You Have To Be Selfish To Be Selfless ft. Espree Devora

What if the biggest thing standing between you and your potential is your own belief system and you've never been taught how to change it? In this rich and wide-ranging episode, Richard is joined by Espree Devora, founder of the Women in Tech and We Are LA Tech podcasts, entrepreneur, and fierce champion of human potential. Espree shares the daily practices that have transformed how she operates, from breathwork and nervous system regulation to the two-minute task method and the radical power of boundaries.

This is a conversation about far more than tech or women in business. It's about what it takes to show up fully and what gets in the way. Espree opens up about years of burnout from self-sacrifice, her ongoing recovery, and how learning to be selfish in the right way is the key to being truly selfless. 

Key Takeaways

Self-limiting beliefs are the primary barrier between people and their potential — seeing others succeed is one of the most powerful ways to expand what you believe is possible for yourself.

Regulating your nervous system through breathwork is not woo-woo - it is a practical, tactical tool used by elite military units and high performers worldwide. 

The two-minute method removes the resistance to starting small consistent actions compound into significant progress. 

Good, kind, generous people are often the worst at boundaries and mastering them is essential to avoid burnout and resentment. 

You have to be selfish in order to be selfless - taking care of yourself first is what enables you to serve others well.

Episode Highlights

Espree's founding story - why she created Women in Tech after noticing the conversation was focused on what wasn't possible for women. 

The four-minute mile analogy and how one person breaking a barrier unlocks it for thousands.

How breathwork, Reality Transurfing, and nervous system regulation form Espree's daily morning ritual. 

Burnout, resentment, and the long road back, Espree's honest account of years of self-sacrifice and recovery. 

Social media as drug addiction — and the two-phone system Espree uses to take back control of her attention.

Timestamps

00:00 Introduction —  Creating Women in Tech and We Are LA Tech 

02:32 Self-limiting beliefs — the real barrier to achievement 

03:56 Nervous system regulation and why Espree studies it daily 

05:23 Breathwork — not woo-woo, used by the Navy SEALs 

07:08 Reality Transurfing and daily rituals to rewire perspective 

08:10 Daniel Kahneman — System One, System Two and breathwork 

11:11 Why breathwork has been unfairly positioned as far out there 

12:20 Binaural beats, undiagnosed ADHD and learning how your brain works 

15:16 Human design, anger, and embracing emotions rather than fighting them 

17:06 Emotions are information — what you do with them is the work 

18:55 The 18-year-old founder Espree wants to champion 

20:46 Boundaries — the master skill for kind and generous people 

26:11 Burnout, resentment, and the long road back 

31:11 Writing your own headline — your career doesn't have to look a certain way 

34:43 Social media as addiction — and the two-phone system 

38:52 Self-medicating with screens — and the clarity on the other side 

42:40 The book — principles, sincerity, and a promise to publish

🔗 Connect with Espree Devora 

Website: podcast.womenintechshow.com 

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/espree 

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/p/C_jI2v-PHf_/ 

Connect and Subscribe

Thank you for joining us on The Business of Thinking podcast. If you enjoyed this conversation, please subscribe and leave a rating! It helps us bring more insightful content on the psychology of high performance. Find more about Richard Reid's work at www.richard-reid.com.

Download the first two chapters of Richard's "Charisma Unlocked", audio or PDF version for free and begin your transformation towards authentic charisma:

https://richard-reid.com/master-authentic-charisma/

Production Credit: Edited and produced by @the32collective_ / https://www.the32collective.co/

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:04

Welcome to the Business of Thinking podcast. This is the place for high achievers who want more than motivation. They want mastery. Here we skip the surface level talk and go straight into the psychology of high performance.

SPEAKER_02 0:21

Hello, and welcome to the Business of Thinking. My name is Richard Reed, and today I've got the great pleasure of being joined by Esprey Devorah. She's often known as the girl who gets it done. She's the founder of We Are Tech and We Are LA Tech, and she's a massive advocate of female empowerment, particularly within the tech sector, but also about creating more diverse inclusion within that sector as well. Esprey, fantastic to have you here.

SPEAKER_04 0:51

Yeah, thank you so much for having me.

SPEAKER_02 0:54

Our pleasure. Perhaps if we start off, do you want to tell us a little bit about how you uh were drawn to the kind of work you're doing and how you got involved in this area of female empowerment and creating more inclusiveness within the tech sector?

