Joining the Dots

SHOW NOTES

In this episode, Lee and Michelle turn an unplanned recording slot into a surprisingly rich conversation about trusting the process of life.

The discussion kicks off with a quote from Steve Jobs’ 2005 commencement address at Stanford:

"You can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards, so you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future."

That idea sparks a wide-ranging conversation covering:

• The difference between gut instinct and impulsiveness, and why Lee has learned to pause before engaging her mouth
• How ADHD shapes Lee's natural enthusiasm and decisiveness, and what she is learning about tempering that with reflection
• Soren Kierkegaard's complementary thought: "Life can only be understood backwards, but it must be lived forwards"
• How Lee and Michelle approach risk very differently, and why that contrast makes them a stronger team
• The role of courage in making decisions that are not permanent, and being willing to pivot when something does not work
• How Lee's business, Welshot, navigated the pandemic with no proper internet connection, running Zoom photography lessons off a mobile hotspot from home
• Why looking back at past decisions with a positive lens can build the neurological confidence to make bold decisions in the future
• A little detour into growing potatoes in tubs, subscription gardening boxes, and new potatoes at Christmas in New Zealand

Michelle also sets listeners a small piece of homework: think of a time when something unexpected happened and you had to change course. Can you look back now and see how the pieces fell into place? And does that give you more courage for whatever is unfolding right now?

Quotes mentioned:

• Steve Jobs on connecting the dots
• Soren Kierkegaard on living life forwards
• Marie Forleo: "Everything is figureoutable"

Connect with Lee and Michelle using the link in the show notes. If you have questions or ideas for the show, they would love to hear from you. And if you enjoyed this episode, please share it with a friend or colleague who might need a little courage and confidence today.

Find Lee at:

• Website: https://welshotimaging.co.uk/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/leeatwelshot/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lee.iggulden

Find Michelle at:

• Web: https://www.thinkingspacecoaching.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thinkingspacecoaching/
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/cmichellerogers/

Transcript

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SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to season three of Courage and Confidence with Lee Iggledon and Michelle Rogers, the podcast in which Lee and I build up our own courage and confidence while helping you to do the same thing with some handy tips, techniques, and some inspiring stories from some very special guests.

SPEAKER_01 0:21

Claude just looks at me and says, Why would you want to grow potatoes?

SPEAKER_00 0:28

I refer you to my earlier question. Are you impulsively?

SPEAKER_01 0:58

Hello everyone. So if you're listening to this particular episode, it means that life has got in the way, and that Michelle and I haven't been able to uh record our scheduled re um podcast, and this is the one that we keep for spare, you know, just in case life happens. So obviously, if you're listening, life has happened, hasn't it, Michelle?

SPEAKER_00 1:27

Yeah, and I think we've all been there, haven't we? Uh, you know, you've got an emergency meal in your freezer for that night when you can't be bothered to cook, you know, or spare pair of shoes in the car in case it snows and you have to walk home rather than uh than drive or whatever. So yeah, good plan, Lee.

SPEAKER_01 1:45

Do you know what my um emergency meal is?

SPEAKER_00 1:49

That's exactly what I was just gonna ask you. What is it?

SPEAKER_01 1:51

Cheese on toast. Or baked beans on toast, or cheese and beans.

SPEAKER_00 1:57

I was gonna say, or cheese and beans on toast.

unknown 2:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 2:01

It always involves bread, cheese, or beans, or all of it.

SPEAKER_00 2:07

We normally have an emergency pizza, so I guess that's bread and cheese in some format as well.

SPEAKER_01 2:12

Yeah. Right. So I read a quote this weekend, Michelle.

SPEAKER_02 2:19

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_01 2:20

Now I haven't actually looked up to see if it is properly attributed to Steve Jobs, but in my book called The Fifty Secrets of Self-Confidence, The Confidence to Do Whatever You Want to Do, it is attributed to him.

SPEAKER_00 2:37

Yeah? Okay. And it's who's the book by, by the way?

SPEAKER_01 2:41

The book is by Richard Nugent.

SPEAKER_00 2:44

Okay. Just in case anyone's interested. Right. And so what does what does Steve Jobs have to say?

SPEAKER_01 2:49

Okay, well, it really resonated with me. Um, so you can't connect the dots looking forward. You can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something, your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. Because believing that the dots will connect down the road will give you the confidence to follow your heart, even when it leads you off the well-worn path.

SPEAKER_00 3:27

So tell me why that resonated with you.

