From Survival Mode to Identity on Purpose - Leah Coss on Rebuilding Who You Are to Live Fulfilled

What if the life you're chasing is being blocked by the identity you've unconsciously built just to survive?

In this powerful conversation, Leah Coss - speaker, author, and co-founder of Build a Biz Kids - shares her personal transformation from self-doubt and burnout to building a life rooted in purpose, clarity, and impact.

Leah’s story is as relatable as it is inspiring. She grew up entrepreneurial and independent, but behind the scenes, was silently battling pressure, depression, and misalignment. What changed everything? Rebuilding her identity - on purpose - and aligning it with the life she was meant to lead.

We explore:

• Why so many high-achievers feel “off” despite success
• The hidden cost of identities shaped by survival and external validation
• How to become the version of yourself you admire — now, not someday
• The power of identity alignment for leadership, relationships, and fulfillment

Whether you’re a young professional navigating transition, or a leader longing for deeper impact, this episode will leave you with fresh language, bold perspective, and permission to become who you’re meant to be.

Listen in - because your next level of growth isn’t about doing more, but becoming more aligned.

Transcript

0:05

So for my story and why identity is so powerful to me, you can look at identity as mindset, which is a really big topic these days that people talk about all the time, right? But essentially identity is how are you... How are you showing up in the world? So one is an external component. Reactivity is the biggest indicator. Like if someone cuts you off in traffic, if somebody says something that you don't like, are you the shy person who takes it? Are you the aggressive person that tells them where to go? Do you try to retaliate by being mean? What is that reactivity? Because it's when your guard is down that kind of who you are comes out or the insecurities that you have start to show. The other is when you're on your own, what do you say to yourself? What are you talking and saying in your head internally? How do you feel when you're by yourself? Are you a happy person when you're by yourself? Are you lonely? Do you feel like something is missing? Are you angry at the world? What is that internal dialogue? And that I believe is what really forms your identity. Because those are the things that essentially creates the lens with which you are viewing your world. And when we're kids, we just don't have a lot of perspective. Any identity we've been given, so much of how I viewed others or my strategies for feeling good about myself or the same strategies that my mom had or my dad had, and they were not healthy. You know, they'd be things like, you know, backhanded compliments, pulling people down so that you feel better about yourself. um Those were all things that I used to do. Now, the big shift though that I've reflected on and the thing that I'm so grateful for, used to say, I don't know why all of a sudden I changed literally overnight from that destructive teenager into a capable, successful human in life that could contribute meaningfully to society. I just used to always say there must have been something that was born in me. I'm just so grateful for it. Whatever it was, the light shone down. I've now come to realize that was not the case. I had already created a younger identity, a younger persona when I was about 10, 11 years old, where I really believed in my heart of hearts I was gonna take over the world. I was super capable. I was really confident. I was able to make good decisions. Ultimately, I just knew this. And then over time, because I was... flailing a little bit to feel a sense of self and autonomy. I made these series of bad decisions and it took me way off path. I was able to reflect in that moment and go, yeah, like this is not taking me to where I'm supposed to be. Like I really felt like I was supposed to be somewhere else after graduation. And at this rate, I'm not even going to graduate. And so when I look forward now, and there was a number of things over the last 10 years where it's just not feeling satisfying, it's still not where I feel like I'm supposed to be, I recognize that I kind of hit the limit of who I was and what I was capable of holding. Because practically, In this day and age, with technology, like what you're doing right now, like back in the day, you'd have to create a radio station and there'd be so many other things you'd have to do. Right now, you literally have a computer and you're good. Like, you you set up a piece of software and you get someone who wants to talk to you and you have got your own platform. And so things are so much easier for us to be successful and it's not difficult task wise to do the things you need to do to be successful. We just don't do them, because there's a part of us that says, I'm not that kind of person. But what if they replied to that email? What if they picked up the phone? I'm not the kind of person that knows what to say. I'm not the type of person that, you know, fill in the blank. So that's been that process and that journey for me over these next 10 years or for the past 10 years and now moving forward into my next 10 year chapter of who am I today? But more importantly, what is it that I want? And then who do I need to become in order to hold that, to have that, to achieve that in a way that feels really authentic and that I'm not going to be self-sabotaging and making life harder than it needs to be along the way. Hello and welcome to a new episode of the podcast Life and Leadership Connected Podcast. And today's guest is someone who embodies the phrase 'Build a Life on Purpose'. Her name is Leah, Leah Cross. And she's a speaker, author and philanthropist and the co-founder and CEO of something called 'Build-A-Biz-Kids' which is a Canadian charity equipping youth across the country with the real world skills and emotional intelligence they need to thrive in an ever-changing world. But Lea's story isn't just about professional success. It's about transformation. From a turbulent childhood and high-achieving career marked by burnout and self-doubt to a turning point where she reclaimed her identity, rewired her beliefs and rebuilt her life on purpose Leah now helps others to do the same thing. Her message is clear. If any part of your life feels off, it's not because you're broken. It might be because you're trying to live a big life without an identity built for survival, not fulfillment. In this conversation, Leah will probably share we can shift from a default to design, not only as leaders, but also as whole humans. Let's dive in and welcome to the Life & Leadership Connected podcast Leah! Thank you so much for having me, it's pleasure. Lea, It would be great to hear from your own voice, tell a little bit about yourself. Take us back to your early years. Who was young Leah? were some of the experiences that shaped you, your identity growing up? You know, my story is not super uncommon. I was a child of divorce. My parents divorced when I was four. They were childhood sweethearts, but it just didn't work out. And it was a very, it was not amicable. It was a very not good divorce, which created not great energy between the two and a lot of confusion for a child of that age. They also both then ended up in other relationships where those other partners were going through their own things. At the time just manifested as creating a really toxic and abusive household. And for the younger part of me, I really grew up not trusting the adults that were in my life. I grew up feeling very helpless, like they were making decisions like where we're gonna live, who's gonna be allowed in our home. You know, they label you as all parents do in ways that they think they're either being funny or they think they're being supportive, but you know, ends up creating identities for us, who we believe we are and how we're supposed to show up. When we receive love, you know, is based on if I'm outspoken, if I act confident, whether I am or not, I would get a lot of praise for that. So I grew up with this persona that I was an aggressive person that got what they wanted and was outspoken, rude, you know, but that was good. She was a powerful young girl, right? Standing up for what she wanted. But ultimately it was just me really trying to find some sort of autonomy in a world where as a child you don't get to make any of the important decisions in your life. And you're of along for the ride. So the moment that I became a teenager, as many teenagers do, we take whatever little power we can get and we abuse it, which ends up hurting ourselves. So I made a lot of terrible decisions as a teenager. Pretty much everything a parent would hate for their child to be into, I did. I was using drugs, I was selling drugs. got tattoos. I got tattoos at 15, homemade. I was living with my boyfriend. Started falling behind in school and actually went to an alternative school so I wasn't gonna graduate on time. Doing criminal activity, all kinds of things. That was my way of feeling like they may not be good decisions but they're my decisions. There's a certain sense of satisfaction you get when your parents are now the ones feeling helpless. So that I think is a fairly common trajectory. The difference is that some of us pull ourselves out of that and some of us don't. Some of us just takes longer. Some of us make huge strides and others don't. And that's really where as you get older, I think you can only have those types of reflections once you