The Foureva Podcast
Welcome to The Foureva Podcast, where we break barriers and redefine success!
Join host Jamar Jones, a dynamic entrepreneur, national speaker, and author of "Change Your Circle, Change Your Life," as he takes you on an extraordinary journey of inspiration and motivation.
In each episode, we bring you an impressive lineup of star-studded guests, each with a unique voice and a wealth of insights to share. From industry leaders to renowned experts, we uncover their secrets to success in personal, business, and marketing domains. Prepare to be captivated by their stories, strategies, and experiences that will empower you to reach new heights.
Whether you're an aspiring entrepreneur, a marketing professional, or simply seeking fresh perspectives on life and business, The Foureva Podcast is your ultimate destination. Discover the transformative power of changing your circle and unlocking your full potential. With each episode, we delve into the minds of the most influential voices in the industry, providing you with the tools and inspiration you need to overcome obstacles and achieve greatness.
Don't miss out on this dynamic podcast that will fuel your ambition, challenge your limits, and propel you toward success. Tune in to The Foureva Podcast and join a community of driven individuals who are ready to make an impact. Get ready to be inspired, motivated, and 'foureva' transformed!
The Foureva Podcast
Breaking Family Patterns to Build Stronger Leaders with Sylvia Lafair
What if your biggest leadership struggles didn’t start at work — but at home?
In this eye-opening episode of the Foureva Podcast, we sit down with Sylvia Lafair, award-winning leadership expert and author of Don’t Bring It to Work, to explore how family dynamics and childhood patterns shape who we become as leaders.
Sylvia shares the 13 hidden patterns that show up at work — from the Drama Queen to the Avoider — and how to transform them into strengths that fuel communication, teamwork, and growth.
✅ Learn how family patterns impact your leadership style
✅ Discover how to handle conflict and communicate effectively
✅ Shift from stress and reaction to awareness and transformation
✅ Become the kind of leader people actually want to follow
This conversation goes deep into personal development, emotional intelligence, and the power of self-awareness in leadership. If you’re ready to break patterns and elevate your potential, this one’s for you.
🎧 Tune in now and start transforming your past into leadership power.
And this gal was a scientist. She's brilliant. But they called and said, everybody's ready to mutiny. She's driving people crazy. And no matter what they do, it's never enough because she's always the best one. So when I talked with her, she said, Well, Sylvia, she said, they actually want to go home at seven o'clock at night. I said, tell me that's not true. Seven o'clock at night and they want to go home?
SPEAKER_01:What's up, everybody? We're back with another banger episode on the Forever Podcast. Uh, we got Sylvia in the building.
SPEAKER_00:What's going on? How are you doing? Oh, I'm great. Now that I'm with you, I'm even better.
SPEAKER_01:Awesome. Awesome. What so tell me what has your day been like today?
SPEAKER_06:Well, it's been problem solving and helping people get to their next level of their career and uh cleaning the kitchen.
SPEAKER_00:Busy day.
SPEAKER_01:We got a busy day. Um, so you you've been running your company for a very long time. Um I am so curious to learn about how has the coaching world changed from the time you first started till now.
SPEAKER_06:Well, it started from then the word coaching was only for football people.
SPEAKER_00:Right, right.
SPEAKER_06:Yeah, it didn't even it it's somewhere in the middle of this, because you know, my background is as a family therapist, yes, and um so what I was doing was therapy, and I never really liked the word because it was like, well, something's gotta be wrong with you. Coaching has a much more uplifting feel to it, yeah. I think so. When that came along, I thought makes sense, okay, I can join that group. Um, what I saw initially were people like me who had a gazillion years of training uh going into working, basically it was one-on-one in those days. Um and then I saw a lot of people grabbing because there's no certification, really. Yeah, quote, certificate. And um, I would talk to somebody who said, Well, I have a life coach, I have a career, I have a this, I have a that, and I'd say, So what are you learning? And I got the sense they needed to go deeper. So the people who were doing it before are still doing it, doing good job. And I think there needs to be a bit more training going on for people who take on helping other people in their lives.
SPEAKER_01:It's a big deal. So you think the access to becoming a coach is way like I mean, because anybody somebody could wake up tomorrow and call themselves a coach, but then they don't have any real experience or know how to how to actually coach people. Um, it's interesting, even like um in the word the the coaching word of like in sports. I mean, some people, yes, they they can go to school or um, but most of them like kind of just get started early and they have a passion for the game, and then they gotta mold into being a coach. Um, but at least they have a lot of experience, hopefully, coaching um in that sport before they call themselves a coach. So, how how um how do you identify a really good coach versus a really bad one?
SPEAKER_06:By the questions they ask, yeah, you know, I mean the the root for coaching is in the questions and not the telling. I mean, there are times over the years where I have seen the situation, and as an observer, it's so clear where to go, but I have to zip it, and it's not easy, it's not easy for anybody, but for noisy women, it's even harder, and I would have to say, Well, what do you think would happen if how do you think you could approach it when? And meanwhile, I'm thinking, quit the quit the job, yeah, yeah, because it's not gonna work, but I have it it's sort of the best coaches lead you to your own answers, yeah, that's true, that's true.
SPEAKER_01:They kind of they they just they set the path for you, and then they let the other person kind of discover it, and then as they're discovering it, you kind of um further um identify what what they're finding, and then you kind of just help them even a little bit more, but then it's all about them finding it um and asking the right questions. And what is the and as far as the really bad ones? Um, just this would be fun content. So, what what would you say to the to the really bad ones? Like, what advice are you would you give them? I mean, if let's say they've been coaching for a while, they really don't know what they're doing. Uh, maybe they they keep having a lot of turnover for clients because they can't keep anybody. Um, maybe they're not really getting results. What what would you tell those bad coaches out there?
