016 - Why You’re More Than You Think - Exploring the Innate Self with Jules Kuroda

In this episode of Life With Purpose, I’m joined by Jules Kuroda, leadership coach and author of The N8 Self: You Are More Than Your Mind, Body and Emotion. We explore what lies beyond traditional personal development and why our higher nature - the part of us that longs for meaning, contribution, connection and creativity - deserves more attention.

Jules shares how the eight characteristics of the N8 Self can help us rediscover who we truly are and live more authentically, not just in our personal lives but in leadership too. 

We discuss the difference between recognition and contribution, why many of us struggle with creativity, and how meaning doesn’t always come from big life missions - it’s also found in everyday moments.

If you’ve ever felt like something deeper is missing, this is the conversation for you.

For more insights, tips, and guidance on living a meaningful life, visit Mel Harrowsmith Coaching. Ready to dive deeper? Reach out to book a session and start your journey towards purpose today.

Edited with finesse, transcribed and produced by Mike Roberts at Making Digital Real

Transcript

Hello and welcome to the Life With Purpose podcast. Today I'm talking to Jules Kuroda to talk about her new book, The N8 Self, You Are More Than Your Mind, Body and Emotion. Jules has had a varied career from teaching English in Japan and to refugees fleeing poverty and persecution to an executive and leadership coach. 

Now she's bringing her passion for helping people to personal development, to help the likes of you and me to get past the ideas we have of ourselves and unlock more fulfilment, joy and understanding. Jules celebrates the mind as a wonderful yet dangerous tool, depending on how we use it, and recognises that the mind and body is not all that we are, which is exactly what we will be discussing today as we talk about her new book and why we are way more than just our mind, body and emotion. Jules, hello, welcome.

Thank you so much, Mel, and way to sum up my life in such a beautiful way. You captured it. I need that.

That's a perfect description of me. So thank you. I will email it to you and feel free to use it.

Oh, so it's great to have you here. It was an absolute pleasure reading your book. I really loved reading it and I have already told Jules this, but when I got to the end of the book, there's a quiz or a tool to complete and I always love that. 

I love a little quiz in the book to help consolidate what you're doing. So I did the quiz and then I turned the page and I was at the end of the book and I was so disappointed. I was really sad and I thought, well, that's a great sign because I wanted more. 

I just absolutely loved it and it's definitely one of those books that I know I'm going to go back to and there will always be something new to come out of. So I'm looking forward to reading it again. So it's really enjoyable, it's funny and I really did find it thought provoking and it did make me reflect on what I'm doing to nurture and grow my innate self.

So with that, let's start by explaining the title because I suspect there will be people out there who did exactly what I did and thought it was the innate self and it's not. It's the N8, as in letter N, number 8 self. So Jules, let's start. 

What is the N8 self? I love it, Mel, and thank you so much. It's so nice to hear that the book resonated with you. So the innate self, the whole concept of the innate self is really trying to capture what our spiritual side is and we in the professional development space don't have language for that. 

That isn't kind of religious. And so the N, capital N, stands for our higher nature and the 8 is our 8 characteristics. And I'm an English lit major in college and so I love a good double entendre.

So it works very well if you say the innate self because it is innate in all of us. But that's really what it's meant to capture is what is our higher nature? What is that element of us that is more esoteric, that we have a hard time kind of wrestling with without good frameworks? And it does have very specific characteristics that can help us really start to grapple with what that part of ourselves longs for. Okay, so there's two things that we're going to spring off into there that you said.

So there's some characteristics around this innate self and we're going to dig into that in just a second. But why is this innate self important? Why do you want to tell us about it? Yeah. So, you know, I have worked with executives. 

You did a really lovely job of my background. And I've worked with executives for the last 10 plus years. And one of the things that was so interesting to me because I've gone through coaching school, I've got my master's in organizational leadership.

We have all these frameworks to understand our mindset, our limiting beliefs. Like what are the ways that we see and understand the world? We have all of these frameworks to talk about our emotions. Emotional intelligence is a big thing that we discuss and understand.