get older, and those things become less triggering for us and emotionally fueled, that we can look objectively and go, wow, what happened there? What could have happened differently? And then how do I relate that to how things move going forward? So for my story and why identity is so powerful to me, you can look at identity as mindset, which is a really big topic these days that people talk about all the time, right? But essentially identity is how are you... How are you showing up in the world? So one is an external component. Reactivity is the biggest indicator. Like if someone cuts you off in traffic, if somebody says something that you don't like, are you the shy person who takes it? Are you the aggressive person that tells them where to go? Do you try to retaliate by being mean? What is that reactivity? Because it's when your guard is down that kind of who you are comes out or the insecurities that you have start to show. The other is when you're on your own, what do you say to yourself? What are you talking and saying in your head internally? How do you feel when you're by yourself? Are you a happy person when you're by yourself? Are you lonely? Do you feel like something is missing? Are you angry at the world? What is that internal dialogue? And that I believe is what really forms your identity. Because those are the things that essentially creates the lens with which you are viewing your world. And when we're kids, we just don't have a lot of perspective. Any identity we've been given, so much of how I viewed others or my strategies for feeling good about myself or the same strategies that my mom had or my dad had, and they were not healthy. You know, they'd be things like, you know, backhanded compliments, pulling people down so that you feel better about yourself. um Those were all things that I used to do. Now, the big shift though that I've reflected on and the thing that I'm so grateful for, used to say, I don't know why all of a sudden I changed literally overnight from that destructive teenager into a capable, successful human in life that could contribute meaningfully to society. I just used to always say there must have been something that was born in me. I'm just so grateful for it. Whatever it was, the light shone down. I've now come to realize that was not the case. What it was is there was this moment that I remember very clearly. I was sitting on the stairwell in my boyfriend's home. So I was only about 16 at the time and his mom and he were having a conversation and it was about me and him in this kind of toxic relationship. I believe in this conversation. The reason I could hear it was because it was not being said to me. Because if you tried to talk to me at that age, I was very defensive. Like, you don't know what you're talking about, turning off. But I was overhearing this. And it almost didn't even matter what it was that was said. But it was basically saying, you guys aren't good for each other. Like, what do you think is going to happen from all of this? Like, where are you guys going? Now, that conversation would have just been like, oh, wow, yeah, let's ponder that, right? But then we continue with the destructive behavior. Why that was so poignant to me at that point was I had already created a younger identity, a younger persona when I was about 10, 11 years old, where I really believed in my heart of hearts I was gonna take over the world. I was super capable. I was really confident. I was able to make good decisions. Ultimately, I just knew this. And then over time, because I was... flailing a little bit to feel a sense of self and autonomy. I made these series of bad decisions and it took me way off path. I was able to reflect in that moment and go, yeah, like this is not taking me to where I'm supposed to be. Like I really felt like I was supposed to be somewhere else after graduation. And at this rate, I'm not even going to graduate. That was super disjointed. That poor guy, the moment he went upstairs after that conversation with his mom, I broke up with him. I ended up getting two jobs, every day after school. I worked on the weekends. I got my driver's license because I hadn't gotten it yet. Got my first car. It cost me $500. I ended up going back to regular school, taking extra courses during lunch hours and such, graduated on time, and as they say, the rest is history. Now, I still had a lot of mental health and things that I was recovering from through my adulthood, as many of us do. But I was able to have that massive change. And it felt really easy. It was just like super objective, like, okay, well, that means I got to stop hanging out with these people. I got to start spending my time differently. You know, let's go do the things that we all know we should do. We just don't for whatever self-sustaining reason. So how that identity was created was during the time that I was in probably one of the more toxic households with my stepfather, my stepbrother and I, we loved money. And uh we loved uh creating things. And uh that was during a time when your 11 year old could go take a bus and you weren't shamed by their parents or your kids being out on their own. So if it wasn't nailed down in the house, my brother and I were taking things and going to something called flea markets. Flea markets at that time, I mean, this was like 90s, really early 90s. It was all just senior citizens selling their old antiques, you know? There's, we're not seeing kids there ever. And here we were taking the bus, getting there on our own, bringing our products, talking to strangers and making money. And that was this first glimpse into me demonstrating to myself. No parent was telling me, you can have a business, you can be successful, you can make money. That stuff feels good, but it doesn't necessarily impact our confidence in who we are. I was demonstrating to myself and during that time when things were really bad, I just built this knowingness that if things got really bad, I could leave. I can hop on a bus. I can make money. I can talk to strangers. I can ask for help. I can do a lot of things. And I had some role models at the time as well that were business oriented people and I was just like, that's who I'm gonna be. I'm gonna be able to take over the world. Now that... I lost sight of over time being a teenager and being distracted, but I was able to rely on that identity when I needed it. And so when I look forward now, and there was a number of things over the last 10 years where it's just not feeling satisfying, it's still not where I feel like I'm supposed to be, I recognize that I kind of hit the limit of who I was and what I was capable of holding. Because practically, In this day and age, with technology, like what you're doing right now, like back in the day, you'd have to create a radio station and there'd be so many other things you'd have to do. Right now, you literally have a computer and you're good. Like, you you set up a piece of software and you get someone who wants to talk to you and you have got your own platform. And so things are so much easier for us to be successful and it's not difficult task wise to do the things you need to do to be successful. We just don't do them, because there's a part of us that says, I'm not that kind of person. But what if they replied to that email? What if they picked up the phone? I'm not the kind of person that knows what to say. I'm not the type of person that, you know, fill in the blank. So that's been that process and that journey for me over these next 10 years or for the past 10 years and now moving forward into my next 10 year chapter of who am I today? But more importantly, what is it that I want? And then who do I need to become in order to hold that, to have that, to achieve that in a way that feels really authentic and that I'm not going to be self-sabotaging and making life harder than it needs to be along the way. Wow, interesting. So it was your stepfather brought you into entrepreneurship? Inadvertly. He did have his own business which was a common thing back then. And it was like your..., this uh moment when you realized that you were with your boyfriend and you realized something is wrong here. Would you say that's the turning point that turned you from that environment and you started your trajectory to what you're doing today? I would say that that was one of the turning points. know, I think it's kind of like when you say, you know, what's your favorite book or who you idolize or, you know, what was that one thing in life? I think there's different stages in life. Unless someone who's just perpetually stuck in the same, there's a lot of people like, you know, people in my family that I know where they have just been stuck in the same mindset their entire life. They may have never had a turning point. But for others, I think when you become really conscious of what you want and how that relates to who you are, you have multiple turning points. And I'd say that was probably the biggest one that I reflect on. But there's been others along the way, whether that be a turning point in my health, a turning point in that for the majority of my life, I really identified as somebody where I'm just depressed. Depression isn't something that I'm going to cure. Depression is just something I'm going to learn to manage. Mm-hmm. just who I am. I'm not a happy person. I get to have happy moments, but I'm not happy. know, like all of these had turning points in order for me to get to where I am today. Yeah, good. Thank you. Thank you. You shared before that even though you looked confident and successful on the outside, inside you