SPEAKER_06:Well, I I would ask them what they want as an outcome, you know. I mean, everybody wants everybody to be happy and kind and good and all that kind of stuff, but I would ask them, it it's like being a Sherpa. Yeah, right. You know, I I've done some crazy climbing in my days, and I've always been happy. If somebody in front of me is saying, um, I suggest you be careful there.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_06:And if you didn't, it would be down the mountain you'd go. Yeah, it's it's it's I I would and I would ask them, I I also have some strong feelings. Look, none of us are perfect. I mean, I have some really good stories, not gonna share them, but I have some really good personal stories. And once my one of my daughters said, How can this is a really funny one? I was coming home from work and I have two daughters, and they were, I don't know, nine and eleven at the time. And I came in and and I said, Did you get this done and that done? And they didn't. So I got really mad and I was yelling at them. And they said, We are going to your office and telling what your clients what you're really like. And I said, have some candy and be quiet. What do you want? Don't tell anybody, but you know, it's really it's like uh having done some of your personal work on yourself, I think is critical to being a good coach. Yeah, I really think, yeah, and I'll tell you one more thing that quickly, when I was supervising in uh in the uh one of the uh medical schools uh family therapists, they had to do their own family chart. Makes sense, and some would come to me and say, you know, it's one thing to talk about them, I don't want to talk about me. And I say, then find another supervisor, because unless you can integrate and understand and have compassion for, yes, you know, you're you're gonna it's it's more textbook that way, yeah, yeah, 100%.
SPEAKER_01:And and what's what's the um what's your opinion on uh therapy versus coaching as far as what's the difference between the two?
SPEAKER_06:Well, you know, that's the same thing, management leadership, you know, you you can um I I can't I can't do that divide anymore. I think when you're involved with another human being, you want to get them as the Sherpa does to the top of the mountain and then get them back down safely. So it's the same thing with therapy uh and with coaching. I think in therapy, and I've created kind of a unique position in this where it's a both end. And the both end is what we learned in our original organization, which is the family, whatever constellation, you know, single parent, two parents, same-sex parents, even foster care from a young age. What your family constellation is, is your original organization, and then we grow up and we go to another organization, and it's called School First. And there are a lot of kids that that kind of show signs of being a rebel or being whatever, you know, a pleaser in school, and then we move into uh the phase of work. Now, what we learned in our original organization, the family, shows up in our present organization at work. Now, I didn't make that up, I just know how to report it.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I see it. Yes, and you told me an amazing story about that, too, of even how you got into this. Um, as far as it oftentimes comes from the from the first organization, from the family, because that's where a lot of our um our traumas are at. That's where a lot of our um things that like honestly were things that were taught, things that were uh learned during that time period, and we're just transferring that over into work. And some of us haven't done the work on ourselves to even work on that a little further or figure out what that even means, or what was that back there that I experienced, and then they're having these trigger points at work and then not knowing where it's coming from. Can you just tell that uh story really briefly on um that transition that that you had from um from uh family practice as far as with therapy into the uh corporate space?
SPEAKER_06:Well, it has two phases. One is married, raising my kids, and I got divorced. So um it happens. Okay, I worked on it, I understood, or at least I do now why then I didn't, but I do now, and uh so I wasn't gonna do therapy anymore because I figured I can't keep my own family together, so what good am I gonna be for other people? But I began to morph into more of the human potential movement, you know, helping people become the best they can be. And um, one evening we were doing a program for parents whose adolescent kids were driving them nuts, so the room was full. And we were talking about, you know, communication styles and how to handle conflict uh, you know, between the generations. And some man walked up to me at the end and I thought he was going to talk about a son or a daughter. And he looked at me, he said, Will you come work with my senior leadership team? I mean, it was like so far out of left field. I looked at him, I said, Why? They're fighting. And I said, So what? He said, But so you work with people who have to get along. Families, it's better if they get along. Yes, they have to get along, and you know, I thought, well, that kind of made sense. So I went in and did what I knew how to do in terms of listening to each one and helping to integrate the thoughts and getting them to talk with each other differently, and it worked well.
SPEAKER_01:So he liked it, so he had me stay, and then he told a friend who told a friend, and all of a sudden I thought, I'm in the business world, it sort of just happened, just like that, just like that, just like that, and you're and you're and you've been doing this for for a long time, and and what uh I I gotta ask as far as all the companies that you've ever worked with all these years, what is the one thing, if you had to pinpoint it down, what is the one thing that they're oftentimes missing within their leadership or even their in their management, like that's hindering them from growing and scaling their business?
SPEAKER_06:Yeah, it's how to handle conflict. Oh, exclamation point. You know, it's it's they're either it's my way or the highway, or it's I'm so good, I'll say yes to everything. So we've got the extremes, neither of them work, yeah. And in the middle is where we have to learn how to communicate more effectively. So you you can't separate conflict and communication. There they sleep in the same bed, yeah.
SPEAKER_01:100%. 100%. And and can I add a um another one in there? What about like, and this kind of goes into communication, but what about negotiation? How important is that?
SPEAKER_06:Oh, I think it's very important. I I think you have to listen. I think there are times that people have to do a hard line, you know. I'll use a family for an example. You're not gonna say to a nine-year-old who says, I think I'm gonna take the car and go go uh around the neighborhood. I mean, the word no does exist. And it doesn't mean so there are times that you know you have to say it's not my way or the highway, it's this is the appropriate response for what the situation is, right? Um, but negotiation, it's it's like how else are we gonna win? Yeah, if I tell you you have to do XYZ and you're not happy with it, and I am, you're gonna be gone, right? I'm gonna have to get somebody else who go through the same period till I finally have to say, is it do I have a piece to play in this?
SPEAKER_01:Yes, yes, it's called a pattern, and we gotta get out of that pattern, people. I mean, if you if you're if you have any inkling of of uh what sylvia is saying in your organization, like get out of that pattern. And so how is is there a process? Is there is there a framework, is there something that you can give us how to handle that conflict?
SPEAKER_06:Well, thank you for asking. Of course I do. And if anybody wants to read more in-depth, it's in the book, don't bring it to work. Breaking the family patterns that limit success. Because, and also in in it's well, it's in all my books because it's so basic, but that one gives a really strong uh view of what to do. We we need to begin to listen differently, and we need to begin to respond differently, you know. And we we have the patterns. I came up with 13 of the most common patterns that show up at work that come from family. So I'm not gonna do all 13, it's too many.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, give us a couple, give us a couple.