And somatic work, the work of the body, how we hold our emotions in our body has been a lot more present in the conversation around personal development. But at the end of the day, I would have these conversations with executives and we would be talking about the dysfunction of their team. And they would come to these fundamental human questions around, like, what am I doing with my life? Or am I really adding value? Or is I'm not getting to use my creativity? I really feel stifled, even though they're in these high powered kind of successful roles.

And there was something that was missing in the conversation. And it's really that spirit side of us, that part of us that longs for purpose and meaning and contribution and creativity and joy. And we haven't had a good framework to wrestle with it outside of sort of religious constructs.

And there's absolutely a place for that. But I think it's missing in the personal development conversation because it's a huge aspect of who we are. And so my goal with writing this book was to try to give language to that, to try to give a framework so that we could talk about this stuff socially and start to unpack in coaching conversations.

Oh, when you talk about the fact that you don't feel the meaning or purpose, let's unpack that. And here's how we can think about it in a different way. Just so interesting hearing you talking about this in the leadership context, because one of the things I was thinking about when I was reading the book and knowing that you are a leadership coach is how are you weaving that in? Because traditionally, this is not an area that leadership coaching and executive coaching goes into.

You see glimmers of it more now than we ever used to. But it's way more in the personal development space if people want to look at higher being and higher development and a bigger sense of peace. It's in that space, not the leadership space.

So it's incredible to hear that that's coming through now and that people are actively wanting to bring that into the leadership space. So what kind of things are you finding in the leadership space in terms of how do they bring their innate self into their leadership roles? So I think you've named something that I think is so important, which is the struggle. And the struggle, I think, is real when it comes to this because there is in leadership, there is this idea of presence.

And there is the idea of kind of, you know, there's always power dynamics and the facade that one must carry when you sit in a role of authority. And how does that that how then do you allow your kind of more authentic self come out? And where are the lines? And I think, you know, as you as you ask like what's coming up in the leadership space, I see the struggle coming out in the leadership space, which is a part of why I feel like there's such a missing framework. There has been such a missing framework.

And so if we can start to talk about like, OK, what I hear you saying, you know, Mel, you're struggling with how the team is thinking about you. And I think it's what you're really saying is you're wondering what your level of contribution is. And so if you can start to use these eight characteristics to unpack the social issues that are happening within the team, you actually get to the heart of something deeper.

That's fundamental and human, which is going to totally enable you to have more influence and authenticity and connection and therefore should get better results. But you also are going to do it in a way where people feel like they they can trust you. Authenticity in leadership is is I predict is going to be a huge problem in the next several years just because of what's happening culturally.

And so how do you break down some of that facade of the past in an authentic way that doesn't that doesn't undermine your positional authority? Yeah. Yeah. Authenticity is a really interesting one. 

So I think it's interesting what you're saying about this is potentially going to become a bigger issue in the next however long. And only if that's because we're going to we're going to become more consciously aware of it. Because when I think about my time in the corporate world, I look back with the with the knowledge I now have and I think about people.

I think they were really struggling to do that authentically. I know I was. And I could see that. 

See that across the board and through all the different levels. So I think if there's something that we can we can work on here to help us be more authentic and in line with our higher nature, it's very exciting. Absolutely. 

Absolutely. And I think, you know, this one of the things I have found so humanizing and working with executives is that, yes, there's all this pressure in these positions. There's a lot of responsibility. 

But I haven't met a person yet that doesn't want to be able to show up like as themselves in their role and contribute and drive meaning and create more value for the people around them. And so I think there is something like in us that longs to be human, even in maybe conditions that we've created a lack of humanness. And so if we can start to break that down without politicizing it, I think that that could really allow for us to have more connection in a meaningful way, which I think is something that people are really struggling with right now.

Yeah. So you've mentioned the struggle a couple of times. We could talk about it as a bit of an internal conflict.