felt disconnected? Can you maybe talk about that season of internal misalignment? What was happening behind the scenes? Maybe share some thoughts. What was spinning in your head a little bit? You know, there's, I'm sure, you know, imposter syndrome is something that a lot of people are hearing more and more about. You could call it imposter syndrome, but there's also other reasons that we feel this disjointedness. And it's because it's a defense mechanism. So for me, I was always praised, my mother was very shy. And so even if we're at the grocery store and she wanted to know where the ketchup was, she'd send me, you know, a little three year old to go ask the clerk. Where's the ketchup? And so I just grew up with this praise that I get love and appreciated when I act confident, when I show no fear, when I talk to strangers or when I say things. Then there was that whole era, especially with girls and such, when a girl speaks her mind, back in the 90s, you were heavily praised. then if a woman can put a man in his place, you're heavily praised, right? yeah. All of these became personas where when I would say something, whether it was serving me or not, whether it was mean or it was kind, I had built this persona of, you know, the more aggressive that I am as a girl and the more outspoken I am, seemed to respond to that, better or worse. The thing is, is that ended up becoming a big defense mechanism. If you wanted to come at me with logic or tell me I'd done something wrong, my goal was not to be right, it was to make you feel terrible. You know, and to pull you down. If you felt lower, I would then theoretically be higher. Sometimes I would just want to fight a point because it wasn't about how do I want this relationship to end in terms of at the end of this conversation. Do I want us to be friends? Do I want us to be partners? Do I want us to collaborate? I never looked at the end goal. My goal would be to make you feel wrong, even if my point wasn't right. It's all just a defense mechanism, to cover the actual insecurity that I felt. I did not love or like myself for the vast majority of my life. There was so many memories I would have and I'd come home and I'd like, what did you say that for? That was so mean, that was unnecessary. You looked stupid, you know? And yet you can't help it in the moment because that had been so ingrained as this, the quicker you are, the more wittier you are, the faster you are, the more... praise somehow a reaction I would get and that just became habitual. It also did feel good for a moment in the time, leading right up to the words coming out of my mouth. It would feel really good, like I'm onto something, I'm getting somewhere here, right? And then you would feel the energy shift and just feel really bad. You know, to some degrees, it is an imposter syndrome. I also grew up in the fake it till you make it kind of category, you know, act confident even when you're not, Yeah. syndrome. And then the defense mechanisms was probably the biggest. What's interesting is there needs to be lot of clarity around what is shifting your identity into someone new or evolved or different and what's the difference between that and imposter syndrome or faking it till you make it. And the difference is when you're faking it till you're making it, you're literally faking it because you don't believe it. Mm-hmm. Yeah. into it knowing, I don't believe this. I just need to trick everybody in the room. And then when I go home at night, I will continue to be the same person that I was. When it comes to shifting your identity, it's very intentional. And it, and when you're shifting your identity, it's about helping your brain to start to realize that, um, there's already evidence that you are the person you want to be. Mm-hmm. But because you believe you're not that person, your mind is only queuing into the things that prove that you're not that person. So for example, maybe somebody has really held an identity that they're shy. I'm just a really shy person. I don't like talking in public crowds. I don't do public speaking. Don't put me on the spot. This is just not who I am. Mm-hmm. Their mind, if somebody says, you're not shy, do you remember that time? Like that you did this and that, they'd be like, no, no. And they can list off because all they can remember is the evidence that their brain has collected because something called your reticular activating system, it triggers. It's always looking for evidence of whatever it is that you're wanting on your radar or evidence to validate something that you believe. And this could have started right from a really young age. Your mom or dad could have very innocently when you went to meet somebody and somebody goes, hi little girl. What's your name? And you don't answer right away. And your mom goes, don't mind her. She's shy. And that label just stuck with you. And your reticular activating system that was so young is just this sponge going, am I? Yeah, I guess so. Look at all the evidence. And now that's all that it sees. Opportunities for you to be shy, opportunities that you were shy, even though. When you're comfortable around your friends, you have no problem talking, even though you had to ask a question in class when you were in school and you had no problem with it because it was a genuine question that popped in your head you needed the answer for. Your mind doesn't retain that because you haven't asked it to. So when you decide, I want to become a person more like this, it's about you starting to embody it and you creating reminders to reprogram that reticular activating system, your RAS, so that it starts remembering all of the previous evidence, but also moving forward, it starts looking for opportunities where you are able to demonstrate that new ability. And that's the difference. You're not an imposter because you are building a belief around it by creating and finding and seeing the evidence that already exists. Yeah, wow. Thank you. Thank you. We'll come to conversation about identity. But first, let's talk about Here comes the first of questions I always ask, everybody about in the podcast. And now it's about leadership. So tell us about your leadership, of yourself and others. What challenges or turning points shaped you to the person you are today? You've mentioned some of them. But if you would you know... say in a summary way, what would that be? Goodness, mean, you know, growing up in the 90s and 2000s, leadership had a different persona. It was the hard hitting, do the work, lowest person on the totem pole is getting fired this month. Like it was a much more aggressive time and it was very acceptable. Hazing, I was hazed in my first job growing up. So I'd say those impacted me, but they're not the things that turned me into the leader today because today the world very much has changed. And if you are a business owner or a manager of any number of team members, you know that when you hire someone in their 20s, it is an experience that you may not be equipped with because people in their 20s, they have different requirements of what matters to them in a job. In my case, it was around pay and bonuses, getting to flex the perks of the company. that they were giving you, right? These guys, you can give a raise to a 22 year old and they will turn it down if they don't like your company or your leadership style. They're willing to live at home until 27, 28, 30, really doesn't matter to them. They don't need to buy a fancy car because a lot of them aren't even getting their driver's license anymore. Money is not the biggest thing. Of course, everyone's a little bit different. But just speaking in generalities, this next generation wants to feel good about what they're doing. And that feeling good about the activities that they're doing in their job, it could be about the mission that the company holds. And then they're willing to do the crummiest job because it's fueling a mission. They're all a little bit different. The other factor that's really changed is youth under 25 have the highest rate of mental health challenges in any other age group. And so now you're also contending with them just not showing up one day because they couldn't get out of bed. Or they're using their mental health days very readily. And you're needing to obviously ensure the operations of your business survive, but also figure out how can I connect with these people? It's also a different age where you're not sticking with a company for 25 years to get the gold watch. It's been known for many years, you make more money by hopping from company to company every couple of Mm-hmm. more vast experience. So in the age where companies are also just not hiring as many employees, they're hiring contractors and people that are more contract oriented. So you have to flex your leadership. And with the charity that I run, 'Build-A-Biz Kids', we not only are helping kids in a very young age group get their future ready skills, flex human skills to prevent mental health challenges, but also our company is highly operated by youth under 30. So I feel like COVID was the greatest boot camp that I had for becoming a better leader. Because I was able to take some of the leadership strategies I had developed along the way, hiring practices and things like that, onboarding. But it really comes down to helping people feel your authenticity, because you're authentic, feel the authenticity of the company and your intentions. The other missing factor is you have to care about the people in your company. So in the interviews, the thing that really defined us is I would only ask three questions.