SPEAKER_04 1:09

Sure. So I created Women in Tech and We Are LA Tech over 10 years ago. Started with We Are LA Tech, and then later I launched Women in Tech. They're both podcasts, they serve different purposes. One uh is a global platform to champion women in tech around the world. The other one is more in-person gatherings along with the podcast to spotlight what's going on in the Los Angeles tech and startup community. And um, I had built the first Action Sports Social Network and done a lot of incredible things, raised money, grow a whole ass company. Uh, and when I finally um came across women in tech groups, a lot of the conversation was what's not possible for women. And I said, that's interesting because I've already achieved all these things. So I know that's not true because I'm that and I've done these amazing, accomplished these amazing milestones. And so I wanted to create one positive piece of content for women around the world to expand their belief system to see if she can do it, so can I.

SPEAKER_02 2:21

Fantastic. And and you mentioned belief system. Is it is it all about uh women's beliefs about what's possible, or are there genuine obstacles that are still out there in that sector?

SPEAKER_04 2:33

Yeah, I think it's all about just people's beliefs of what's possible, whether a guy's listening or a girl's listening, it's just as human beings, we really limit ourselves based on our belief systems. We said a lot of the times we don't achieve the goals that we'd like to achieve because we have self-limiting beliefs. So the more that we work on overcoming those self-limiting beliefs, one way is seeing examples of what's possible, then um we're able to achieve uh a lot greater things. I bring up the example often, which I should really Google it. I never have, but um, it's either the one minute mile or the five-minute mile or something. Anyway, nobody can run that. Was it the four-minute mile? Thank you. Okay, I need to remember this, but nobody could run it. And then one year, one person ran it, and then that same, I think it was that same year, like 20 people were able to run it because the one person ran it, and then now a lot of people can run it. And it's simply uh an example of look, look, it's possible to run a mile in four minutes, and then people are like, whoa, it is, and then all of a sudden their belief system matches what their body's able to achieve.

SPEAKER_02 3:43

Yeah, so so true. I you may already know I work as a psychologist and a coach, so I see this all the time in people. You know, obviously there are external factors that that that sometimes blow up people, but so much of it is self-imposed, isn't it?

SPEAKER_04 3:57

Yeah, it is, and it's why I've spent the last year and a half, almost two years now, studying my regulating my own nervous system. Because um, we go into, again, I don't have these things memorized, but we go into these states, which you probably know really well freeze state, flight state, uh uh, fight state. There's these states that we go into naturally because our body naturally just wants to protect ourselves. And our nervous system's job is to protect ourselves. So there's nothing wrong that we're procrastinating or that we're not doing the thing that we've been wanting to do or calling the person we've been wanting to call. It's just our body's way of protecting us. But when we don't understand our nervous system, we feel like there's something wrong in the actual thing not happening or going wrong or why we feel so stuck. But really taking that moment to understand our body is just keeping us safe because something has set off set off our alarm bells. And then circling back, if we're able to calibrate our nervous system to say, hey, body, we're safe. We're good. Calling the accountant is a-okay. We got to do this thing, you know? And then so I do a lot of breath work, but not in a woo-woo way. Um, I heard again, I Richard, I really got to start Googling the accuracy of the labels, but I think it was either the Navy SEALs or the Marines. They they use breath work before they went off. Do you know who it is?

SPEAKER_02 5:23

Oh, don't so the individual is it, is it uh um whim?

SPEAKER_04 5:28

I can't say that. Oh, no, no. I mean uh a military unit wet would utilize breath work.

SPEAKER_02 5:34

So the guy who taught them, but no, you're absolutely right. They'd learn that. Um, Wim Hof taught the military? I didn't even know that. Yeah. I think it was Wim Hof, yeah. Monty Robinson. Oh, interesting. I've never seen it.