So we're doing things and behaving in ways that are conflicting with what our innate self is. So I think this might be a good time to go through some of those characteristics. Yeah.

So people get a good idea for what you mean when you're talking about the innate self and what makes up. Perfect. That part.

Perfect. So the first characteristic of our innate self is actually character. And it was so interesting, Mel, when I was writing the book. 

This is actually my hardest chapter to write because character isn't something we talk a lot about socially. When we talk about character, how do we think about character? It has sort of an 1800s Jane Austen sort of ring to it when you talk about character. And as I was really thinking through and doing some research on it, character is sort of the bedrock of your human values and your moral code and the ethics with which you want to live in or live by.

And it's such an interesting time to be unpacking that topic just in and of itself because of what we do see, especially in the leadership space politically. But I think it's such a great opportunity for us to reflect and to ask ourselves, OK, when things are hard in life, who do I want to be and how do I want to make decisions? And where are, you know, I think of the moral code as like our personal 10 commandments. Like what are the rules we will not break? We cannot violate within ourselves.

And then our ethical code is more about how do we want to handle the gray, where it may not technically be right or wrong. It's more nuanced. It's more challenging.

But if you don't determine who you want to be in those moments, when you're in those moments, you will cave to the pressure of the moment. And so character becomes this really important kind of foundational aspect of self with which we build the other characteristics of the innate self on. So I think it's a really good one to start with.

OK, so we've got character as the first one, which turns out that's where our values come from, which are incredibly important. And it's something that coaches really lock onto and encourage people to look at. So what's the next one? The next one is contribution. 

So we really long to be able to share the gifts that we have, our talents, our skills, our perspective. We want to be able to contribute to people and or the world around us. And so as we as we flex these muscles of our innate self, the contribution then leads into our third, which is connection.

So we're all wired for connection. We desire connection. We need connection.

Connection is the longest chapter because it is the juiciest, I would say, from a human's need and social perspective. Like we are really unpacking what it means to be lonely and anxious and connected or not connected right now. It's a really fundamental one. 

So that's our third. And then we have creativity. And I think creativity was one of my it was so much fun, honestly, to to engage with, because creativity is to me, it's kind of the fun we we bring into life.

I talk about it as the spice of life. But what I have found, especially kind of going back to that demographic of the executive team, is that a lot of times we think about creativity sort of one dimensional. We'll think about creativity as like an artist, an artist, right? That kind of definition.

And so many times that I have led exercises that require creativity, I will have people say to me, well, I'm not an artist. I can't do this. Like I'm not creative. 

And I'm like, you are creative. You may not be creative in the way Picasso was creative, but you are creative in your very own way. So let's unpack that. 

There's another little good quiz in there on on that one. It's funny, funny you draw attention to the creativity one, because I was going to ask you a bit more detail about that one, because that was one of the main ones that stood out for me. And I wished in some ways I'd done the self-diagnostic tool quiz at the beginning, because my attitude and my thoughts about creativity completely changed by the time I'd finished the book.

So if we'd started and you'd said, are you creative? I'd be like, nah. Bearing in mind, I can play three musical instruments. I write songs. 

I sing. I'm not creative. Because in my head, if you're creative, you've got a great big canvas in front of you and a paintbrush.

So the chapter on creativity was brilliant to go through. There's the four different types. And it was that powerful. 

I threw my Kindle in front of the face of my partner and said, you need to read this chapter. Oh, that brings me great joy. But I think what you're what you're saying is how I find so many people engage with the idea of creativity is that we kind of box ourselves into one type.

And yeah, if it's if it's an artist for you and you're not that artist, many people would think of it as people who play instruments. But there are you know, I grew up in a family full of engineers and engineers inherently are incredibly creative, but they're functionally creative. They are not artistically creative. 

And so having a better understanding of the different types of creativity can really open up our minds into understanding how to to build those skills within ourselves and to give us a little freedom to flex and have some fun. Excellent. So we've got up to number four, which is creativity.