SPEAKER_01 3:30

Well, have you ever noticed when we've been having our coaching sessions or even in the some of the podcasts that we've done? Is I'm always saying that I feel like I'm getting nowhere, and then all of a sudden, all those little dots seem to be connecting. I and reading that quote, it made me realize that it's so true. We can't connect them going forwards, can we? Only backwards.

SPEAKER_00 4:03

Yeah. It's an interesting quote, isn't it? Because when you talk about connecting the dots, it makes me think of those join the dot pictures, you know, that you had when you were a child in the colouring book. And I suppose when I first read that quote, because I had that in mind, I sort of didn't agree with them. Because if you think about a join the dot picture, you are joining them going forward. Oh, you're going forward, yeah. Now you can only see what the picture is afterwards, so that you know, technically, once the dots have been joined, you're you're doing so. I agree with that a bit more now. I thought about it uh further, and Lennet reminded me there's a Danish uh philosopher called Soren Kierkegaard, and he said life can only be understood backwards, but it must be lived forwards, and it's a sort of very similar expression. So, you know, it's easy to sort of look back over the last year at Wellshot and think, oh well, that happened because we made that decision, or you know, um, that thing didn't work out quite the way we did, so uh we hoped it would, so we pivoted, and actually this is better, you know. So I think on the whole, combining that Kierkegaard with Steve Jobs has helped me sort of understand that that uh quotation a bit better. So, do you feel like for you uh it it it talked in there about um your gut, your instinct, um destiny, or whatever. Which of those do you think is joining the dots up for you?

SPEAKER_01 5:36

I think I rely on I want to say instinct, but obviously there's gotta be some sort of knowledge in there, doesn't it, based on what's happened in in the past and you know what I know. But I have learned I've learned often the hard way to trust my gut instinct. If something is telling me that it's not right or that it feels right, then I should embrace the fear, you know, and be confident and courageous and go for it. I've learned that my my gut and my instinct isn't often wrong.

SPEAKER_00 6:19

And does when you talk about your gut for you is that a sort of is that a physical experience? Do you physically feel like you know, this doesn't feel quite comfortable, you know, in in yourself, are you feeling you know, a bit sort of yeah, like I say, uncomfortable, a bit sick about it or whatever.

SPEAKER_01 6:39

If I have to if I have to think about something as, you know, um overly overthink something, then it's not something that I want to do or I feel comfortable with. I mean, not because I'm not courageous or confident or I'm fearful, but more that I really don't want to do it.

SPEAKER_00 7:03

Oh, it's not right in some way for you.

SPEAKER_01 7:05

Yeah. So if I go into, I always say if I go into a shop and I'm humming and harring over something, you know, like a whether it's a top or or or you know, an item, yeah, not food, but you know, something, a purchase of some sort. If I have to think about it, I don't really want it or need it. But if if if I yes, that's what I want, then I know it's what I want. I did that with my little calf, a fee at 500, and it was green, minty green, and I bought it within 30 minutes because I just saw it and I wanted it.

SPEAKER_00 7:49

And has it worked out?

SPEAKER_01 7:51

Do you love it? Yeah, it's worked out. You know, it's been it's been mine and then part of the business, and then it's now it's gone to my husband, and soon it might be going to um um a friend's daughter who's who's just about to get it her license. It had only gone about 600 miles when I bought it.

SPEAKER_00 8:15

When you bought it, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:16

Um, it had been a little old lady's and it had sat in her garage. That that's just I always thought that was a myth. But anyway, it sat in her garage and she didn't like it.

SPEAKER_00 8:28

So she just didn't she didn't enjoy driving it. It was sitting in the garage and along came you and bought it. Yeah, yeah. Well, there you go. So that worked out.

SPEAKER_01 8:38

Yeah, and I find looking back, so again, looking at the dots or looking at what's happened, that's been the case all along, whether it's um being friends with somebody or or just my intuition about something and or the way I want to do something within the business. I I can't sort of explain it, but I've learned that trusting my intuition is good for me. Might not be good for everybody else, but yeah.

SPEAKER_00 9:16

Um so part of that for you then is that if you are overly thinking something, it's not it's not right. It should be more of an instant thing. It's funny, isn't it? Because they talk about the gut being the second brain and the importance of your you know, your actual physical gut health on your you know, your mental health and your physical well-being. And then I that when you were talking and talking about overthinking, it reminded me about you know how cow how cows have is it four stomachs? Yeah, and you know, their food kind of uh moves through and and sort of has different stages, and and they talk about that as rumination, don't they? Um they're ruminating, ruminant animals. And we talk about ruminating to mean kind of that idea of churning an idea over and over, and you know, kind of an unhealthy rumination is to sort of overthink something and not be able to put it down. So it's interesting there's an expression which is linked with the stomach or the gut, and we you know we're linking that to sort of thinking and um you know making decisions. Just think it's interesting how we connect different bits of our body, you know.