SPEAKER_04 5:47

I mean, obviously he's a legend. Yeah, he's a legend. Um, I've never studied under him, but like, but yeah, but to see a very non-woo-woo establishment, the military, like go off, utilize breath work in order to regulate their nervous systems to do what they need to do, it just shows you the power uh of breath and and how to take care of really difficult things um by regulating our uh nervous system. So I do breath work every single morning. I do it to a woman named Lee B. She's based in Kauai, and I do a lot of her webinars and stuff. And um, yeah, so between expanding my own belief system, and I'd say the last thing that I do really leaning into the psychology of it all is I uh my self-made billionaire friend, he's still in his mid-20s, um, completely self-made. And he said the most important, yeah, he and he he actually loves South Africa, by the way. He said the the most important um book he's ever read is reality transurfing. And it's all about how to control your perspective. So, and it's three minute reads, it's something like 78 principles. And every morning I read that book, just three minutes, because I'm hoping if I I mean, when I finish the book, I read it over and over and over again because what I'm hoping is my body, my mind and body will start to like just use the script of the book as default, almost like brainwashing myself, because these messages that I'm reading the book are so positive and so empowering. Why not see if I could shift my perspective just by having that, you know, ritual routine in my life of rereading this book? So those are the breath work, expanding my limitations, um, or expanding what's possible and uh reality transurfing.

SPEAKER_02 7:46

Some really interesting things you mentioned there. I I fully subscribe with the things that you've you've you've mentioned there. Um, you know, rereading things and processing them continually, it's really important instead of laying down those new neural pathways. It becomes more ingrained ways of uh dealing with things. So I think that's really important. And I like what you were saying about the breath work. Um it's absolutely true. Navy SEALs do use this stuff. A lot of uh law enforcement um.

SPEAKER_04 8:10

Oh, so it's Navy SEALs. Okay, I think that's a good thing.

SPEAKER_02 8:12

It's it's Navy, it's Navy SEALs, yeah. But I I think a lot of uh sort of military units, particularly advanced military units, law enforcement, do use breath work because I I'm a big advocate of um Daniel Kahneman's work. He talks about system one and system two. System one is a safe response. Check it out, thinking fast, thinking slow. Uh and he's done a whole lot of other stuff. But it he talks about the fast brain and the slow brain. And we often think you know, when we're in danger, we need to do things quickly, but actually, that breath can make a fundamental difference to which part of the brain you operate from. So you make the right decisions rather than just any decision.

SPEAKER_04 8:52

I'm writing this down, thinking fast, thinking slow.

SPEAKER_02 8:56

And I think it ties in with some of the things that that that you're saying. And so often people think in all kinds of walks of life, it's it's about making big actions, isn't it? Big decisions, big movements. And we often overlook breath. And you think, you know, if you stop yourself at any point during the day, your breathing may be very, very different, not just because of physical exertion, but because of the emotions. And if you don't stop and register that and do some that has a heavy influence on how you come across and how you behave and the choices you make.

SPEAKER_04 9:29

Totally. Oh, and I thought you were gonna say when you said we come across these really big decisions, I thought you said we overlook how important the very small decisions are, like just doing. I have a task list of the most important priorities in my life. And it's the task list is called two minutes. I just need to do two minutes of each one of these huge things a day, and then I consider that success. So, whatever those things may be in someone's life, the biggest like crazy projects, just two minutes. Because after a while, those two minutes add up, and then and you end up doing more than two minutes the majority of the time.

SPEAKER_02 10:08

Totally, totally true. I I I again I use that a lot with my my clients, and it and it takes the pressure off, doesn't it? Because a lot of the time, going belief systems, we build up all these obstacles in our heads about how difficult something's gonna be, why we don't want to do it, all the things that could go wrong. And so we immobilize ourselves, don't we? And as you say, even two minutes, you know, two two minutes is not a big commitment. And that's and again, as you say, you know, you do that, and then a lot of the time you start to get in the flow and realize actually it's not as bad as I thought it was.

SPEAKER_04 10:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 10:38

And if it is, I can stop after two minutes. Um and it chips away, doesn't it? It chips away at these bigger things that they're gonna do.

SPEAKER_04 10:45

It totally does. Yeah, it's it's incredible. Yeah, yeah, it's really interesting.

SPEAKER_02 10:54

Yeah, yeah. I you know, and I and and you mentioned woo-woo, that made me laugh because that's that's what I often say when I talk to people about it. But you're not woo-woo.

SPEAKER_01 11:02

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:02

But I'm not, I'm not woo-woo. Yeah, but I you know, I talk to you. Yeah, no, it's not about this as well. Yeah, and it's and it's not, it makes a massive difference when you start to do it.