So number five, we get into generosity and generosity is really not just, you know, the way. Similarly, like the way that we think about generosity content, sometimes just be like be generous with the money that you have or be generous with your funds. But there's all different types of generosity. 

There's generosity of heart, there's generosity of spirit. So we can be generous in our in our time and the way we spend our time and give our time, we can be generous with our presence, we can be generous with our words, with our kindness. Right. 

So generosity is something that we we feel so good ourselves when we do it. And we love to be the receivers of it. It really nourishes something within us.

And then the next characteristic is gratitude. And, you know, Mel, there's been a ton of kind of PR on gratitude. And yeah.

And I have always found it, you know, it's an interesting thing because I almost think of before writing this book, I almost thought about gratitude is like an attitude. Like you just have to feel positive, you know, put on those rosy glasses and see the best. And really engaging with it, what I really started to look at is how does gratitude, how does it get born in it within us? And there are so many beautiful stories of people who emerge out of pain and suffering with more gratitude.

And so there is something we don't like to talk about or don't like to think about in terms of like gratitude and its relationship to suffering or pain. But for me, it actually really opened up something like I don't always have to feel positive. I can step back and recognize that I have a really great life where I feel really connected to nature and I have this clean water and this clean air.

I didn't do anything to earn. It's just here for me. And can I be attuned to that and grateful for that? And, you know, you know, when you get sick and you have that like head cold and you hadn't been thinking about your health, you hadn't been grateful for your health.

But you get over that cold and you're like, oh, my gosh, it just feels so good to be healthy again. It's like that. Right. 

So gratitude, gratitude, I think, is it is a door through which we can enter after pain, which I hope is a light at the end of tunnel for for people. And something something really rich there. So that's the next characteristic.

And then we get into courage and courage is a really interesting thing, because I think we think about courage and bravery as being the same thing. And I actually think about them a little differently. And I think I talk about in the book.

I think bravery is like the stepping stones to courage, like jumping out of a plane. It's brave. It's facing a fear. 

Right. But courage is facing a fear plus a willingness to do something that may be bigger than you. So like when you think about people who run in front of buses to save children, like that's really brave.

And they were willing to sacrifice something. And so there's something really powerful in courage to me. I'm just interrupting this episode for a brief moment to ask, how are you enjoying these podcasts? Have you got any questions or comments you wish you could share? Well, now you can. 

If you'd like to ask any questions or suggest topics for a future episode, if you'd like to be a guest or leave some feedback or a review on this or any other Life With Purpose podcast episodes, or simply say hello, then you can leave me a message at speakpipe.com forward slash Mel Harrow-Smith coaching. And you never know, I might even include your message in a future episode. Now, let's get back to the conversation.

And then the last characteristic is meaning and meaning is so interesting because, you know, we we talk about meaning sometimes is like, what is the meaning of life? These big, esoteric, scary questions to ask. But when you start to look at it on a psychological level, like human beings are just meaning makers. We make meaning out of everything, the little tiny things and the big.

And I talk about the micro versus macro, like I will look at your face and see that little grimace or see you make a little frown. And I will start to make a story out in my head about what that means. And that's just kind of the nature of humans. 

We constantly are grappling for meaning. And so we do that in the tiniest little interactions and we do that in the biggest ways or we stuff it down and we don't. And then that has its own impact on our on our happiness.

Truthfully, if we if we aren't engaging with some of the bigger questions. So purpose is baked in into meaning. I talk about purpose kind of separately, but it's within that characteristic.

Fantastic. So that's a great summary of the eight characteristics. And I could talk to you all day about each one in detail.

But I'm sure you've got things you need to do today and I suspect the listeners have as well. So I'm not going to do that. I already dived in because I couldn't help myself to talk about the creativity one.

But I just wanted to draw attention to two of the others because they they seem particularly connected. Now, obviously, all all eight are interdependent because they're all part of the higher, higher nature. But the two that kind of struck me as being connected were meaning, which you've just mentioned, and contribution.