SPEAKER_01 10:25

That reminds me about a podcast that we recently did about opportunities, Michelle. And and we had a conversation where where you had very different thought to what I had, and I said, Oh, I'm gonna I'm gonna remember that. Oh, okay. So I think I am going to I am more aware now of my intuition. So and I'm thinking that is it my intuition or am I scared or is it because I don't feel courageous and confident? So while I might say, yes, I'm gonna buy that car, I'm now learning to step back and think about whether um it's me just jumping in, or if it's if you're being if you're being impulsive, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:22

Yeah, so you it's okay. So you're sort of what I'm hearing is that you think whilst you want to trust your instincts and trust your gut, trust your intuition, you also don't want to kind of hand over all responsibility to that and just go, well, if it feels good in the moment, it's right. You know, what I'm hearing is pardon me, is you saying that um you want to recognise that sometimes, you know, that initial kind of uh sort of like all the lights going on on a Christmas tree of excitement about something, you know, that might need to be tempered with a bit more rational thought.

SPEAKER_01 12:00

Yeah, and I think that comes down to me learning more and more about my ADHD because I do have a tendency to be impulsive, even though I call it decisive. Um, and you know, or in that I say something and then I think, oh, maybe I shouldn't have said that, or I commit to something, and then I, you know, after I've thought about it a bit more. So there's my intuition, and then there's me trying to just engage my mind and my before I engage my mouth.

SPEAKER_00 12:40

Yeah, I think that's a really good way of putting it. I think it's like tempering your initial instinct to leap in with both feet, you know. I think one thing one of the things that's that is absolutely brilliant about you is that you are incredibly enthusiastic. Um, and so if something sort of does light you up when you hear it, you know, you're gonna go all in. I think you know, for somebody that that would want somebody to come alongside them in their organization and just sort of make stuff happen, you would be an ideal choice because you know, once you are enthused about an idea, there's kind of no stopping you, is there? No, um, you know, and I think you know, some of that is your is your natural personality. I think you're that that kind of person. Maybe some of it is um affected by the ADHD, and maybe you know, there's sometimes an element of kind of hyperfixation on something or or whatever. But it is interesting that you can see that sometimes there is a need to, as you say, engage your brain uh a little bit more rather than just going with your sort of natural instinct to do something. Would you say that you are an impulsive person?

SPEAKER_01 13:53

Um I I suppose so, but I like being there. Again, I'm not saying it's bad. Yeah, I again I put that down to my intuition. If I just jump in, then 99% of the time it is the right decision, you know, or it is the right feeling that I'm having. Um I suppose like I could be impulsive when it comes to um to buying stuff. So if if you're listening to this podcast, um it's probably happened by now that after 19 years, we've moved out of a big static caravan into an actual house. One with some water. Yeah, we've gone from a a static caravan to hopefully by you know by the time you you're listening to this, it will have happened. But I decided that I was gonna use big plastic boxes to put things in. Yeah. Now my husband, and I've and I've bought these big plastic boxes, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:13

Now my husband is saying, so what are we gonna do after we've moved? With the plastic boxes.

SPEAKER_00 15:20

With all the plastic boxes, put them on marketplace, someone else's moving house and needs some plastic boxes.

SPEAKER_01 15:27

He thinks we could have a you know, have a a yard sale or something, yeah. Absolutely, you know, but they those sorts of boxes always come in handy. So while it might have looked impulsive, I think it's gonna be one of those times when all the dots are joined and somebody's gonna need all those boxes.

