always a pleasure to connect with you. Jamie, I'm so lucky to know you. Thank you so much.

56:55  
If you found this episode helpful, please leave a five star review on any of the podcasting platforms on which you are listening to this podcast. Past listeners have shared that these free workshops, free podcasts, have helped them get hired, get promoted and get paid more. Your review helps other people, other women, find the 100 plus free podcast episodes, and if you come on over to Jamie Lee coach.com that's spelled j, A, M, I, E, L, E, E, C, O, A, C, h.com, you can also access 100 plus free articles I've written on leadership, negotiation, confidence for the ambitious professional women. Until next time, please keep advocating for yourself and remember advocating for yourself is not selfish, it is an act of service. You.