So to me, I think about that, you know, they are incredibly connected because if we're contributing, that can give us a sense of meaning. But one of the things I wanted to draw around contribution is that in the book, you're very clear about contribution. But you're also very clear about what it isn't.

And one of those confusions that we have around contribution versus recognition. And I wonder if you could just say a little bit about that. Yeah. 

Yeah. I thank you for bringing that up. One of the things I think we are we're living in and I do attribute a lot of this to our social media addiction, as I would call it right now.

But we're living in a time of constant interaction with ourselves on screens, on videos, in in a virtual space. And I think with that kind of instant connection, that instant sort of transaction, there's been a ton of recognition that gets thrown around. Like you can go viral overnight. 

Like these are things that happen for people. And so what I think is so important is that while we all I mean, who doesn't want to feel validated in their life? Who doesn't want to feel like what they're doing is meaningful? But we can we can mistake the the symptom for the cause. And so if we get attached to the recognition and we miss the point, which is the contribution, then we're looking for kind of that dopamine hit instead of the real powerful change in our life.

And contribution is where we are giving the things that we have to give. So our talents, our skills, our perspective and recognition is the is the output of that. And so it's kind of it's really important, I think, for us to not be looking for recognition and mistake the substance of contribution.

Or it's kind of like eating junk food all the time. You know, you it might fill you up, but you never feel full. It's it's one of those those kinds of things.

Excellent. So we've already we've already started to touch on where we're heading next. So we can draw all of this together. 

So if this higher nature, the innate self is part of who we are, we bring it with us from wherever we come from. Why is it that seemingly so many of us are either disconnected from it, don't really know it's there? We're living in a struggle with it or in a conflict with it. Well, how has that come about? So this is where I talk about the mind as being a little bit of our frenemy.

And the way I I describe that is, you know, I think the mind is such a beautiful and wonderful thing. And we understand all the power that comes from our thinking and how we can our perception is our reality. But because of that, you know, our minds are really wired to protect us.

And I think we have really gotten into sort of logical loops where if we can't prove something, we don't know if we believe in things. And that's just kind of where we are, I think, a little bit socially. And with that, I think there is just this really important thing that we have to come back to, which is like humans have always sought for meaning and connection to something greater than ourselves.

And if I think because we mistake connecting over ideology versus connection, that is beyond ideology. Like there are these human moments that we experience that we can experience no matter what we believe. For example, the beauty of a sunset.

If you and I spoke totally different languages and we'd never had any overlap in our lives and we sat in front of a beautiful sunset and we saw it unfold together, we would be feeling something similar, regardless of all of our differences. And that is kind of what I talk about is that thread of connection that kind of runs throughout us. And that connects us all on a very human level.

And when we get so caught up in our minds and our belief structures and our ideology that we think that connection is really about, do we believe in the same things? And there's power in that, but it can be very limiting if that is how we understand ourselves. So I think our minds are standing a little bit in the way of our ability to understand this piece of ourselves because of that relationship with ideology. And so there's something there to just examine and to try to step away from to maybe see a little differently.

Yeah. And it seems to me as well that not all societies and not all cultures, but certainly the society and culture I grew up in, that some of this, you know, the shaping of the mind starts very early. So if you talk about it in the book and people will be where children are incredibly creative, you know, and they don't follow the rules and they test the boundaries.

But gradually, as we get older, that stops. And why is that? You know, potentially because somebody somewhere said something or you saw something or interpreted something through the wonderful power of the mind that then discouraged you from doing it. So, you know, there's all sorts of little things that would have chipped away of that over time that has helped us to disconnect from that higher self.

Absolutely. And I think we live with a huge fear of judgment. And, you know, I talk about this when we talk, when we unpack connection, because connection is so easy if you don't think about it.