The last question being: 30:01

'What are your goals? Like you're probably, you're young. You're probably not going to be here long?' And I should mention all of these roles I was hiring for, I'll put in quotes, was for volunteer roles. Yeah. had up to 60 volunteers during COVID because all of these youth that used to get serving jobs or work at the state fair or whatever it was during the summer holidays and such, those jobs didn't exist during COVID. And so a lot of them were like, well, if I'm gonna do, the option of doing nothing or doing something, I may as well do something that's actually gonna help me towards my future career. So we had people doing technology programs for us and... Creating software doing our social media creating videos for us like doing really cool work and Projects that they can point to and build their portfolio around, but why were

they willing to do it for us out of every other company and it was because I said: 30:52

'I know you're not gonna be here forever. What is it you're looking for and that way I can make sure that you're walking away with skills or portfolio or a letter of reference or a bigger, better LinkedIn profile than when you started.' And I think because it's so hard for youth to, they feel so much insecurity because that scary question of what do you wanna do when you grow up, they don't know. There's too many choices. And when you let them know, I don't need you to know it all. I just wanna give you something. What can I give you from this company? knowing that you're probably gonna leave and do something else with it. Like it just helped them feel like they weren't, yeah, it took rid of the transactional feel that so many jobs feel like. It felt like a fun opportunity of work experience for them, uh which made them wanna do it that much better to dive in that much deeper. They asked a lot less questions because they were excited to figure it out because they knew that my expectations was simply for them to do what they're loving or wanting to do, I guess. Yeah, I feel like I'm starting to ramble now because I'm remembering literally so many of the people that came through and all of the different goals that they had. And some were only with us for a couple of weeks and others stayed to the point where I had one gal that started as a volunteer just doing some customer service phone calls for us during COVID in And she ended up being my right-hand gal, my coup, in the organization four years later. And the funny thing is I had never actually met her in person. She lived on the other side of the country and we had only really corresponded through Zoom. And that relationship was so incredibly helpful to me, massively helpful to her and what she's been able to go on and do now. So yeah, as a leader, it's so important that you understand as a leader, you're not there to lead for the sake of the company. As a leader, you're there to lead the people so that they can show up and do what they want to be great at that then just happens to also serve the company. You know what I mean? yeah, great. Great. Thank you for answer. You shared before You said that everything began to shift when you rebuilt your identity on purpose. And what did that process look like for you in your own life? Well, definitely it's a lot. It took a lot longer when I first started this journey than what it's taken me now to make these major leaps. And that's because I was kind of having to piece together different tips and tricks and figure out what was working and what was not. I mean, the end goal is to rewire how your brain interprets the world around them. Like quite literally, I was thinking about this just this morning, like everything that you can possibly conceive of in your mind. from the crazy cool things we see in future sci-fi movies and the technologies we see that don't currently exist, that being conceived because of that movie, that is a reality. It is a possibility. Likewise, there's really nothing that you can think of in your life. Like, if you're like, I want to be a published author. I want to be a movie star. I want to be a streamer. I want to be, you know, uh I want to have my own company, whatever it is. There are so many paths to that. And our minds of the life that we want are actually not that crazy because the things that we dream for the most part, there's like thousands, millions of people living or experiencing those things every single day. So it's very possible. We just somehow think that we're the exception to the rule and that it's not possible for us or it's gonna take a long time or whatever the case is, right? The goal is for you to simply see those pathways, believe that those pathways exist, I guess, first, and then to start understanding who you need to be, how you need to show up in order to get those things. So my process is pretty simple now. The first thing is to audit the what is it that you want. So start with anything. What is it that you want? It can be something tangible. It can be just a lifestyle. It can be how you want to feel every day, how you want to look. you want to achieve. What is it that you want? The second though, caveat to that is ask yourself seven times 'why' you want that. Meaning, you know, I want to run a marathon. Why do you want to run a marathon? Because it seems like a really good life, you know, journey and achievement. Why do you want to do that? Well, I know that I need to get exercise so that I can get, you know, healthier. So that seems like a good thing to do. Why do you want to get healthier? My doctor has just put me on some new medication. Make sure that you do that kind seven times deep. The reason being is it's an unfortunate thing when a lot of times we want something, but the reason we want it is because we feel like we're supposed to have it. I won't be accepted by society or my parents or my peers until I've got a million dollars or until I have a nice car or until I've got the job or the career. Do you really want that? And so you need to audit your why first to make sure it's something you actually authentically want. Otherwise, you will feel a disconnect and you will self-sabotage that journey because it's not authentic. Once you figure that out, then figure out who you need to be to get there. So what I like to do is just kind of visualize. And for some of you, you're more writers. Others like to visualize and see it. And I always suggest don't picture yourself. You know, lot of people say, picture yourself doing it. Now, a lot of times, there's a reason you can't do that. It's because you either laugh, your mind tells you that's stupid. You know, it just doesn't come together in an authentic way. So picture either a faceless avatar or someone you know who maybe you believe could achieve that. You can even plug in a celebrity or, you know, a character from a movie. I don't know why, but so often, like for a big part of my journey, was to get rid of that reactivity of wanting to pull other people down or to be so quick to have an answer for everything. And I just always pictured Denzel Washington, whether it be a person that he plays in a movie, like a character or him in real life, he is just one of the most stoic people. Like he could be like, I mean, gosh, what is some of his movies? Like, I'm going to murder your family. And he'd just be like, hmm. And he's processing and you're like, wait a minute, like, where's the reaction, right? But he's that. And so picture this kind of person, this figure, this avatar living that life or achieving that thing that you want and really analyze it. What are they doing? What are they thinking about? Like ask a lot of questions. What do they think about when they go home? Do they feel relaxed? Do they feel like they can put their feet up? Would they put their feet up or would they be hopping back on the computer? Would they go for a jog before they go to bed? Like what is this person look and act and feel like and write those traits down. And then your goal is for you to look at those traits and ask yourself, when have I ever demonstrated any of those things? No matter to what degree, you may not have an answer to any of them. Maybe you just have an answer to one or two of them. That's okay. That's a start. But you want to read those things and ponder it because what you're doing, and especially if you do it, in that moment right when you wake up in the morning or right before you go to bed when your brain is starting to shut down or hasn't quite booted up. It's that time that your brain feels a little more open and less impacted by the influences of external things or people or the news, right? And you're able to now look at this list and the goal is that the more you look at it, your reticular activating system, it just kicks in automatically. You're not gonna feel it. It's not like a car got turned on and it's like, vroom, vroom, okay, now we're off to the races. It's like, it'll just start and you'll probably first start to see those things in other people around you. Now when you're standing in the Starbucks line, you won't notice when someone's got an issue with how their macchiato is made. You'll see the person who's just really like, thank you so much, I appreciate that. And they walk away and they're just really kind and you're noticing these traits in others. And that's because you're activating, it's now kicking in. And then you'll start, noticing it in yourself where someone cuts you off in traffic and your reaction was different or the line of the grocery store is so long and before you would have been