SPEAKER_06:Well, I'll start with me. Okay. Bonafide drama queen. And here's where how this began. And I began to look at the at the at the essence of what goes on at work. I can get really annoyed and upset and pound my hand on the desk and be a real nuisance. I could use other words, but that's what but I I I learned it in my childhood. I have an older brother who was king of the hill. He was the boy, he was gonna become a doctor, and I was just the cute little girl. It's like if my brother said tomorrow's Thursday, my parents thought it was the most brilliant thing they ever heard. And if I said, Oh, tomorrow's Thursday, they go, That's right, go play. So I learned if I wanted attention, I had to do a hissy fit, and I became a master to get attention. I became a master at making a lot of noise and you know, crying and you know, slamming doors and whatever I had to do at the moment. Okay, that's the drama, Queen or King. So here's what happened one day. I mean, you you it in threes. I want your whoever's listening to know if it happens three times, it's a pattern. Yeah, one time it could be an accident, two times it could be a whoops, three times it's a pattern.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, okay.
SPEAKER_06:So this was a day I was working in in the workplace right in the beginning. I hadn't pulled all this together yet, I was just observing it. And we were in a meeting, and somebody said something that, trust me, was really, really stupid. And being young and being not so schooled, I put my hand down on the desk and I went, now that doesn't make any sense. And I saw a few people sort of rolling their eyes, and I saw somebody say to something, Oh, she gets so dramatic. And I thought, what do they know? Meeting's over, afternoon. I go to another meeting, variations on a theme. I knew not to pound my hand on the desk, but I put my hands up like this, going, wait, wait, wait, that doesn't make sense. That's not right. And it was done noisily. And somebody as I was walking out said, Sylvia, oh my god, stop being so dramatic twice. Okay, remember I said the third time's a time. Yeah, that evening, um, my kids were in college at the time. One of my daughters called, and she started telling me something, and I went, Julie, that's absolutely ridiculous, and blah blah. She said, Mom, you get so dramatic that there's no room to talk. How about if I call you later? Clink, and she was like, It was yeah, which was rare, but she did, but it was like uh throwing um uh ice water on me three times in one day, and then I started to do the deep dive to say, well, where did this start? And it hit me after a period of time that it came from the only way I got hurt as a kid was to make a lot of noise. Now, here's the piece of this if all I did was figure these patterns out with no way to transform them, it would be nice and interesting and not worthy because I didn't want to go to meetings where I'd say, Hello, my name is Sylvia, and I'm a drama queen.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, right.
SPEAKER_06:Hello, Sylvia, you're a drama queen. And that's you can keep it. It was like I had to say, what happens? What's the reverse? And the reverse of a drama queen is a storyteller. Now, here's where I put it together. When you're doing the drama, it it's it's actually fun. I mean, you get a lot of adrenaline, you get a lot of attention, good, bad, and different. Right, yeah, but it has no direction when you navigate to take that and put it into good stories, then it has a purpose. You still can be dramatic, you can still tell a story with a lot of verbs and you know energy, and you'll still get the adrenaline rush, but it has a purpose. So I spent a big chunk of my career listening to stories and understanding which stories went into people where they could hear them and use them and say, I never my key is if somebody says to me, I never thought of it that way before, I know it's a success. So I'm waiting for you to say that.
SPEAKER_01:No, it's it's really eye-opening. I mean, the even that, even the story you just told, it's very eye-opening, and also the uh the correlation between what you were experiencing and then your your uh childhood as far as like just that mechanism. I'm even thinking about even to myself about not necessarily the drama, drama queen um side, but when I was really struggling, so I I have this um I have this ability where I get real passionate about things that I care about, right? And the passion is like sometimes I I can't control it, it's just like I'm super passionate. And this is about anything that I'm because I'm like an all-in or nothing guy, so I it's gotta be all or nothing. So this is uh a long time ago when I was working in IT. Um, I got my first kind of uh went from a technician into a team lead role, and unfortunately, I have my boss got changed to a different manager, and this manager was a micromanager, and she was terrible, it was absolutely terrible. But it was the first time that I ever got hit with a brick wall where I was the idea guy, so I loved ideas, I love to push forward ideas. And uh, if I was really passionate about it, I'm like, Yeah, we should do this. And I'm like, I'm just problem solving, right? I'm just a solution, solution, solution. And the problem is I kept running to a brick wall with her because she didn't want nothing, she didn't want to hear anything about it, nothing. And then and then I started getting written up at work. The first time ever I was to get gotten written up. I was working at probably for probably about four four and a half years. Wow, no write-ups. Uh, I think one one write-up because I was late though, but that was my that was my bad. Um but fast forward and now got one write-up, another write-up. I'm like, dude, what's going on? Until I took this one seminar about how to deal with difficult people, and the and and what happened is uh my communication was wrong, so I was trying to have all my ideas pushed forward, but she wanted everything to be her idea, and maybe it was some childhood trauma, maybe there was some childhood stuff for her with her family that maybe like she was put down so much. Now, when she's in this leadership power role, she's like, I want the ideas to come for me because I want the recognition. So maybe so you got me thinking a little bit on that piece where I'm like, Okay, that's something that I struggle with, but I actually turned that around because I started to make things her idea, and then behold, then she just was like, Oh man, so we should do blah blah blah.
SPEAKER_00:I'm like, she literally just said what I just said, but yeah, great idea, great idea, and I didn't get any credit, it only it only was lasted like that for about six or seven months.
SPEAKER_01:Then she got fired, which I was super happy about, you know, just to kind of end the the story on that climax. But uh, but that was a big learning lesson for myself, you know. And I'm kind of thinking about those situations that you just said. It's like there, I think everything kind of goes back to family. Um, or if your communication style is a certain way, it might not be the right communication style for that particular person.