SPEAKER_00 15:46

I think that sounds good. I I was when I was checking that um Sauren Kierkegaard quote, it brought up a list of other things he said, and I think you'll like this one in terms of what we were just talking about. He said to dare is to lose one's footing momentarily, not to dare is to lose oneself. Oh so there is a chance that if you, you know, d jump based on your intuition, you know, one of those times out of a hundred you might slip, you know. But if you don't dare, then who would you be? You know, you would you wouldn't be the same person at all, would you? You know, you are that kind of person. I think you and I are very different in that respect. I'm I'm a I'm a researcher. Um, you know, so it would look like so. We bought a new car before Christmas. Um, and it probably looked to the salesman that we were the most impulsive people in the world. Uh, because we walked in and we said, see that one out there, we want to test drive that. We've got some questions about it, we test drove it, and you know, an hour later we were buying the car. It's a pretty expensive purchase. But actually, we'd done kind of months of research about, you know, we had a particular car that we really liked before that that isn't made anymore, and you know, what would be like that? What did we enjoy about that car? What are we going to use this car for? Why are we changing from a we've got a golf and we wanted to go up to an estate car? You know, why was that? What was that about? Was it worth doing? You know, so we'd done all that thinking in the background. But as I say, you know, one December morning we showed up at uh at a garage in the new forest and bought a car. Um, you know, so we the salesman was probably like, wow, that was an easy sale, didn't have to do much with them.

SPEAKER_01 17:39

So that's really interesting, Michelle, because my husband and Avion are like that exactly. Yeah. And I'm gonna refer to the house move again. So Avion collects um vinyl records. Okay. He's got a lot, he's got over 300, yeah. Oh wow. Yeah, and we were talking about how we were gonna move them and store them while we were doing the house move. So I went on Amazon and I found these sort of proper um they were like they were like polythene plastic sort of bags, yeah. And each one held about 150 records, yeah?

SPEAKER_00 18:27

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 18:27

And I said, look at that, Avion, that's perfect. And you get four for four fourteen ninety-nine or something really ridiculous, under 20 quid. Anyway, that's a really good idea, isn't it? I'm gonna get them, yeah. Because I was so pleased that I'd found them. And he said, uh, hang on a minute, hang on a minute. No, no, I don't want to do that. I don't, you know, don't want to do that. Um, and he went away. And I thought, oh, okay, right. Well, I thought that was a good idea, but you know, I left it. And then half an hour he came in and he says, I've been thinking about that. Let's have a look at them again. And he says, Yeah, I think that's actually a good idea. So now underneath my work desk, I have about um eight of these bags underneath my desk full with records because we decided that they'd be safer in the office till we got all his stereo stuff. But wow, but and I said, Well, I just said that. Why why did you not just let me get them? And I showed you, and he says, Well, I like to think about it, I like to ruminate was your I like to, you know, think and be considered about my decisions, because I would have just gone and got them. It's it's like that, so they were under 20 quid, and I thought, well, can I afford to lose 20 quid if they're not right? And yes, I could. If they'd been like 300 quid, yeah, then I would have thought about it more. So me jumping off a cliff or being impulsive, I I do weigh up what can I afford it if something goes wrong?

SPEAKER_00 20:13

Yeah, yeah. So you're you're calculating is this a risk or is it not a risk? You know, what is it, what's the consequence, the potential consequence of this decision?

SPEAKER_01 20:22

Yeah, or you know, per on a personal level, well, you know, am I happy in this relationship or do I keep working at it? Or is it making me walk on eggshells or be unhappy? That's when I go, you know, I give it a long time. You know, I really work at it. But if I'm continually unhappy or sad or nervous or anxious, then I know that I need to trust my instinct.

SPEAKER_00 20:56

Yes, and I wouldn't say that you were all at all, you know, impulsive in terms of you know making big decisions like that, you know, but about sort of those decisions of a personal nature. I think you take that very seriously, you take other people's feelings very seriously. But you know, I think it's really refreshing to work with somebody who has an idea and you know, for for work and says, let's try it. You know, if it doesn't work, we won't do it again, or we'll tweak it and do it a different way. I think you know, I find that it is helpful to me to know you and to be friends with you and to work with you because you know that isn't necessarily my instinct, you know. I'm I'm you know, more uh more sort of risk analysis based, really. I think, you know, about decisions.

SPEAKER_01 21:48

Yeah, you're maybe more considered than I am.

SPEAKER_00 21:52

Well, no, I no, I think I just I'm I I I I think sometimes I'm less confident than you are. Um and I Think you know that's the whole point of doing this podcast, isn't it? We're trying to build our own confidence and our own courage. You know, I think that you and I just have a different approach because we're different people with different strengths and foibles and and whatever. And you know, I think that's okay for people to know that, you know, yeah. Just because I'm a coach, I haven't got it all together all the time.

SPEAKER_01 22:22

Definitely. I think I do scare people. I mean, I know I scared my husband, you know, and it's taken him a long time to re you know, to realise and get to know me. I mean, we've been married since 1987, so you know he's probably used to it by now. I think he's only just getting used to me, and certainly I scared Avian, and I probably scared you a bit. Can you know, remember? Hey Michelle, do you want to do a podcast just down nowhere?