SPEAKER_04 11:12

But some people in, you know, our culture do position it in very woo-woo ways, and that's the kind of activities that I don't really uh that aren't really good match for me. And so I understand why the public perception may see some of these things as, you know, a little far out there, because um I think as a a whole, especially breath work, it is positioned to seem far out there. And I think that's really unfortunate because it's really just not a weird thing. It's not weird. It's it's also if if I I don't know if some people may disagree with me, it's not spiritual, it's not religious. It's literally just, I think that we should learn how our bodies work when we're children and understanding how powerful breath is as a child so that we can regulate as we move through our lives. It's I would equate it to the same thing as um, so I'm undiagnosed ADHD, and uh my friend had an ADHD cohort. He said, You could join if you'd like. And I'm like, oh, thanks. Right. I'm like, I think I have that thing. The stuff I learned in the cohort, I had no idea, like one specifically, if I listen to binaural beats, I can focus. And I I put it on the headphones, tried it. I'm like, what is this world that I didn't know existed? I had no idea. Why could someone not have told me when I was a kid, hey, with your brain type, when you listen to binaural beats, you'll have like a lot easier time focusing. And so it's kind of like that. That's like breath work. It's like, hey, if you just learn how to uh, and these the breath work is not a one-hour thing, it doesn't have to be that. I do three minutes, seven minutes, ten minutes, whatever I'm in the mood for every day. It doesn't have to be this big thing. There's one breath called box breath. There's, you know, there's very simple techniques. And so um, I just think it's a very practical, tactical way to function well in you know, this journey of life. And unfortunately, it it has been positioned as very far out there, woo-woo spiritual. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 13:33

Yeah, yeah. So I think it's it it's it's important to re reframe it, isn't it? I think that is starting to happen. But it's good to hear you say that. And you know, a lot of the people I work with, and you I'm sure you'll find the same, they're very busy. And you know, you can have all these sort of fantastic ideas on things they can do to improve things and turn things around. But it becomes another imposition, it becomes another pressure. And as you say, you know, it might be they've only got 30 seconds or a minute in between Zoom calls, but actually managing your breath is something you can do that gives you that little reset before that next interaction. Yeah. Just offsetting some of that buildup of stress that we don't realize is there.

SPEAKER_04 14:13

100%. Yeah. Yeah. So if anything, when you stop listening to this, you know, podcast episode, go Google breath work. Where would you send them, Richard? Is there is there a practitioner you I you know, I know you mentioned Wim Hof, but that's pretty intense option to start with.

SPEAKER_02 14:34

It is, and it does all sort of the ice dyes and all that kind of stuff. So that won't be for everyone. But um, I mean, one of the ones that I like is uh I can't tolerate uh he does a lot of things. Does he have a breath work series? So he does breath breath work stuff. Uh there's another guy um who I follow from time to time, uh called Shamash Aladina. Again, you know, he he sort of works within sort of the mindfulness element of it. Uh and again, you know, a lot of this is stuff that we we do, but we don't do it deliberately and purposefully.

SPEAKER_04 15:05

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 15:06

You know, we we we we we we we do this stuff from time to time, but this is about making it more consistent, isn't it? So having having some skills in your back pocket that you can draw on.

SPEAKER_04 15:17

Totally, totally. Another one that uh Lee taught me in the last few weeks was um, I don't know if you know much about human design, and I won't get into it much here, but my natural I'm a person of principle, and I um when I feel that something unjust has is occurring, I feel a lot of anger. And so when I feel everything is just, I feel really peaceful. And when I feel uh that things are unjust, then I feel a lot of anger. And uh according to human design, everybody has kind of like a default of how they feel when they're good and how they feel when they're bad. And so those are mine. Lehi was sharing with me not to resist the anger because I was like, how do I get over this anger? I'm like, you know, and she's and she was sharing, and I thought it was beautiful to have an embracing, like comforting relationship with the anger rather than fighting against the anger itself and and just um letting it process through me. And of course, this doesn't mean doing anything, you know, volatile. It just, you know, I'm just having this energy, this feeling inside my body of anger, and to say, hey, body, what do you need from me to feel comfort right now? Um, maybe what perspective do we need to take on? Do we need to go for a walk? Like, you know, instead of like, how do I get rid of this? You know?