SPEAKER_06:You got it. It's like what I teach is we have to meet people where they are, not where we want them to be. You know, and if we can get them to if we can help meet them where they are, which is also good coaching, then the opportunity for change comes. So it sadly with this gal, the next level dialogue would have been something like this, because as you were talking, she fits the the uh pattern of a superachiever. I call it the me, me, me guy or gal. Yeah, you know, and I just wrote the blog about this, which is interesting because it's like somebody says, Well, I just did a half a marathon, and um I came in third, and the superachiever will say, 'Well, I've done 12 marathons.
SPEAKER_00:I'm always going.' Those people just get on my nerves. Like, why can't you just be happy for the other person? Like, why do you got a one up it?
SPEAKER_06:Like, why? Well, that goes back to, and there are various reasons for that. For some people, they were what what this is back, it's a therapy term, but it's still usable. The designated person. In other words, somebody in the family was designated to be the big success, and they got, you know, um everything extra. So when they grow up, they feel like they've got to do that. Yeah, sometimes it's to make up for some sadness in the family, you know. Uh, somebody who got sick really young, and uh a parent got sick, and the child has to do the dream for the parents, and they have to be the best. And one that was very dramatic for me, this is a very big uh uh corporation, and this gal was a scientist, she's brilliant, but they called and said, Everybody's ready to mutiny, she's driving people crazy, and no matter what they do, it's never enough because she's always the best one. So when I talked with her, she said, Well, Sylvia, she said they actually want to go home at seven o'clock at night. I said, Tell me that's not true. No, seven o'clock at night, and they want to go home. She said, But we have to discover the cure for whatever.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_06:And I said, We she said, Well, it's my stuff. They're doing the work. And then I found out that as a child, her father, who was a doctor, stood up for whatever he did and lost his job. And he could never get a job. He didn't do anything illegal, but word got around and he couldn't get another job. And she said, I knew I was going to become a doctor and make sure the name she never got married, but she kept her name from her family. She said that that name shines. And I said, Well, it may, it may not, but I said, unless you start looking at your team and you know, sharing with them what needs to be done in a way, and maybe they could even go home at five. Oh my god. Yeah, oh, or work from home, yeah, whatever. And and it took her, it took her a little bit of time to see that she was she was not doing her life, she was trying to do her father's life.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, her father's life.
SPEAKER_06:Wow, and that happens a lot, it happens more than you realize.
SPEAKER_01:This stuff is deep.
SPEAKER_06:Well, it's deep, but it's doable. That's yeah, it's so exciting. That's why you know, I I just don't get bored.
SPEAKER_01:I don't think I don't think she should ever get bored with this this line of work. It's it's it's crazy because you're you're having this perfect mold within like the family therapy that you were doing, and then within the corporate space. Um and it's like a perfect connection between the two. And and I know you probably can't, you know, say this is therapy when you're going and coaching, you know, organizations, but but I mean, if you can shed some light on this kind of you know, this past and and look at that and say, okay, and let's identify that, and then how do we work through it? I mean, it's just so it's so powerful because you're probably not just changing their work life, you're probably changing also their home life.
SPEAKER_06:Well boy, did you just lead me into a very good sentence? So one day we we do a program, we used to do it um in person, but after COVID, we we put it online called Total Leadership Connections, and it's a four uh it was uh a four-module program. We we met four times over the course of six months. Okay, now it's online, and you can do each module of the four online and get some coaching with it. It's really good, but anyway, we were doing it in with a group, and the groups were always maxed at around 1820 max because we would take people deep. Anyway, one day I get a call from somebody's wife, and you know, I did the automatic thing we do. I said, Is everything okay? And she said, Yes. I said, Well, how can I help you? She said, Well, I'm just calling to say thank you. I said, For what? She said, I don't know. Okay. She said, But Sylvia, he is so much nicer at home, and they had three kids. And she said, uh, two were teenagers and one was a little. She said, The kids said dad asks better questions, and he's so much kinder. Now in the work, he had to do his personal work about why he had become, I call it, a persecutor, you know, the boss and an aka bully boss. And you just after he, I mean, he resisted it initially, but then he finally began to share about his relationship with his father, which was not a good one, and how he had taken over in the house as the oldest kid, and he was the boss. He took that to work and he would. I mean, we did a meeting once, Tamar, that I mean, at that moment I thought, I just want to go sell sweaters at Nordstrom. I'm not doing this anymore. In the middle of this meeting where their conflict was over the top, and it was a high-level sales team. This guy said, Well, I'd like to say something. And I thought, please don't. But his mouth was already open, and he looked at the group, he looked around and he looked at me, and it was out of my hands at that point. And he said, I want you to know that some of you I know are really upset with the way I'm leading you, and you think I'm too strong-willed. He said, What I want you to know is I'm the boss, and there's the door, and you can always vote by walking out with your feet, and that moment was Nordstroms, you're gonna get a call.
SPEAKER_00:It's probably easier.
SPEAKER_06:You sell something, and if they don't like it, they take it back to the refund place, they don't even bother you. So right, but anyway, we sat there and the room was frozen, and they're all looking at me, and I'm thinking, What do I do now? So I did, and I'm giving this to anybody who's watching this who's a coach. This is the best thing you can do. I said, How about if we take a 10-minute break?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, after that, yeah. You you can't really repair anything. There it the damage has already been done.
SPEAKER_06:Oh my god, I pulled him into a room and I said, What did you want as an outcome from this? And that's the good sentence. Not for what is I want for an outcome. My outcome is everybody is nice and good and creates and does good work and makes good money and blah, blah, blah. I said, What do you want? He said, Well, they're not listening to me. I said, Who would listen to you with what you just said? Right. I'm ready to leave. So I said, The difference between a bully boss or a persecutor is your finger's going like this, you're pointing it. You, you, you, you, you. And I said, the transformed persecutor bully boss is a visionary leader, and they're pointing the way to the future. You take your pointer finger, that's the finger you use. It's the only one that's allowed here, and instead of pointing it out, you point it up and you learn how to become a visionary leader. And he said, How do I do that? I said, Well, you're gonna have to start looking at that anger with your father that's that's showing up at work, you know. He didn't listen to you, and you think your team doesn't listen to you, so you're responding the exact way you did to him with them, doesn't work.