SPEAKER_00 22:50

Absolutely, absolutely. I mean, I think anybody who's known you for a while knows that that you have big ideas, and sometimes you follow through on those big ideas, and sometimes you you just like to enjoy those big ideas for a few days, and then you know, you pull them back a bit, don't you? Yeah, yeah. Um, when you look back though, when you look back across at 16, 17 years of Wellshot, and you were making decisions at the time, and you know, you were living life forwards, and and you couldn't understand necessarily why all the decisions you were making, how they were all going to fit together. Uh, to use one of your favourite images, can you look back at that now and see the kind of the jigsaw puzzle sort of that it's come together, even though some of those pieces felt a bit weird?

SPEAKER_01 23:36

Yeah, definitely. Even now, with the you know, the changes that we've gone through over the last um year and you know, and it's still continuing, and and I keep thinking that oh, okay, it's not quite there, but I can see how it's how those dots are definitely joining. I think it's like one of my favorite phrases. I think I use it a lot, don't I? That I see the dots joining. Um and I can see how you know so I am quite good at spotting an opportunity. So if I if I meet somebody and and I get to know them and what they do, I'm quite good at oh, I know how we could do some work together. And and then so we we come into each other's lives and we get to know each other and we work together, and then all of a sudden that that particular thing has joined with another dot. Yeah, and and that's that seems to be what my whole life, personal and business, has been like. So is it fate? Is it hard work? Is it because I've put lots of thought into it, but I don't realize I've put the thought into it? Is it intuition? Is it gut?

SPEAKER_00 25:10

Who knows? I but I think there's one element that's definitely there throughout all of that is courage. Um, and I think the one quality that you do possess uh in bucket loads is the ability to say, I can change my mind. If I make a decision, it isn't, you know, in most instances, it isn't, excuse me. Uh if I make a decision, in most instances it isn't forever, you know. It could be you take the business in a particular direction, you go and do a particular event. Maybe it's fantastic and you get lots of new leads and you meet lots of interesting people, or maybe it's just a bust. And you know, and you were very good at saying, right, well, we won't do that again, but it doesn't stop you trying. Um, you know, you're not so hat up on things working perfectly immediately that you choose to do nothing.

SPEAKER_01 26:03

Yeah, I am very adaptable and flexible, and I I say to my husband and Avium, and and even some of our delegates, I said, Well, it's not really a problem. Um, everything's figure out. Now that that's a Marie Folio quote. Um everything is figure out. It might not be what you maybe thought how it would work out, but you can figure things out. And isn't there a quote about problem solving? Um that a problem can always be solved or something. There's or there's no problem that can't be solved.

SPEAKER_00 26:48

It can't be solved. Yeah, probably.

SPEAKER_01 26:50

Yeah. And and it's and I think I'm quite good at oh well, we can't do it like this, but we can do it like this. And I think my life while building this business has helped me be like that. So, you know, COVID is a good example having to, you know, oh, so well, this has been taken out of our hands, we can't do this anymore. But what can we do?

SPEAKER_00 27:19

Yeah, yeah. And you know, for my business, COVID wasn't a massive problem in that, you know, it's I was already working with a lot of people online, the people I was working with face to face. Well, they had to go home and work online. So, you know, we could we could just adapt to that overnight. It's a little bit trickier when you're running events for people to come along and learn how to use their cameras. Uh, you know, so yeah, you the your sort of pivoting required a lot more um sort of flexibility and adaptability and creativity, didn't it?

SPEAKER_01 27:55

Yeah, yeah. I did just jump into it with two feet. It's like I don't think I was I don't think I was I was more phased and worried about letting people down who'd given us money for events, but you know, they knew that it wasn't our fault. Yes but but staying at home and having to do things online, I just jumped into it. Well we'll we can we'll just tell them that we've never taught somebody to use a camera via Zoom before, but we soon learnt.

SPEAKER_00 28:31

Yeah, and now we know how to do it. So when you but you could because you and I didn't know each other then. Um when you were doing that, were you doing that from home or were you allowed to come into the office to use the you know to to use all the facilities? How did that work?

SPEAKER_01 28:48

We were doing it from home, so we we um locked up off the office sort of late February and we went home and we didn't open back up till the tail end of September that year, and but we didn't even go outside our gate, so we went nowhere, we were fully self-isolating, yeah. Um, and we didn't have a proper internet connection, so we were running our laptops off our mobile hotspot.