It's when we think about it, it's when we start to analyze and worry about what will they think or what will this be or what are their expectations or I don't know them enough or whatever it is that we don't share in these moments. And so we get attached to protecting ourselves, in part because we're worried about the outcome, the possible, you know, myriad of outcomes that could come. And so that protection then takes over, you know, that willingness to connect and and it keeps us it keeps us disconnected from this piece of ourselves.

Oh, the good old mind. Our frenemy is powerful in so many ways. Our frenemy. 

It's funny, I had a conversation with my partner and he works in tech. So AI comes up quite a bit and we're both of the opinion. It's not AI we need to be worried about. 

It's our minds. They're the scariest things on the planet, not AI. Yes, yes, yes.

So through the work that you've been doing and through your coaching, your leadership and now moving into personal development, are there any particular innate characteristics that stand out as being particularly neglected across the board or need more attention than others? It's a really good question. I think that everyone has one or two that are harder for them. So I think it's individualistic.

I think for some people, they may struggle with character because maybe they're a people pleaser and or they're a chameleon, which we talk about as being positive things and can be. But it can also make you really waffle on what your beliefs are and or values. When I say that, that's what I mean.

So that may be more difficult for you. It may be more difficult for you for connection because you've been hurt in the past and you worry and you just don't know how to reopen yourself back up to that kind of vulnerability. For others, it's gratitude.

It's creativity because of that mental block around how we think about creativity. I think gratitude is something that we we've talked a lot about social socially. I don't think we sit in the space of gratitude as much, particularly for for Western cultures.

I have worked with a lot of other cultures who do operate a lot more in in gratitude. But I think the thing that we maybe are like a moth to a flame, like we're attracted to it, but we worry about it or we really don't know how to grapple with is is the meaning piece. It's what is the meaning? Where is the meaning in my life? And I think we're scared of those questions.

I think we're afraid that by going down those questions, what if I don't like what I see or what if I can't answer that question? Will it lead me to greater depression or that that has been gnawing in the back of my mind and it feels like depression instead of opening it wide open and really allowing ourselves to create the meaning in our lives? And that's why I think these things all go so closely together. You talked about that earlier. None of them stand out by themselves.

They all work in concert with one another. And if I just take a holistic coaching approach to some of those like part of, you know, when you're working with somebody and they're stuck in there, let's say they're stuck on an emotion. They're really having a hard time unblocking an emotion.

Going straight at that emotion is usually not going to help unblock that emotion. You have to take another approach. So you either go in and talk about something mentally that's creating that thought, that's creating that emotion.

Or you can talk semantically about where are you holding that emotion to allow us to explore it from a different angle. And I think the same is true with our innate selves. Like if you're struggling with meaning, maybe you don't go straight at the meaning piece.

Maybe you start to ask the contribution questions. Well, where do I feel like I can contribute? Do I allow myself to contribute? Am I so concerned about what other people will think that I hold back my skills and my gifts? And if you start to play with contribution, you might go, oh, that feels a little meaningful or that felt like some purpose in there. And that can be another way to start to unfold these things is looking at the multidimensions of the eight characteristics.

I think something you said earlier as well, when you were talking about meaning as the characteristic and you said the macro and the micro, that was something that struck me in the book as well. And certainly from work I've done with people and this kind of assumption that, you know, what is the meaning of life question? Well, if you're Douglas Adams, you know, the answer is 42. But if you're not, you know, I think from the work I've done, it's not I think, from some of the work that I've done, people really get stuck on this because they think that if they're not solving climate change or they haven't got a cure for cancer, then there is no meaning.

And I think the way that you describe the difference between the macro and the micro is incredibly helpful as well then as going back through all the other characteristics to come at it from that different angle and look at it through a different lens. So I think that chapter is really powerful, in my opinion. Yeah, no, I appreciate that. 

You know, it's funny, my husband and I, we talk about what is the meaning of life and we joke, but there's some seriousness to it of like, the meaning of life is to discover the meaning of life. Like, I think in there is just like, it's the journey of becoming. And again, this is where I think if we allow ourselves, like, one of the things I do talk about in the book is I think we, as we grow up, we tell ourselves, some of these things are childish and we stuff it in a box and we throw it in the closet.