SPEAKER_01:Wow, this stuff is this is crazy. So it it definitely makes sense why you've been able to do this for so long, um, and create the impact that you've been able to create. How do you now pass this off to because you have other coaches, yeah, as well? How did how did you have the confidence and also the ability to delegate this? Because the way on how you're doing it, you're even changing my mind right now about some stuff. So I'm like, okay, maybe I should think a little bit more about this, or maybe, and and I'm kind of reflecting about a lot of different moments, even from other people. I'm even thinking about other people that I know where I'm like, oh, wait, that was maybe there's maybe a connection there. But how do you how do you now take all the knowledge that you have and also your way to storytell that you've learned, and your way to articulate this? How do you now trust other coaches to do that for your clients when you may or may not be in the room?
SPEAKER_06:Well, trust is the word, but everybody that has become a coach with us, and we don't have thousands of them, you know, you can't just pay money and become a coach, it doesn't have to do the the the primary thing is you have to do your own personal work, and we have a model, and it's interesting. Here, I'm gonna show you. Yeah, you see this bird, yes. Okay, this is called a Sankofa bird, and this is from Ghana, and this was a gift from one of my clients in Ghana, and Sankofa means clear the past to free the present. So you can't stay in the present and say, well, the past is over, because it's not unless you clear it, you know, and so we created this model where we do a thing called a Sankofa map. Now, the bird that which is part of the the there was a film, it was about slavery. Oh my god, it was must have been in the late 90s, called Sankofa. And it was a very powerful film by a man named Holly Jirame, I think was his name. And it it it it had its moment, but I fell in love with the term Sankofa, clear the past to free the present, because it's required. You've got to clean, you know, the garbage, you've got to clean out the old memories, they're not gonna go away, but you can reframe them. And the thing with this bird that's interesting is this bird has its neck turned on its back, which birds can't do, so I've been told. But this bird has its turned to the back and it's picking up an egg, which it will bring into the present. And the egg is what's left from the past that's still fertilized and can be used in the present. So you're not throwing everything away, and it's a very wise, old, deep myth from Ghana.
SPEAKER_01:Um, wow. And so every all the coaches go through that um that process, yeah. And then they so they're learning on how to even deal with the with their own past to then help um be present in a lot of the calls and trainings and etc. with with the companies and in the individuals.
SPEAKER_06:Absolutely, and then of course, we we do uh they they have supported and been uh co-leaders in the when we were doing, I mean, it is sad and good at the same time that COVID was the time that said, okay, we're not doing the um in-house anymore. Partly because we had a retreat center that we used in the east coast in Pennsylvania, and it was sold. So that's the story, but it's in the book, it's in the Don't Bring It to Work book, how to do it. It's better to do, and now what I'm doing is the coaches are doing it one-on-one. That was in a group setting, but they're doing it one-on-one, and I'm still doing it. If you ever want to do that, you can get me. It's not easy to get to me anymore, but you can get to me. Just because I like your laugh and I think you're cute.
SPEAKER_00:I'll take it. Hey, I I've learned in life you got to take all the wins you can get. That's good. That's good. I'll I'll take it.
SPEAKER_01:I'll take it. Uh no, and and has there been any um any moments, I guess, with the with the coaches um that you've had to either do some repair work, or um like has there been any kind of uh challenges that you've had with the coach? Because I there's there's several, there's a lot of people within our audience that either has a coaching business and they're trying to grow it, or they now are at the scalability of it, and there's even people that have like 60 plus coaches, um, and they're looking, they're always looking for ways because people is like the number one problem when it comes to scaling a business. There's always operations, there's marketing, there's branding, there's all these other things. It's people 100-110. It's the people. So how has there been challenges that have come your way? And how did you overcome those challenges with the coaches?
SPEAKER_06:Well, I would cry. Yeah, I bet I'd shake my head. No, the way the way it would work is with the coaches, and of course that happens. And when you're you know, when you're learning, you're gonna trip and fall. It's when you get up and how you handle with elegance, which is an important word because elegance means do it in as short, as short a way as possible to make it good, it's not big and long. Um, I've had people have to say, what is it about the person you're working with that has made you feel less than, or made you so angry, or made you so it's it's kind of, you know, I just did this two days ago with a gal who was a director, and she'd got a position raise in in a new company as a VP, but she didn't have the skills to be a VP. This was me with her. She's the feedback I got, and they said, please, will you work with her? The feedback is she was like a dictator. So I said, Well, when you ask people how to do something, what do you say? And she said, Well, I say, Well, this needs to be done by Thursday, um, have it on my desk. And I said, She said, But that's the truth, Sylvia. I said, So I try to explain to her, and you do this with the coaching, the way I'm taking people is deeper, but it it's life-changing for the coaches too. I mean, I've gotten that feedback, and you know, I will probably next year start a um a session uh or a series of sessions for coaches who want to learn how to put this process in what they're doing. Because without it, it's it's it's it's not full enough, yeah, I don't think. But that's but anyway, so this gal said, well, this person's there and I'm here. And I said, Do you understand that in that empty space, just like even with us right now, even though we're you know online, there's an empty space between us and it's full, it's filled, and it's the questions, and so I helped her. I said, What if instead of saying I need I need this done by, you say, help me figure out together how we can get this done by Thursday. Here's my part. What is your part? I said, So it's inclusive, yeah. I mean, that's that's the piece. So some of the things, I mean, I have a series of maybe one-liners, okay, and I'm gonna tell everybody who's on here I'm giving this one away than I should, because nobody's working for it, but it's when people and I don't understand this, I just know it's true. When somebody is saying something to you, you know, I really am angry with my boss about XYZ, and you say, What is it that he does or she does, and they say blah blah blah blah blah. Instead of then responding to exactly what's said, here are my magic words, they're bankable. You say, Tell me more, and then you zip it.
SPEAKER_01:Tell me more, tell me more.