SPEAKER_00 29:21

Wow, yeah and teaching Zoom lessons, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 29:25

It was a bit hit and miss, but you know, we coped.

SPEAKER_00 29:29

Well, I think that was one thing about that time, wasn't it, that everybody accepted that things, you know, we hadn't planned for this, things weren't going to be perfect, and we all had to kind of make our best efforts.

SPEAKER_01 29:41

Yeah, yeah. But so the dots that I was creating over that time have have helped us grow the business now. So, you know, looking back, it's I do like the this image in my head of seeing a whole row of dots or joining together, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:05

And also I think what's interesting about that is that you are taking the positive from those experiences, you know, the positives out of all of those dots, and you're thinking, well, what can I build on from that? You know, it isn't just uh kind of right, well, I'm not gonna do that again, or I learned that that was a bad decision. It is also that there were a lot of positives that have come out of those decisions, and then I think you know, there's this theory that uh our brain is uh activated by us kind of rehearsing um or recollecting an experience in exactly the same way as it is as us physically doing that thing. So that's why it works. If you know you're going to go and um, you know, be a keynote speaker at a conference or something like that, you know, you you're sort of advised to um visualize what it's going to be like to be there and you know, what is it gonna feel like? You're gonna be almost like you're watching yourself on a um in a film or whatever, you know, presenting and you're looking confident and you're doing a great job and you're speaking calmly and and people are engaged and asking questions. And that that sort of constant rehearsal in your brain is basically saying to your brain, I can do this, I've done it before, it's a safe place, you you know, you've got this, it kind of building building your courage and confidence right at that kind of neuroplasticity level. So when you're doing the same thing and looking back at the dots and saying, you know, we made those decisions in COVID, we're not in those that um those circumstances anymore. But you know, what we learnt then and what we did well then allows us to have the confidence that we can make decisions like that again and and be confident going forward.

SPEAKER_01 31:51

Yeah, and they say, don't they, that that's not going to be the last pandemic. So, you know, we've got all those tools, you know, physical tools and you know, mental tools to be able to cope with that if it happens again.

SPEAKER_00 32:08

Yeah, and and there's all sorts of other stuff going on in the world right now that you know might lead us to need to make different decisions. You know, at the time of recording, I was reading yesterday about you know that there may not be enough um jet fuel for for you know people's summer holidays. Yeah. Um because of the or the crisis in the Middle East.

SPEAKER_01 32:29

Yeah, and okay, so jet fuel, yeah, that's a big that's a a big thing, obviously. Um but you know, it would be nice to holiday in the UK. But I was reading that there's gonna be a shortage of tomatoes. Now, can't we grow our own tomatoes? I'm sorry, I am diverging, but but the the media saying that there's gonna be food shortages. What did we do in the times when we didn't get food from other countries?

SPEAKER_00 33:02

Well, I guess what we have done since those times is we've stopped growing some things, you know, because we're getting our tomatoes from you know Morocco or Spain or and they're being they're coming via freight. So yeah, sure, we can grow our own tomatoes, but I guess we have a much shorter season. So you go back to that whole seasonality thing, wouldn't you? That I mean, I know I've seen British tomatoes coming into the shops, it's it's April as as we're recording this. Um but you know, I guess they're probably grown under glass and stuff like that. So we have made our lives um fit our current circumstances, haven't we? No, it is completely possible for us, whether or not you think it's okay, to eat, you know, green beans that were flown in from Kenya two days ago, uh, you know, or to you know have beautiful bouquets of roses that were grown in different countries. We can grow roses in this country, you know, but it's more expensive and our weather is trickier or whatever. So we have it we have adapted in a way that is reliant on our circumstances staying the same. And so, you know, whether or not we can get tomatoes or whether or not we can go on holiday are absolutely tiny um uh elements compared to how awful it must be to live in a war-torn country, you know. But yeah, you're right, you're right, you know, we have we've kind of learnt not to do things or not to need to do things.

SPEAKER_01 34:40

I know this is totally off topic, but I'm really hoping I can have a vegetable garden.

SPEAKER_00 34:47

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 34:49

Clive just looks at me and says, Oh, why would you want to grow potatoes? It's just as easy it's easier and cheaper to go and get and buy them. But it's just how satisfying, you know, but I don't want a garden, garden like digged in the earth. I want to grow things in pots and tubs.

SPEAKER_00 35:12

And yeah, planter or whatever.

SPEAKER_01 35:13

Yeah, you know, like a big container with potatoes in, and you just empty that, you know, container out. Yeah. I just remember in New Zealand that um we had new potatoes out of the garden for Christmas Day.