Instead of maintaining some of that sense of humor, curiosity, lightheartedness that we have mostly as children into what it means to grow up, to grow up with those things. And if you do, there's just some freedom in there, there's some playfulness, there's some discovery to be had. And I think we need to re-employ some of our fun and curiosity into how we think about meaning and purpose.

Yeah, hurrah to that. That's what I say. So we've got people listening today, and I hope we have, who are listening to our discussion and thinking, oh, this sounds really interesting and they want to take some steps to develop their innate self.

Apart from reading your book, which is obviously a great place to start, and taking the self-assessment quiz, what advice would you give to people about where to make a start with this? Yeah, great question. I would say start with nature. Part of how this unfolded in my own life is we were those people during COVID that packed up our lives.

We were living in L.A. and moved into an RV and traveled throughout the Grand National Parks. That's where you really start to see the interconnectedness of life, like how it all flows together. And it was one of those things in my own life that helped me really start to feel more abundant.

Like, wow, I see how, you know, I take so many things for granted because I don't have this kind of macro perspective in my life. And I think nature offers us kind of a mirror on the connectedness of life and how it flows together and the energy. And I think that because we've separated ourselves so much from it, we're missing lessons learned, really important kind of ancient lessons learned from this world around us that we thrive by.

And I think that that is a great place to start because it's just embodied. It's just ontological in that way, by just sitting and steeping in it. You'll start to have some of these, I think, thoughts yourself.

So that would be one place I would start, but also read my book. Well, yes, read the book. But I guess the beauty about choosing nature is it's so accessible.

I mean, even if you're in the middle of a city, you can find nature. It might be a little bit harder to hear, especially if you want to hear the sounds. It might be a little bit harder, but you can find nature pretty much anywhere.

You can. And it's so important, I think, to just be reminded and to get out of our own heads around how we exist in this world. We are not these isolated, independent beings that just run around in our cars busy all the time.

Even if it feels that way, even if that's how we built it and that's the perspective we carry, that perspective doesn't mean it's true. It's not necessarily reality. So I think nature offers perspective and that is something we all need at any given moment in our lives.

So, yes. And you can find it just sitting next to a giant tree. Give it a little hug if you feel the need as well. 

Have a chat. I do that. I say hello to trees. 

I'm a bit strange like that. But I enjoy it. I dare you not to not to smile, though, while you're talking to trees.

Absolutely. Absolutely. But it also sounds like your time in the woods with the trees, that has been part of your journey and your inspiration to write this book.

Absolutely. And throughout the book, and you know, I mentioned the importance of nature multiple times, I think because we just forget how interconnected we are with it. We survive because of it. 

And when we start to think of ourselves as agnostic to it, I think that's really dangerous. I think it's dangerous for us and I think it's dangerous for each other. And it's definitely dangerous for the world.

So really stepping into that kind of understanding of how we're all interconnected, there's power. And it's a lot less lonely to think that, to see that, to feel that. And it just I think, you know, there's so many studies about the power of stepping into nature.

And, you know, forest bathing is a huge thing in Japan. It's like there are these physiological things, even if you don't believe, you know, that this is going to help you. Like there are physiological studies on what it does to your blood pressure, on what it does to your stress levels.

So the science speaks about it as well. And I think there's just something though, mental, that we don't quite maybe recognize until we do, until we engage. Great. 

So get out, hug some trees, listen to the birds. Yes. Enjoy the fresh air.

So I just want to change direction a little bit and loop right back to something you said right at the start. When you were talking about personal development and talking about the higher nature, the higher self, the innate self, and how that's been lacking in executive and leadership coaching. And you used the word spiritual.

And one of the things you say quite early on in the book is referring to the mental health crisis. There's a lot of chat about a mental health crisis. And you take it a step further and say, actually, we're not having a mental health crisis.