SPEAKER_03 16:40

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 16:42

I thought that was really interesting. So that's something I'm currently practicing with great difficulty, but currently when when somebody does something that I just feel lacks integrity, I just feel like my head spins. I just I fly off it.

SPEAKER_03 16:54

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 16:55

Yeah, but it's good to it's good to have that um that that warning system there, isn't it? And as you say, it's it's it's what you then do with it. And and I think a lot of the time, you know, anxiety, apprehension, anger, these kind of things, we we we almost kind of insist that we shouldn't have them. They're bad emotions, but they're they're there for a reason, and it's what we do with them. And I think sometimes, as you touched on there, showing curiosity for them allows you to engage with them in a different way. And I think the risks come when we we we immediately act on that. Again, if you look at Daniel Canneman's stuff, that's just the one-brain. I feel angry and I'm gonna punch somebody or you know, tell them exactly what I think in in the purest form. So it's it's it's how you then use that and channel it in a way which is is is productive. Um it's great, it's great to hear you saying all these things. It's this is this is my stuff, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 17:49

I and going back to your original question about you know how I got into creating the women in tech podcast and the we are la tech podcast and all the work that I do, the ethos of my work is for people to believe in themselves further. Um, just the same pain points I had as a young founder, 18 years old, having my own self-limiting beliefs. I didn't understand how extraordinary I was, how extraordinary I still am. And I feel so much compassion for that version of myself building the first action sports social network. Like that's crazy. Raising money, having no connections at all. That's crazy. And because I just did things from such an intuitive gut level, I felt there's no way I could know things. There's no way I could be smart, you know, there's no way this, no way that. And now having the opportunity to look back and seeing how brilliant she just intuitively was. I um I want to give the the that same girl, and for me, it's the symbol of my audience, you know, everything they could possibly receive so that they could go off believing themselves and create the magic they can create. My culture code is uh I mentioned this a few times already, that I don't care to interact with people who lack integrity. I don't care to interact with unkind people. So the people that I want to, you know, empower, champion are truly good, kind people making a difference. And I don't mean making any grand difference in the world. Maybe they just smile at the person at the cash register. Just making a difference in how they show up day to day in life. I want to champion all those people. So if I could even remove 1% of pain in their builder's journey or their career trajectory because they were able to get hired through a job on my podcast, or they were able to find the perfect candidate, or they were able to raise their money via some a guest on the podcast, whatever it may be, if I could reduce 1% of that pain, that that for me is living a really purposeful life and really celebrating and championing that 18-year-old version of myself who deserved to win.

SPEAKER_02 20:07

Yeah, yeah. I think that's a fantastic goal to have. And I was also struck by what you were saying about the 18-year-old you get giving her credit and recognizing her uniqueness. And I I think this is often one of the things that gets in the way of people's self-belief, is that we we compare ourselves to you know, normal, you know, how you should be. And then it what it means is people often feel like imposters, don't they? They actually compare the perceived worst parts of themselves and the best parts of other people, don't give themselves credit for what what they have that's unique and special about them. So we so as a result, we diminish our power.

SPEAKER_04 20:44

Yeah. I and I think, and this doesn't exactly have to do with your podcast, but maybe because of you know your passion for psychology and just how important it is in business. My new era is all about boundaries. And I'd say that good people, kind people, generous people, thoughtful people, we need to become masters of boundaries because people will take as much as they can take, and they don't always necessarily mean harm, even though it feels harmful. And if we deplete our own energy, and I'm sure I know I heard this earlier in my career, and I was like, yeah, yeah, yeah. And it's so important that if we don't have energy within ourselves to, you know, prioritize ourselves first, we cannot serve anyone else. Our cup needs to be full, and that's essential. And this is coming from someone who has self-sacrificed the majority of my career, and that was not the right way. And so um boundaries are the key to that. That like what works for you know, you to have your meetings, to schedule your day, to uh the kind of people you interact with, the kind of friendships you have, um, you know, when When you exercise, uh, when when you say no, when you say I have a yes document in my phone to know when to say yes to things, like um when and you're not saying yes because you feel like you should, but you actually want to. Um when you know someone's like, Can I pick your brain for one minute? Uh, you know, oh, let's just grab a coffee. Oh, how about a quick Zoom meeting? There's so many little things, and just like that two-minute thing I shared earlier, these like little tiny micro asks turn into your whole life. I once recorded every single ask I got on a spreadsheet. And if I had given to all those asks, I'd have zero time to do any of my work, spend time with family, nothing. And so boundaries need to become something that good, kind, heart-driven people are masters at. And unfortunately, we're the exact people who do not master boundaries and don't even get the memo till like way late. And so that's where I'm right now is completely um practicing and evolving my boundary setting so that I do live a very energized life. And the things that I say yes to, I astronomically want to say yes, and uh I say no kindly.