SPEAKER_06:I am telling you when I found this years and years ago and started working with it because it's going down into the deeper parts of I don't know where it goes. Yeah, our heart, our head, our brain.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, you're you're spot on. You're spot on that. Tell you, tell me more is so powerful. It it's it's the same kind of principles of the of the five whys like keep asking why until you know the by the fifth time, you're gonna get to a level deeper than the first why. Um, and then um we we interviewed, I got to interview, uh, do an awesome interview with uh Jarek Robbins, and that's uh Tony Robbins' son. Yeah, and uh it was the interview's absolutely incredible. But he said that the biggest thing is for people is the deep work, like sometimes people need to stop, listen, and just and just be in a place and do deep work and keep asking why, keep asking tell me more again and again and again until you get to such a deep level where you get to the root of something, and then you're really gonna figure out something. And oftentimes, people, especially leaders, we oftentimes try to solve problems quickly because we're like, okay, all right, this is it's like uh it's like a checklist, and and then and then somebody a team member brings an issue, it's like okay, tell me, okay, well boom, let me answer that real quick and like get on to the next thing. But you gotta take time in those conversations because you're answering those things quickly, but you're not answering the right problems.
SPEAKER_06:You're just let me let me let me take this and give an example. It's really important because the reason we want to resolve this stuff quickly on one level is to diminish our anxiety, yeah, 100%.
SPEAKER_01:Yep.
SPEAKER_06:So we're in a meeting, and there was a guy who will remain nameless who used to be in the NFL. He's a big guy, and uh he and somebody else in in the team, there were about 15 of them, I guess, and we were meeting for two days, and they were in it. Okay. And um, so I did what I offered your anybody who's I said, Why don't we take a break? That's my other uh tell me more.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, let's take a break.
SPEAKER_06:So I pulled him over and he was he said, We are taking so long to get a resolution to whatever the problem was. It was a business problem, you know. Should we sell 20 of these or two million of them? It was that kind of stuff. And he said, and this one gal is in the way of it. I said, Well, how did you feel? That's my F-word. How did you feel when she was? He said, I could feel my stomach starting to go, and I was, and he said I was ready to tackle her.
SPEAKER_02:Wow.
SPEAKER_06:So I said, Well, the anxiety, your anxiety, it was pretty obvious in the room. And I said, We can't solve the problem yet. And I thought he was ready to kill me. He was furious. So I said, Do me a favor. Oh, then he said we were at the retreat center. He said, Um, I want to go to the gym. I said, Well, we have, you know, a stairmaster, we have an exercise bike, that's about it. He said, How far is the gym? I said, No, it's a half hour away, it won't work. So I said, How about? Remember, he's talking about anxiety and having to solve problems quickly. So there was a big pond in the uh area outside. I said, Why don't you walk slowly around the pond? He looked at me like I had two heads. He said, Are you out of your mind? I was in the NFL. We didn't walk. We ran or we tackled.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_06:You know, I said, Well, so it's time to do it differently. Patterns, you know, he had a pattern of get it done quickly. So I said, just humor me, just do it. So, anyway, we come back in the room and I said, Well, I'm kind of curious to the group, uh, are you ready to solve the problem or do you want to keep talking? And he said, I think we should keep talking. And I thought, I wonder what he was drinking or smoking or I was curious, and I said, Why? Why do you after you were so upset, you wanted to solve it so quickly? Why are you saying now we should talk more? And he basically said, Because I know we have to go deeper, and walking, and he shared with the group how he resisted taking that slow walk rather than pumping it up at the gym. So we have to learn to look at the opposite, but most of us we want the solution so quickly we don't give it time to go deeper, right?
SPEAKER_01:That's really interesting.
SPEAKER_06:Take a deep breath, let it go deeper.
SPEAKER_01:It's it's it's taking it's disruption of the patterns. Sounds like the the name of the game. So identifying the patterns, how do I disrupt them? And then basically looking at yourself of like you're doing the deep work of it's probably either family or something personal that should maybe a past thing, it can be cultural too, or cultural, yeah. That's true too. Yeah, cultural, and then and then applying the necessary steps to start to slowly either correct or identify. Some of it probably is just identifying and knowing that that that's a uh a routine or a pattern for you, and then it's about slowly working on it and kind of getting out of that habit because you got an A plus for that.
SPEAKER_06:That was very well said, yes.
SPEAKER_01:That's what I'm that's that's how I interpreted this.
SPEAKER_06:Well, we call it the the way out. So out O U T O is to observe. Remember, I said it took three times one day for me to finally get the little drama queen stuff out of go. Then uh it's understand, so it's out, understand, which is I had to go back and say, where the heck is this coming from? I mean, I wasn't thinking about you know, that my brother was king of the hill while I'm doing this in the business setting. But I had to go back and look at my Sankofa map, the map that I had done, you know, years before. And I said, Oh yeah, my brother, whatever he said, he's still sorted that way, but he'll listen to me a little bit more now.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, that's good.
SPEAKER_06:And then T, so it's observe, understand, and then you have to do the heavy lifting, which is what you just talked about to transform it, to transform it, and that means sometimes you say, I really want to go, because the old pattern is so you it's comfortable.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, yeah, super comfortable.
SPEAKER_06:Yeah, I mean, it kept us alive and here all that time, yeah. You know, so and then you have to you have to work it. You can have a a friend who will say, Oh, you did it again, or you know, there's lots of trips that tip tips and tricks to keep doing this, but it takes for a pattern to change, it's not a one one-off, it takes time, and you really have to pay attention to it. Yeah, but the pattern, this is the other piece, is for me, is in doing the earlier work, the the family work. If there are rifts in the family to see how they can be healed, sometimes they can be, sometimes they can't, but if you do your part, that's all you can do, and then you're free.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, yeah, because you kind of say state your peace. Uh I I actually like like like the way that you said it, do your parts, then state your peace because state your peace.
SPEAKER_00:Some people might be like, All right, I'm gonna go in there and I'm gonna say it, and I'm I'm out.
SPEAKER_06:That's it, that's exactly what happened. Well, let me the the guy who who had who had said, you know, the head of this big sales team, you know, I'm the boss, there's the door. Yeah, I finally had him. He had no relationship with his father since he was 12. And we don't need to go into the details, it was just difficult. And I said, Well, maybe it's time for you to reconnect with him. No, I don't want to. I said, Well, think about it. And if the intention is there to get past this, maybe that'll help. And he called me a few days later. He said, This is creepy. I said, Why? He said, My aunt called me yesterday and said, Your father is in a nursing home in Las Vegas and he wants to talk to you before he dies. I mean, even I got creeped out.