really annoyed they're not opening up more tills but now you're just like: 39:33

'Oh, I think this is everybody actually they don't have anyone else that could open up a till...' like you're just you're different and and you're acknowledging it so it can feel like a slow process especially in the beginning and that's because you're not confident in the proccess. Once you get confident, the rewiring can start to happen a lot more rapidly. And that's, of course, the first step, because when you show up as a different person and react differently to the world around you, you're seeing the world different. You'll start to notice new opportunities. People will respond to you differently, giving you more opportunities. Now, of a sudden, the things that you want don't seem so far-fetched, and they just start to occur. Great, thank you. I wonder what made you realize that your identity wasn't fixed and could be rebuilt intentionally? Because many people think that, 'I am this way'. I think both you and I know that if they think they can't change, then they get really defensive when somebody criticizes them. What's your take on that? Yeah, you there's a lot that you just mentioned there of, know, I think that's why that moment on the stairwell was such a thing because I was hearing it without it being said to me. So I was able to receive that information, right? I was able to hear that, yeah, this is not a good life. Like maybe something should change. And depending on where you're at in life, influences around you, some of us really feel like the world is happening at us, and around us and we have no control over it. And you know what? You're right. There's a lot in the world you can't control. But that's not the point. The point is the things you interact with around you, you can control. And the things that are attracted to you because of who you are and what you're emulating and the energy you're putting out there, that you can control. I think for me, I've had many moments in life where I've been sick and tired of being sick and tired. Right? And that could be not happy with the money or the career or my physical body or as I mentioned before, that identity of just being depressed, feeling so helpless. And there's a moment that I hope everyone can experience when they have those moments being sick and tired, that you recognize that nobody is there to save you. And that's a good thing. Because it means you can start whenever you want by doing it yourself. And the best thing you can do is ask for help. And that doesn't mean even talking to a person. You may not have a lot of people to ask for help from that are helpful. There's a lot of people in my life I do not want their help because their mindset is not any healthier. But where can you go? Again, this day and age, you can literally create your own crew of influencers. Every morning still, I wake up. I have these incredible YouTube videos that I listen to which is just these people who put together compilations that will be all around belief or compilations that are all about visualization or compilations all about achieving big things. And I just listen to those on repeat and it programs my mind. I read a lot of books. When I say read, I'm more of a audio book person. And I've swung the gamut of everything from things on growth mindset with Carol Dweck. or spirituality and reprogramming the bringing with Joe Dispenza. The hard working work ethic of Layla and Alex Hormozi. mean, Mel Robbins, I actually bought one of her journals and it was quite a great thing. A big part of my journey when I was navigating depression was just trying to get a way of how I was feeling on a day-to-day basis. We don't check in with ourselves. on a lot of basis, we just kind of take for granted how we feel and never question it, never ask if we want to feel something different. And so I've had a lot of gurus and a lot of influence. And all I can say is just if there's something in you that knows fundamentally, you're just a person like everybody else with, know, physicality that's basically the same, the internal organs, the brain functions, all of this stuff. And you know that there probably is a way that you could feel differently and live a different life if there's just any glimmer in there. Start going down that rabbit hole. YouTube, get those algorithms changing. Get rid of all of the crime documentaries and the negative cops arresting people videos and the Garen videos or whatever, people aggressively in public. Get your algorithms changed. Have it start bringing up things of belief and people who have accomplished big things coming from really tough backgrounds. Inspire yourself and remind your brain that you can do it too because that's all it is. It doesn't remember what you don't allow it to remember, what it's not programmed to remember. yeah, yeah, great. Thank you. We are going to take a short break here for maybe 20, 30 seconds and we'll come back very soon. Hi there, just taking a quick pause. If something in this conversation is resonating with you. Maybe you are in a season of transition, or you starting to ask deeper questions about purpose and direction. I want you to know you are not alone. If you would like to explore what coaching could look like, or just take the next step toward clarity and impact, you're warmly invited to visit lifeleadshipconnected.com. And while you're there, grab your free copy of my brand new ebook, the "Identity to Impact Starter a Guide". It's full of practical reflections to help you reconnect with who you are and where you are going. of this is waiting for you at lifeleadshipconnected.com. Now back to the episode. Hello and welcome back to the Life and Leadership Connected podcast. Today I have a conversation Leah Coss. Before mispronounced last name. Your name is Leah Coss and else. It's okay. It's a really common thing. I even get mailed with cross. People just see an R in there. Okay. Here's a quote

that I heard you said: 45:55

"We try to live a big life with an identity built for survival". I wonder what does it take to begin shifting that identity? Yeah, I mean, the first one is to want to, you know, that kind of moment of being sick and tired of how you're feeling. The second is to recognize that it is really up to you, but you can have supports around you. Just make sure that there are supports that are going to help you and believe in you as much as you want to believe in yourself on this journey. And that may not include family and friends. That's why this day and age of having technology that brings people from around the world with a positive mindset or mindsets that you aspire towards, you can have right in the palm of your hand on your phone through YouTube videos, podcasts like yours. You can truly immerse yourself into another world that exists out there and is very common for people. Living good lives, happy lives, successful lives is a very common place for people who have already made that identity shift. Yeah. The second is really make sure that you're not trying to hit an end goal. You know, I've had a lot of transitions in my identity and how I believe myself to be, how I show up to the world, how I see the world, and it's still growing. I am not to say unhappy. I am just knowing I can achieve and have and hold so much more, but I also know that I need to continue evolving into that person, that next threshold of a person, right? Like the person who can handle managing a thousand dollars is different than the hundred thousand dollars. You know, because the person with the one thousand dollar mindset, if they win the lottery, it's been documented in a scary way. A lot of people who win the lottery end up not only being broke within three to five years, but they actually have more debt than when they started. And that's because you had the one thousand dollar mindset and it felt really uncomfortable having a hundred thousand dollars in your bank account. You just started spending it and sabotaging it. So even when something feels like it's right there and you can have it, you kind of sabotage it. So yeah, so you're not done. You're never done. And this is meant to be a fun journey. If you can really embrace the fun of it, it also helps you laugh at yourself when you maybe don't react the way that you were hoping you would react or something like that. But it's just that process that I mentioned, ask what you want, make sure it's something you want and it's not something else wants. And then visualize who has that and what do they have and start reprogramming your mind with that, and there's a lot of different tricks and tips for that. You know, you can write your 'I am affirmations', there's something that I use which is like that but it helps you create belief and get to a state of gratitude and even beyond gratitude which is called an 'emotional pathway', so if you're feeling depressed and you want to feel good, to make the leap from depression to gratitude is too big of a leap. It's the same reason where maybe something really horrible happened in your world and you're feeling really angry and your friend comes over and they put their arm around you and they say, everything's gonna be fine. You kind a just wanna punch them. You're like, you can't pull me into happiness from where I'm at. And that's why you're feeling so jarring. Meanwhile, you sleep on it the next day, you come to that conclusion. Yeah, everything's fine, right? Hmm. Because it's not as big of a leap you've reset yourself asleep. So the emotional pathway is basically this journey you take from whatever state of emotion you're in and you talk yourself into smaller increments of 'That's that's not as big of a leap', so for example if you're in depression, you're probably feeling a lot of numbness, helplessness. This feeling of despair like like there's just something holding you down. You can't even get up out of bed. Hmm. Well, getting energy moving into rage, jealousy, even though it's external, right? It's okay. Externalize it. Be jealous, be angry, be full of rage. Want revenge on people. Wouldn't that be great? I'd to take revenge on that barista yesterday that made my macchiato wrong, right? Whatever it is, feel that. Get the energy moving inside of you. And that's a much easier leap for you than going straight to gratitude. But you don't want to stay there, right? Now you want to work up to maybe know, disappointment, you know, keep the energy moving. And so to do that, you want to feel each of those emotions really authentically. And I always say, it out loud, because when you also hear your irrational thoughts out loud, it's easier to be objective, right?