We're having a spiritual crisis. So what is the difference between those for you? And why are we having a spiritual crisis? Yeah, it's a really good question. And I do think, I think that one feeds on the other.

I do think that I in no way want to diminish the fact that there are mental health issues and that people are dealing with anxiety. What I think we misunderstand, though, is sometimes the root of the cause around like depression and anxiety related to loneliness or a feeling of disconnection. And I think that that is related to the spiritual crisis piece that we talk about.

And this is where I think, you know, again, I will say the mind is our frenemy. The mind is not the place to go to solve connection. It's the place that protects us.

And that can sometimes lead us away from connection. And not to say that our minds aren't helpful in assessing who we should be close to and who we should not be. Like there's something there for sure.

But it's just to recognize there are limitations to it. And when we start to understand ourselves more holistically, that we need connection and that we can have little tiny bits of connection. It doesn't have to be like, you know, you're bearing your soul to people all of the time.

It doesn't have to be that high level of vulnerability. It can be connection in terms of like walking past someone and smiling and saying hello and letting someone engage with you like that. And it's been really interesting.

Like I travel a lot for work and for life. And there has been such a distinct pivot in my lifetime of engaging with strangers in a friendly way. When you pass people, you smile, you say hello.

You know, there are different places in the world you can go and it's definitely that way. But I find so often now as you're brushing through an airport, it's like if somebody bumps into you, you're almost mad before you're understanding. And that is symptomatic of the fact that we're feeling so disconnected from one another.

And that is because we don't understand how interrelated we all are. That's a part of that spiritual crisis. That's not a mental.

It's so much mental, right? But we get ourselves there sometimes through our minds. So I think it's just such an important distinction because what got us here won't get us there. We have to have a new toolkit.

We have to have new things to look at within ourselves to understand and unpack what's going on that's making us feel this level of disconnection. And I think our minds are one of the reasons why. But I don't think we can solve it from the mind.

That is a very, very good point. As you've been saying, you know, the mind is an amazing thing, both positive and not so positive. And trying to think our way out of some of this stuff.

It's just not. Yeah, we're not going to be able to think our way out of it, right? Absolutely. One of the things I came across this week in a different podcast was talking about thinking and thoughts.

Is it a thought or is it a fact? Most of my thoughts are just thoughts. There's no facts in there. And yet we build so much of our lives around these crazy thoughts that just get us into trouble.

I mean, part of the whole coaching field has been built on helping us see that, right? Helping us unpack our thinking from what's actually happening and story that we attach ourselves to, which then breeds emotion and reaction when most of it's all in our heads. So I think there's something really powerful. And to me, if we engage with some of the softer parts of us that maybe we haven't brought to the table around, like, what does it mean to be courageous? Or what are you grateful for? Or what's one thing you long to give? It opens up a very different conversation than talking about anxiety or what would reduce anxiety.

There's something really powerful, I think, happening for us on the need for connecting to each other and connection to something bigger than us. So on that note, Jules, thank you so much. If people listening want to know more about you and want to find the book, where do they need to go to find you? Yes, you can go to my website, theinnateself.com, and you can find my book on Amazon, The Innate Self.

And thank you so much, Mel. This has been a lovely conversation. I so appreciate what you're doing, talking about life with purpose.

It's so meaningful. And thank you for having me on today. It's been an absolute pleasure.

I love it. Yes, I wish you all the best with the rest of your book tour. And thank you so much for helping us to understand our innate selves through your experience, your journey, and your expertise.

If you're listening to this message, you've listened to the entire episode. Thank you so much. And thank you to Mike from Making Digital Real for continuing to produce these episodes.

If you'd like to know more about life with purpose and coaching sessions with me, then head over to melharrowsmithcoaching.com and get in touch. You can also subscribe to my newsletter for updates, advice, guidance, and all things relating to life with purpose. I hope you enjoyed this episode.

And if you did, then you might like to send me a review or share this episode with others who may be interested in this topic. Thank you so much again for listening, and I'll see you next time for a new episode.