SPEAKER_00 35:29

Nice.

SPEAKER_01 35:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 35:31

Nice. Well, the thing is, if you could find somebody with a couple of potatoes, all you need is like a grow bag stood on its end and use that like a planter and you know, then break that open.

unknown 35:42

Shh.

SPEAKER_00 35:43

Don't tell anybody, but I've got them already.

unknown 35:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 35:50

Excellent. I'm going to give them to the hubster tonight to say here are my potatoes. Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

unknown 35:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 35:59

So I've chittered them and everything. You've chittered them. Golly, you see, you even know what you're talking about. It's when you know when you have I know I know what it is. Yeah, sorry. But it is a funny expression, and they look so wizened. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 36:15

But anyway, that listeners that don't know. You know, when you get an old sort of potato and it's gone in the bag.

SPEAKER_00 36:23

Forgotten in the bag.

SPEAKER_01 36:25

Yeah, and then it has things growing out of it. Well, could you actually plant those?

SPEAKER_00 36:32

We have planted some. I mean, it it's better it's better to buy proper seed potato, but it will work.

SPEAKER_01 36:38

Yeah. I've I've got the I've got the cloth bag, so it's like um like a fibre bag, yeah, so it'll decompose, and you put a bit of compost in, you put your potatoes in, and then you put a bit more compost and soil on top, and then when the green shoots poke through, you put more soil on and keep going like that till you know your big container is full to the top, and then when you empty it all out, you know, there's all these potatoes that have grown, hopefully.

SPEAKER_00 37:10

Yeah. I refer you to my earlier question. Are you impulsively?

SPEAKER_01 37:15

Well, see, I'm gonna admit something now. I've bought a subscription box, yeah? From pot, it's called pot gang. So you get three different sounds like an interesting subscription, yeah. Three things, and you get all the pots and you get the compost and and everything. Um and and it arrives on your doorstep. Now, I did think about it. I didn't just, you know, go out and get it. Yeah, didn't think about it for a while, and then I mentioned it to my husband, and because he didn't say no, and he thought, oh, you know, you could actually see that he was interested. I signed up immediately. So we have now got two boxes that need to be planted up. Excellent. Yeah. But I guess if you think about it, I'm saying we need to do this, and he says, We're moving, I've got to move all the stuff down if we plant and but no, I want to get them started now.

SPEAKER_00 38:26

So again, I guess you know, you're joining some dots up here, aren't you? You know, you're joining the dots up of for 19 years, you haven't lived in something. I know that your new place is a rental, but you haven't lived in somewhere that felt like you could have a garden, felt like it was you were kind of putting down roots to use a horticultural phrase. Um, you know, whereas I think it's quite exciting that you're thinking, you know, I'm gonna grow some potatoes. Our philosophy is to grow uh things which are expensive. Okay. So, like we wouldn't grow potatoes because A, there are only two of us, and we know B, we don't eat a lot of them, and C, they're not particularly expensive. We do eat lots of tomatoes and and peppers and chili, and we really like asparagus. Oh, all that's coming.

SPEAKER_01 39:18

That all that's yeah, yep. I just like the idea of potatoes because they grow it grows in a big container. I like the idea of it being in a tub.

SPEAKER_00 39:30

It's quite a visual thing as well, isn't it? Yeah, and I think because you've got that memory of you know, new potatoes on a Kiwi Christmas, I think that's a nice thing to think there's nothing nicer than new potatoes and a slab of butter. Gosh, you're making me hungry now.

SPEAKER_01 39:46

Salt and pepper. Oh, don't you?

SPEAKER_00 39:49

Can we just make me hungry? So to get back to our topic about joining the dots, do you think it's possible? Knowing that in looking back, you can see the jots, the dots joining together. Do you think there is any way in which you could plan in a way that might be more conducive to being joined up, you know, so that you're thinking, well, if I do A, then that could possibly lead to B, and then I know person C, you know, so you're almost like trying to not force the dots to join up, but creating more opportunities for them to join up.

SPEAKER_01 40:39

I think I do do that, so I'm very good at, you know, um what you said, planning forward, you know. And and you know, if I do this and that and that, and you know, I've just I've just got to wait. I that's what I need to do. I need to have faith. Well, this I can see what's happened before. I need to have faith that those dots are going to be joined. I don't know whether I plan plan it consciously, but I think I do, but subconsciously. Well, maybe good at seeing how things fit together, yes.