And so you might be like: 50:32

'I'm feeling just really, really sad, really depressed. I feel like I can't even get out of bed. I hate it when other people look like they make it so easy. Why do they make it look so easy? Gosh, I wish all of their tires would be flat and you someone would trip the trip them when they go for their morning runs tired of looking at them, right? I'm so disappointed in myself. Why can't I feel that way? Why can't...' You can almost feel it getting lighter? Even though it's still a negative emotion, right and then from there you get into overwhelm and frustration So overwhelmed, like: 'Where do I start? There's like these 5 a.m. Clubs and there's so many books. I'm supposed to read like I don't Where do I start? I'm so incredibly frustrated. Why can't I figure out a solution?' From there, you get into impatience or pessimism, you know, just like: 'Maybe this just isn't for me. Maybe I'm not supposed to be a happy person. Maybe I'm,...' But can you see how different of an energy that feels now compared to a despair, right?

And then you get into just a state of: 51:32

'You know what, it is what it is. I'm bored of the topic. Like there's just, I'm over it. It doesn't matter. Who cares? I don't really care, right?' Now you've kind of come into this state of almost like neutrality to a degree. And you can almost get into a point of surrendering in a good way.

Then you want to move up to: 51:58

'Maybe, maybe there is a way. I mean, I know that if, I know if I read a book, at the very least I'd learn something. I know that others have felt this way and they've gone on to tell their stories on stages.' You're kind of moving into hopefulness, some optimism, but that is not a big leap from where you just were, but it's huge leap from the depression you are feeling. And then from there, you can go into like feeling positive about things, some expectations and even get into gratitude: 'I'm so grateful that, you know, I have the opportunity to even have books. In fact, I can go on YouTube and I can go onto Spotify and I can listen to things. I mean, it's great to know I've got resources.' And then past gratitude, people always say gratitude is like the thing. It's not, because gratitude is still comparing it to a negative alternative.'I'm so grateful that I have this, because it could be so different.' The higher state above that is appreciation and unconditional love. Mm-hmm. This not needing anything to be different, even the bad things in the world.'I don't need them to be different. They're there. They're serving a purpose. I just feel so good knowing that I'm here and I'm able to be and I'm able to exist and that I have so many opportunities around me, right?' You're getting to that state. So that's the emotional journey and pathway, so to speak, that can help you from wherever you're feeling. Yeah. to get to that state of gratitude and beyond in these smaller leaps. Because when we sit down to read those I am statements, I am a millionaire, I am amazing, I have a loving partner, and you have those things in your life, you can actually sometimes be doing harm because the moment you say it, your mind is going, no, you don't. And that's just reinforcing your reticular activating system to go, yeah, remember all those times, all those horrible relationships, remember how you got that money and then you immediately lost the money, right? It's reinforcing that. Yeah. Yeah. you can say those I am statements really authentically from a good place. do people get stuck the most in your opinion? mean, what are some signs that someone might be operating from an outdated identity? If you find yourself having a lot of irritating conversations in your head with yourself, you're probably stuck somewhere. You know, can have just observed somebody. There's been times where somebody will park like an idiot. I don't even know who the person is, but because I'm feeling a certain state of mind, my brain is like, ooh, grab onto that. at, you can pick apart the person parked like an idiot over there and You start having whole conversations with this person of, if I bumped into them, I'd be like, what are you doing? Don't you have any consideration for the people that you're having these whole conversations? There's nobody there. If you find yourself having that, maybe it's not as petty as that. But it's just to show if you are circulating conversations with you that don't feel good, maybe you're having debates with yourself because you just finished saying something where you felt like you put your foot in your You're yourself for that. You cringe like 30 times in 30 seconds because it keeps popping back in your head no matter how much you try to get it to stop. That's because your brain's still connected to this identity that that's who you are. So let's have an example. Maybe you have an identity that you're a klutz. I'm so clumsy. I literally drop and spill everything. I stub my toe all the time. That's who you believe. When people go, hey, you want to go play frisbee? You're like, nah, you don't want to play with me. I'm going to fall. I'm going to throw the frisbee off into the lake. want me on your team, right? That's your identity. A person like that, when they wake up in the morning, if they stub their toe first thing in the morning, they go: 'Ugh, here we go again. This is how my day is gonna be.' Whereas for someone who doesn't have an identity for the cluts, they probably stub their toe just as often, okay?