SPEAKER_00:Oh, wow.
SPEAKER_06:He he went and he met with his father. I mean, we we walked worked on the uh the communication of you know what he was going to say and not to push it. You know, his father was ill and elderly now and so forth and so on. Um, but to find out what the missing pieces, if there were any, from his puzzle, his life puzzle, and where they fit, which is the Sankofa map stuff that we do.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_06:And his father said to him, I know you think I abandoned the family, but he said, when your mother and I split, she said, I want you to stay out of this so I can finish raising Michael without you getting involved in the middle of it. Oh wow, he said, I did that out of respect for her. Now that went into his head so differently. Yeah, and then how did it play out at work? The whole group won awards for most sales, and he got a promotion.
SPEAKER_00:Wow, yeah, that's incredible. Yeah, that's incredible.
SPEAKER_06:But it was the piece of the puzzle that was keeping him stuck. We all have it, and if we can look at it, it's not let me see how to put this, it's not so dramatic, other than the way I do things, but it's not so dramatic when you when I somebody calls me and they say, wait till you hear this. I never thought of it that way before. I know that we're going for the gold, yeah. And that's where I think coaching can be the most successful.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, that's and that's incredible. I did not realize so. When I when I uh had my notes prepped for this call, I did not realize we were gonna go this deep um into this element of it, but I think this is gonna be this is so impactful for the audience because not only do we talk about frameworks and and the processes, but we have real life examples. Um, you actually walked us through several different um types, I would I would call these like uh types or traits that people might be experiencing or have experience from other people, and they can start to kind of piece. And you said there was like 13 of these that you have.
SPEAKER_06:13.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, yeah. We gotta get the book for that, right? Say what we got to get the book for that, right? The 13 steps.
SPEAKER_06:Yeah, you can get that book, or you can get in invisible stress. I I wrote invisible stress during uh COVID, because every time the phone rang and I said hello, somebody would say, I am so stressed. Yeah, okay. So I wrote a short, shorter book, it doesn't have the Sankofa map in it, but it does show. I think I did this with you when we talked about being on the program, but yeah, well, ask it for you, don't have to answer this now. But you know, if you're on a fence and if you're getting a lot of people annoying annoying you, there's a natural way most of us will either shout it out the response or stuff it down. Yeah, you don't have to say what you did, you know. We already know what I do is shout it out on the side of the the the map, um where the it's called Freakoutville, and it's very noisy there, and we see it in our culture all the time. Yeah, the other side, the stuff it downers, are in Zombieville, and it's very quiet there. Neither side is the best place to be. So part of the coaching and the work is to bring people to the middle place, which is the safe stress zone, and that's where you practice safe stress. Yes, you practice safe stress, it's good for you, it's good for me, it's good for the planet, it's good for everybody. Get that protection, people, get that protection, but that's where you say I don't have to scream, or I don't have to, and a lot of people tend to stuff it down, yeah. Because as kids, they weren't either listened to or they were just sent to their room, or they got a whack on the side of their head and they learned to be careful, yeah. And then you see it at work when I work with people and I say, Well, why can't you tell your boss that or your supervisor that? And they go, Oh, you can't do that. I said, You can do it respectfully and say, I'd like you to hear how I feel about whatever just happened, right? And then I'll say, You don't push this stuff. I mean, you're not doing a deep therapeutic lie on the couch kind of thing, but you can say, Where in your childhood, if you want to tell me, and you don't have to, people don't what did you do? You know, when you were upset, how did you handle it? And I say, more people than not would stuff it down, yeah.
SPEAKER_01:You know, yeah, and they're in Zombieville, yeah. I I can just see I don't know if you already have this, but I just see like uh an awesome like illustration picture of like Zombieville and then Freakoutville, and then like this like harm harmonious place, like in the middle or something like that. That's like glowing, and it's like that safe space. Um that I just see this picture, so I you might have to hire a illustrator or something to put that picture together for you because I think it would just resonate with so many people.
SPEAKER_03:Perfect.
SPEAKER_01:Um, you know, with those two things because that it's very uh I can just see it, like I could see the the the imagery of that, which is uh yeah, man, I'm in Zombieville, man. I I feel like I feel like early on in my life I was in um freak outville, huh? And then I transitioned to Zombieville, but um always seeking the middle is is kind of where I'm at. But I definitely earlier on I I was freak out all the time. I definitely I I had anger issues, all this other stuff, and then I learned how to deal with anger, but because I've seen the other side, I now I'm in Zombieville. Does that make sense?
SPEAKER_06:It makes sense, but you have the capacity to be, you know, in the safe stress zone. I mean, you're you're very eloquent in in in your language and thinking things through.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I would say I'm I'm I'm in the middle more than not now, but there are definitely moments where I think I'm in Zombieville. But I'm trying to, you know, it's but I can I I'm now in the place though I can identify though when I am in Zombieville, and I just have to like work my way up to that middle place. Um, but yeah, this is this is really good. This is really good. I think the audience learned a ton from this. So you have a ton of books. People go just go buy every one of her books. Um, like you need to. You need to because when you finish one, you're gonna want to read the next. So go buy all of all of her books. I'm sure she's got some stuff coming out soon um in the future. So just stay tapped in. Um, Sylvia, where can where can people find and connect with you directly if they want to um they have any questions or they want to seek out your services? How can they get in touch with you?
SPEAKER_06:Well, the easiest way is just to email me at Sylvia with a Y, S Y L V I A at C E Options. It's C E O P. T-I-O-N S. And the name of our company, no, we don't sell electricity, is Creative Energy Options, which is CEO for short.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. No electricity sales going on around here.
SPEAKER_06:We do raise energy and it's yes. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:100%. Well, thank you.
SPEAKER_06:You know, I I love that. I love when people reach out. And even if it's a lot of people, my nature is to respond personally. Yeah. You know, and um, and I want to acknowledge you. And you have the best laugh. So yay, you.