SPEAKER_00 41:23

And maybe, like you were saying, you want to kind of introduce um perhaps a little pause for your brain to catch up with your mouth. Um, you know, maybe you can when you are sort of looking at these sort of forward ideas that are exciting and interesting, maybe you can introduce a little pause and think, well, if I'm doing that, what other ramifications might that have? You know, who else who else might want to know about that that I work with, or how how could I get them involved, you know, or whatever. So maybe make your um your dots even more likely to connect, yeah. And then, like you say, have the faith or the courage or the whatever to just wait for that to happen. Yeah. So you know, you've had you you've got the courage to do it in the first place, and then you've got the the confidence to sort of this has worked out before, a bit like your potatoes. You can remember seeing potatoes grow and you know, the the joy of that, you know, pulling the plant up and seeing all those potatoes at the at the bottom of a funny green stalk, and it's really exciting. You can remember that, so you have the confidence that if you plant these potatoes in a few months' time, you'll be doing that.

SPEAKER_01 42:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 42:37

So we're joining the potatoes, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 42:39

And I it's definitely having the confidence, courage, and faith to knowing know what knowing that whatever I'm doing now will connect those dots, will work. I've just got to be a bit more patient. So, you know, I've I've mentioned to you this morning that, you know, we thought we were moving into the house on on one date, it's now gonna be another date, but I've got to have confidence that what we're doing to get pla to do the planning and the preparing for that is all gonna be, oh wow, look, oh all those dots have joined, and I am building other things into that because where we're going, it's going to have opportunities for well shot as well. And I'm already building those things to to to to do in our location, and you know, whether that's big events for wellshot or one to ones, um, or wellshot for children, um, or some of the charity work that we want to do. Yeah. Um, and I didn't it's only now that I'm even talking about it that I realise what I'm doing. So maybe. So yeah. So maybe I have planned for it, and now I'm seeing all these little dots again. And then one day they'll they'll be joined. It's exciting.

SPEAKER_00 44:11

It is exciting. And so I would say if you're listening to this, and you know, you've you've heard us talking about that Lee and the decisions she's made in her personal life and and in her professional life as well, and how those have worked out and how she sees the bigger picture now. I would ask you just to take a few minutes and think about things that have happened in your own life that at the time may have seemed sort of um unconnected or um just you know downright irritating or frustrating, um, and you wondered sort of what it was all about. Maybe you know, you were um you lost your job or um your child didn't get into the first choice of school or your house sale fell through, you know, something sort of unexpected uh that that happened, and then you had to pivot and make other decisions. Can you look back now and see how you know the pieces have fallen into place? You can see the picture now. Um, and and does that give you courage going forward to know that when unexpected things happen, you can deal with them, you can make plans, and you know, things will things will work out if like Lee, you're prepared, prepared to sort of sit with that uh and allow things to unfold and and do what you can to to bring it to a positive outcome. So there's a little bit of homework for you if you're listening to this. So I feel like you've done that homework in this conversation, Lee.

SPEAKER_01 45:40

Yeah, yeah. I've I've really enjoyed this talk. I love that connecting the dots quite. Yeah. And I was thinking I like your analogy too, by that um your author about the forwardness of it.

SPEAKER_00 45:58

Life can only be understood backwards, but it must be lived forwards. Yeah. But I think it's a lot easier to live your life forwards if you have the confidence that definitely things can, you know, things have worked out. They may not have worked out the way you planned, um, you know, but but they have worked out and you've grown through that, you've become stronger, you've um, you know, made new relationships with people, you've learnt stuff about yourself, you've learnt, you know, new skills or or added to your kind of bank of experience.

SPEAKER_01 46:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 46:31

So if you'd like to connect with us, readers, uh listeners, if you'd like to connect with us listeners, uh, you can get in touch with us um through a link uh beneath the um uh show notes. Um if you've got any ideas or questions for us, we'd love to hear them. Um, and please connect us with other people by sharing this podcast and with your friends or your colleagues. And Lee, as always, I'd like to say big thank you to you for such an interesting conversation.

SPEAKER_01 47:00

It's been a brilliant conversation. Um gets listened to. I hope life does happen and we can't record a planned episode, and Neil has to say. And this will be it.

SPEAKER_00 47:13

Yeah. Well, you if if we haven't used it, we'll just make it a bonus episode sometime. So have a great day, everybody. Thank you for listening. Thank you for being here with me today, Lee, and I look forward to being back on courage and confidence soon. Okay, bye, everybody.

SPEAKER_01 47:33

Bye.