But when they stub it, they just go: 56:02

'Ugh, that sucks.' And they shake it off and they keep going because their brain's not trying to retain that memory. So conversations in your head with yourself is a good sign that you feel negative. So conversations that feel positive, that's amazing. But if you're feeling negative when you're by yourself, having conversations in your head, that's probably a good sign something should shift. The other is if you're externally demonstrating things where you notice, hurt somebody, I hurt myself, I feel embarrassed, something negatively has occurred. then you may, and something you've seen occur more than once, right? Like someone cutting you off in traffic or what have you, and you're always getting road rage. I mean, that's something you need to work on, right? Because that's not a good thing. So the internal and external journey, there's something you're unhappy with. That's a good indicator. The other is the life you're living. If you want more of something that's positive, like money, success, happy relationships, it's okay. Because it doesn't mean, because, Shifting your identity doesn't always have to come from a place of negative. If you ask the millionaire, do they want to shift their identity, some will say, yeah, because I can't even fathom having a billion dollars. So even though they've got something that we go, whoa, you're done. You're done. You got the million. They're going, no, I'm not done. I still want to learn what it feels like to make a million in a month. Yeah, identity shifts. Yeah, interesting. comes the second question I ask everybody in the podcast and it's about energy. What gives you life energy the work you do now? And how do you stay grounded and energized day by day? I'm really fortunate that through this journey, which was very, like my background is all in franchising and leadership, coaching, consulting, you know, that business professional. Hmm. But at no point did it really fuel me. If I sat with any of the roles that I had, no disrespect to any of my clients over the years, it's just after a while I'd be like, what's the point of this? Is this just gonna be the same on repeat? It was very serendipitous, but myself and my partner at the time ended up starting the charity that I run now quite accidentally. It was just meant to be a hobby, a little side project that'd be kind of fun and cute. inspired by his son. And all of sudden, in doing that, so much of my journey as a child, building and forging those early identities, the self-worth that I had created, I recognized that that is something I could give to every child across the nation. And that's my goal. And that's where we're well on our way to being, is being able to reach every child who interacts and engages with the public sector, from public schools to non-profits that work with vulnerable sectors, we are slowly reaching all of them so that they can help us with reaching every child to be placed in these real world experiences like starting their own business at seven and interacting with the public. We're creating a uh speech, we call it a kid talk, like a Ted talk, creating a speech on something that really matters to them that they love. Hmm. an online course, teaching people something they love to do, right? And through that, not only are they getting ready for the future, but they're cultivating that identity of what they're capable of based on them demonstrating to themselves, not based on a grade teacher or praise from a parent. And I am absolutely living vicariously, so fueled and pumped every day with what I'm able to do in the charity and the... people were attracting that vision as well. Ahead of mental health challenges so that they don't have to go through the craziness that I did because they've already flexed the skills of resiliency and confidence and self-worth and self-awareness, leadership, et cetera. Simultaneously though, through my speaking and I'm writing a book actually on the emotional journey right now. That's... That's feeling me as well because, you know, of course I want to help the kids because, you know, I was that kid one time and I know the journey, I know the impact it can have, but meant a lot of us like myself, we feel that inner child as well and help us with forming that identity based on those dreams we had as kids and that we've had in our 20s or we had at whatever age it was.'So that was just, you know. silly innocence of a dream. I can't do that now. I'm too old. I can't achieve that. I'm not that kind of person.' I want them to know they can because the amount of shifts and things I've been able to experience in short periods of time now that I've become aware of all that I was doing before that was keeping me in that unhappy state, it's like breathing fresh air for the first time. And I want everyone to feel that breath of fresh air. Wow, there's so much more that I was missing in life. So that's what fuels me. And then of course that reminder every day of other people help to remind me that I still have my journey, holds me accountable to make sure I'm still doing things that I need to do to become a continual person that I admire and yeah, can hold the next life's layers that I want to attract and have for myself. Great, thank you. Let's talk about how this transformation has shaped leadership today. I wonder what do you think the next generation of leaders, including youth, what do they need most right now? I think for youth, the thing that they need the most is confidence in themselves and what they're capable of. As you cannot lead others, if you can't lead yourself. Otherwise, you are one of those leaders that leads by projection, meaning they love to criticize everybody for the things they're doing wrong. Meanwhile, they do those things as well. That's why they can see it. Their their rest, their reticular activating system is kicked into doing things in a half-assed way or kicked into doing things, you know, by cutting corners or not speaking up enough or whatever it is. Project it. And if you don't work on yourself, you can't possibly truly embrace the concept and demonstration of empathy, which I know is really important. I do believe this generation is very sympathetic, not necessarily empathetic. Meaning this next generation, care a lot about a lot of things. In fact, they are more over what you think to, you know, our different generations, we have those big pivotal points like, you know, landing or, you know, what is it the the spaceship that exploded when all these kindergartners were watching, right? Like there's a lot of things, but you get one or two of those in your life, you know, JFK getting assassinated, whatever. This generation has that 10 times a day just scrolling through Instagram or YouTube with the news. We hear of every small war and big war, every trade deal gone wrong, every household murder that occurred. We used to just get the newspaper and we'd just hear about, you know, once, I don't know, every 10 years about a murder that had happened, you know, or maybe on 60 minutes we'd hear something on the news, right? They're just, well, The information that there is today, and that's paralyzing for a child to grow up around. And so they grow up either caring or having to become numb about everything. And that's okay, but you you can't let that paralyze you. That's where again, you can't help others if you can't help yourself. So you can care about people as much as you want, but what's actually changing, right? You can cancel culture everybody, but what's actually... you know, helping to make things better. What are you contributing, right? And the amount of impact one person can have on a scale basis can be so incredibly massive. But we only really want that change to come from someone who's really aware of themselves, who doesn't project their insecurities onto others, who is constantly aware that they're a work in progress. and giving forgiveness to themselves for the things that they are not doing yet that they wish that they were because then they will give forgiveness to others who are also on a journey and maybe haven't figured out what it is that could change that could make their life or the lives of the people around them better. So I think as a leader, you always wanna make sure that you're giving people grace and empathy or having the confidence to say no when you need to, to mentor when it's required. To uplift. You don't have any gas in the tank because you are drained with the you have in your own mind on a day-to-day basis. Yeah, you'll just be a talking You mentioned this 'Build-A-Biz Kids' several times earlier and I what inspired it? it equip kids not just with skills but with identity strength? Yeah so Build-A-Biz Kids it started as just an entrepreneur program for really young kids. Let's teach business that seems like a good idea right. But it very quickly grew. COVID was a big time for it because we were playing around with just all other kinds of possibilities of what this could really be. I'd actually decided at that point I'm going to you know simmer down on some of my consulting and spend more time with it. So was just so intrinsically curious and motivated and at that time I didn't quite understand how connected it was to my own journey.