SPEAKER_00:Thank you.
SPEAKER_06:But you're you're doing really good work in bringing a lot of things to people that that are needed in a way that they can integrate easily. You know, you're you're just you're just you're just a guy. Right. I mean, you know, it's it's you're you ask questions, you share about yourself. Um, um I just want to acknowledge that.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, thank you. Thank you. Yeah, I've been I've been doing this a long time. Um, and I know one thing that I'm frustrated about with other people that uh give out information, it's not easy to implement, you know, like you you kind of you get a lot of this info, and you're like, okay, okay, okay, sounds good, sounds good. But what do I do next? And so I think everything that I do in my life, I in anybody I talk with, any content that I put out, I'm like, what are the actionable steps that somebody can apply in their life? So that way they can start to see a little bit of change, and then you know, we we can always go deeper, but I think it takes somebody to almost to get it's almost like when you go to the food court back in the day. Um, and and you got the Chinese restaurant, they go here's the taste test, here's the taste test. Like, we need we need a little taste test first, you know, and then and then once we're like, okay, actually, I want a little bit more of that, and then we get into more of that. So, um, and I think you've done just that. Like, this this podcast episode is absolutely incredible. Once it releases, I'm definitely gonna shoot this over to some people because they need to hear it, they they need to hear this stuff. Um, and so this is this is absolutely incredible. Thank you so much for for being on the podcast, taking out the time. Um, and for everybody listening, watching, please like, comment, subscribe, share this episode out with people. Um, this is just so impactful, especially if you're a leader in organization, like do the work that Sylvia is talking about, do the work, and then re-listen to this podcast and just see on elements and things that you need to look into in your own self, and also maybe patterns that you have. Um I think that's a really easy thing for people to do is just look back maybe in the past month. What are people constantly people people saying things about you, good or bad, or indifferent? And then what patterns have you done continuously, but are you still not happy with the end result or the outcome? Well, then that might be time to have some self-reflection and make some changes. Um, and I think that's just just so important. Anything you want to add on to that last piece and and and uh identifying the the patterns um that we have. Is there is there any other um uh kind of tidbits or or tips or tricks that people can help to identify if anybody would like um a list of the 13 without having to read a book they're gonna get they're gonna get the here's the deal they have to email me, they have to email me at Sylvia at CEOption.
SPEAKER_06:You can go on the website, which is www.ceop-t-i-o-n s dot com. There's a lot of great stuff in the blog, but the the thing that for me is really, really important is of the 13 patterns, one or two of them I call it sticky. Well, will you say, yeah, that's more like me. So I'm gonna just tell tell a few more very quickly. Uh, one is the rebel, and the rebel is the one who always has to fight against what's going on. I'm not judging it, I'm just saying it. But the rebel transformed becomes um what the heck does a rebel come, Sylvia? You know this stuff. Uh created uh a community builder. You know, there are times I'll just say this very quickly where it's so easy to want to have a class action suit at work. And believe me, plenty of places need something like this, and that's one way to go. And then you get with uh lawyers and you know, and and it can become contentious and ugly. But if you do this to become a community builder, you're gonna bring in people you never thought would listen to you and begin to say, How can we do it differently? So that's one the rample. Another one is this is more for women, but there are men who do it too, and that's the pleaser. The yes, yes, yes person. Now the pleaser becomes a truth teller, and they say, In the past, if you had told me to do that, I would have done what you asked. But no, I have a family gathering that is going to take precedence, and I can't get it done till a week later. And if that's not okay, you're gonna have to find somebody else. People are saying, You can't do that, you can't do that. I said, Do it once. The worst thing than all is your dog, then you'll get another one, and you'll practice there. So we got the pleasure, and then we have the avoider. And the avoider will sit in a meeting, and once the tension starts, all of a sudden they go, Oh, I forgot, I have a call with um so and so in you know, Kuala Lumpur or something, and I have to talk now because otherwise they'll go to sleep, and they're out the door. And the avoider, you know, my husband and I went through this where with the avoider, he he grew up in a family where there was a lot of fighting. So his learning was when the arguing starts, you get the heck out of there. And mine is when the uh things don't work, you just scream and yell.
SPEAKER_04:You just screaming, yeah.
SPEAKER_06:What a what a combination. So one day, this is early on when we were working on these patterns. He said to me, he he would grab the car keys and leave, right? And most most people, men in particular, can relate to that. Gotta get out of here.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_06:So he he said, sit down. And I said, Why? So you can get out faster, get the garage door open faster. He said, No, I'm sitting down too. And I went, Well, that's new. He said, The the avoider transform becomes an initiator, they will start the conversation to resolve the problem rather than run away from it. So he's sitting there saying, All right, let's resolve it. And I'm saying, You're gonna screw up my ability to be a drama. It was like a balloon, and all the air was coming out of it. We resolved that in 10 minutes. In the past, it could have taken a couple of days of not talking, and you know, so transforming these patterns, I mean, the benefits are so fruitful, you know. It's and and it's and it's fun. So, anyway, those are some more of the the patterns. But if you're anybody who wants the 13 patterns, all you have to do is email me.
SPEAKER_01:Oh man, definitely email her, everybody. Email her, you got nothing to lose. I always say everybody's reachable on this podcast. Please, please reach out to Sylvia because this has uh been so impactful. Um, even of a of a conversation. I I feel like I'm definitely the the one that's transformed from the rebel to the community builder, 100%. Not not in the work uh aspect, well, even in work, but I definitely had a moment, especially when I was dealing with my anger issues of um being a rebel, and then now like all I do is build communities. I mean, that's that's like all I do. I mean, it's like you're spot on, like like literally spot on. Um, so that's this is this has been incredible. Everybody like, comment, share, subscribe to the to the podcast. Uh, and don't forget, if you can change your circle, you can change your life. Thank you so much, Sylvia, for being on the podcast. We'll catch everybody on the next episode. Peace. Don't forget to like, comment, and subscribe. And don't forget to hit that notification bell for more amazing content that we're gonna be putting out. And don't forget, you can change your circle to change your life.