Essentially what we do is twofold: 2:06:00

So on the surface it's teaching kids as young as seven really cool things that many of us don't even learn till college. They're launching businesses in malls, know, with 10,000 customers surrounding them based on a business that they created. So products that they've innovated, research that they have done. their branding, their marketing, their sales pitches, all of that. And we've got our kids course creator, our public speaking programs, other programs as well. So the real world component is great. People grab onto that because the number one thing people say is, I wish we had this when I was a kid, right? That's why we created it. But the mission has gone so much deeper since COVID because with so many youth under 30 that I was engaging with and them hearing what we were teaching, when they said I wish they had I had this when I was a kid. They said it from a place that was different than just the things the kids were doing. It was them observing these kids in action and being like, wow, listen to how resilient they are. People say no to them, and they're just like, whatever. It was the emotional journey that I think the belief in themselves, the confidence that they saw an eight or nine-year-old have was something they were struggling to have at 22. And it helped me to really understand that we can take a really preventative approach while simultaneously proactive approach to not just getting kids ready to contribute to society in a meaningful way, a way that's really authentic to them at an earlier age, but those are also skills that they're developing that also happen to overlap with the skills that you need to overcome, cope, or even prevent mental health challenges. Hmm, yes. that's really struggling, it's not a one and done intervention, right? It takes more than that. And ultimately, trying to help them to do is gain awareness of themselves, build a healthy self identity and build their confidence. We want them to have resiliency, right? We want them to get in tune with their emotions to understand that what people say outside of us doesn't really, it's not true. Like we can, Yeah. things that these kids are learning through these programs. So It's a great bonus effect that we're building kids with just a different perspective of who they are and what they're Yeah, great. you. Thank you. Here's a question I ask everybody in podcast and it's about purpose. What gives you meaning and purpose today, Leah? What's the deeper why that fuels everything you do today? I think, you know, it's my journey, right? It's why I've got the charity is because I want every child to feel what I was able to feel back then and do something, right? To be done on purpose. And other is for grownups to feel the same way as I did. The despair and the helplessness that I felt for so long, I just know so many others feel that way. That breath of fresh air, the moment that you realize things can be different, becomes that journey to creating a life you want on purpose. Instead of the one that you felt like you were handed, because who you are has been designed based on the struggles, the coping, the survival, the labeling you can give it. All these things that just were out of your hands, but can be now in your hands to shape moving forward. I wonder what does leading from alignment look like in your day to day life right now? Because I know that's important to you. It is, yeah, I talk to myself a lot. I'll be honest, I do a lot of talking to myself. So every morning I go for a walk in the woods for about 45 minutes with my dog and connecting with nature. If you've ever seen me in the woods, I'm often literally hugging a tree. I love connecting with the earth and just taking a moment to be present. I do most of my sound bites I record on my phone, voice memos constantly of ideas, insights. My screen saver on my phone is the emotional journey that we just went through. It's constantly reminding me I can control how I feel. It's tapping into my goals and reminding myself of who I am today so that I can be ready to hold those things that I want. For someone listening who feels stuck or misaligned, where would you encourage them to begin? Yeah, you know, assuming that they've maybe done the exercise already of what do you want, what do you want it, you need to become, right? You need to create as many reminders around you as possible that you're on this journey, right? Too often we can fall into routines. If I get home from work, I take off my shoes, I can't wait to just sit on the couch so I can decompress from what I've experienced, the traffic, my thoughts, like routines can often rule our lives, scrolling on our phones. So for me, I have the emotional journey up on two walls in my home. The first thing I do in the morning, or actually before I even get up, if you have an Alexa or a Google Home kind of thing, I get put to bed and woken up in the morning by my Alexa. I had to change her name, otherwise she'd be talking to us right now whenever I say her name. So how I wake up in the morning is by Alexa saying, good morning, beautiful. Today's going to be a great day. stretch your body, a really deep breath, and be present with yourself for a minute. And then it'll come on again a few minutes later and remind me of the things that I want to feel and do and achieve. As soon as I get up from bed, I'm putting on YouTube compilations, as I mentioned. I want the programming of my brain. Why would I ever trust my brain to wander for itself for a minute when I know that there's just too many possibilities of old habits still kicking in for me of thinking about something that I wish was different and getting annoyed by it, why not just force that out? know, my aunt, she had a beautiful garden and everybody would ask her, why are there no weeds in your garden? Do you weed? She's like, I don't need to. I have so many flowers in the garden, it pushes the weeds out, there's no space for it. I don't ever want to create space for the weeds to grow. So I'm listening to things like podcasts or books in the car when I'm driving. I'm listening to audio, it's first thing in the morning. When I'm cooking or something like that if I watch a movie I'm making sure it's a movie that's gonna make me feel good, you know, and likewise the people in my life I did a really big audit of and for the people that perhaps you can't remove like your boss or your mom or something like that It's about becoming conscious of those interactions and going into them with intention to say this is just a conversation. How do I want to show up for it? I know. Mom is probably going to say something that's going to really irritate me, but her opinion just doesn't matter. I can just say, yes, Mom, thanks, Mom, and move on. So it's really doing an audit of your life. Don't make room for the weeds to grow. Surround yourself with as many positive influences around you. And that may mean some tough decisions of the people that you spend your free time with, because if they're stuck in that negative cycle where they love to up each other on how bad each other's day was or complain about their jobs. Ultimately, you're going to outgrow those people anyway. And so you just want to kind of start to conserve some of the time restrict some of the time that you spend with those influences. you personally balance life and What have you learned about staying healthy mentally, emotionally and maybe also spiritually? One of the best pieces of advice I got from my girlfriend, Ronnie, and she said it to me during a time when I couldn't hear it. So it's one of those things that I reflected on. And she said, you know, Leah, I keep my life pretty simple. I just follow whatever makes me happy. And I really take that literally now. So when it comes to balance, you know, drives me crazy when I tell people, I'm working. Like last night I was working late. And people are like, don't work too hard, or you need a vacation. My response is like, no, you need a vacation because you hate your job. I love what I do, so I don't need a vacation, right? And so when it comes to balance, think I don't believe in the work-life balance thing because that's different for everybody. And the balance is not a balance of where you spend your time. I think it's internal balance of how you feel. And you can't feel amazing all the time. And you actually shouldn't feel amazing all the time because That's how you sift and sort through the world of what you like and you don't like. So you new goals of what you want. But that's where the balance is. You only want to have a certain amount that you're feeling negative and then the majority of the amount of feeling good. And if you feel good working, if you feel good spending time with your kids, if you feel good on a boat, go do those things. That's your balance. Hmm. I stay balanced by just checking in and saying, I really happy doing this? Like if I'm burnt out and I'm forcing the workout, I go, you're not even gonna do a good job. It's gonna take you five times as long to get this task done. Step away from the computer, go do something else. And then when you come back, guess what? You're probably gonna get done in like 30 minutes instead of three hours. Yeah, yeah, great. Thank you. Yeah, if you could leave one encouragement with the listeners ready for change, but unsure where to start, what would you say? The good and the bad news is that your life is the way it is because of you, but your life can also be whatever you want it to be because of you. You have to love that concept because any other choice, and it's all your fault, but it's also all your fault, you know, it's all because of you. Any other variance to that means you don't have control. Don't ultimately we all wish that we could choose our destinies. Don't we all wish that everything in life was because we got to make the choice. Yeah, yeah, I think was Jim Rohn you want to change, Yeah. Yeah.

And the other great one is: 2:16:15

"If you believe you can or you believe you can't, either way you're is Right". Yeah. a good one too. Where can people connect with you they want to learn more of you and or of the BizKids or if they or of you and maybe book you as a keynote speaker? Thank you so much. So definitely LinkedIn is the easiest place. It's nice because I am the only Leah Coss in the world. So easy to find. You can Google me. You'll find my website. LinkedIn is probably the best place to follow me. And if you're curious about the charity, it's buildbizkids.com and you can see everything that's going on over there. Okay, thank you. Thank you so much for this interesting conversation, Leah. It's been really nice to hear you speak and learn from you. um yeah, thank you. Thank you. So viewers and listeners, thank you for being, for having been with us today. And my name is David Dahlén D'Cruz and this is the Life and Leadership Connected Podcast.

As we used to say: 2:17:16

We empower your journey. So thank you for listening on Apple podcast, maybe Spotify or elsewhere, or watch on YouTube. So welcome back when we release our next episode and until then bye bye.