SPEAKER_02 23:18

Yeah, yeah. I think I think it's really important, isn't it? And as you say, a lot of the time people aren't sort of misintentioned, but they they they do draw in our time and energy. But but but equally there are those people who see kindness as a weakness.

SPEAKER_04 23:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 23:32

Um that's that's the real danger, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 23:36

Yeah, and I don't think I don't think kindness is a weakness. I um I think kindness is the most important key to survive as a humanity. Like kindness has a relationship to compassion, it has a relationship to listening. The more kind we can be to one another, the better everything will be.

SPEAKER_02 24:10

Yeah, it's one of the things that separates us from most of the animal world, isn't it? Or it should be. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 24:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 24:17

There's there's there's a lot in what you've said, which I I guess is is is about promoting self-awareness, isn't it? Actually, we don't just get drawn into our default ways of being, whether that's kindness or whether that's going with anger, or you know, giving away our boundaries. And I guess that takes reflection, doesn't it? It takes a concerted effort to to generate that self-awareness. Do you want to say a little bit about what you do around that or maybe what you talk to other people about around that?

SPEAKER_04 24:48

Yeah, and it's it's interesting. The the same guy told you about my friend who became the billionaire. He um he didn't just become, he worked for it and very uh admire his work. Um, he would say you have to be self selfish in order to be selfless. And I really agree with that and I get it now. And being selfish, again, isn't the way the word is branded.

SPEAKER_02 25:15

It's uh it's got all these connotations, hasn't it? Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 25:19

Yeah. Being selfish is did I rest well? Have I eaten today? Um, am I okay? Like it's this self-awareness check-in of am I okay? Am I taking care of myself? Am I enjoying my life? Am I spending my time in a way that fulfills me? Am I surrounded by people who energize me, who restore me? Um, do I do I feel proud of my life? Do I feel I'm living a purposeful life? Like if these questions are being ignored or not even happening at all, how can we possibly live our greatest journey? And so, and in that greatest journey, at the end of it is serving very well, you know, serving others very well. But if we don't, if we're not okay, we're not able to serve others well. In my story, it ended up becoming resentment and anger, like after years of self-sacrifice and giving and giving. My first of all, I had multi-year burnout. And so I felt that I couldn't even live my life's purpose because I'm completely blocked, because I feel like even opening an email is too heavy of a lift. And then um I just felt like completely just upset with everybody who in the beginning of my restorative journey, I felt like took advantage of me. But then when I learned boundaries, the person who allowed anyone to take advantage, if you could even call it taking advantage, because like if someone asks you a question and you say yes, are they really taking advantage? Or did you just open a door that you didn't want to open?

SPEAKER_03 27:05

Well, you have to take a hundred percent.

SPEAKER_04 27:08

So I take full accountability of the environment that I created for myself. And now I'm rebuilding that foundation. And um one of one of my recent teachers taught me um boundaries aren't a way to keep people out, they're a way to show people where the the door is that you want to say yes to to invite them in. I think that's so beautiful that boundaries aren't this alienation of people, they aren't this like dark, aggressive thing. They're just like, yeah, I'm down to be part of your journey too. And here's the door. So if that works for the both of us, great. And if it doesn't, yeah, I wish you well, you know? And so um, yeah, I uh I'm boundaries for me are very challenging, and um and I think having radical accountability is an important part of the process because I'm still restoring myself from the years of burnout, like I'll feel it, like I'll test it out when I produce an event or I'll do something and I'll feel that burnt out state. I'm like, stop, go play, go rest. Also, speaking of play, that's something that I've been curious about lately. Is how couldn't I invite more play into my life? Because when I was at the very um beginning awakenings of like restoring my energy levels, I would mostly play. I I would like do mostly the play and not not the other stuff. And now that I'm more in like an equilibrium of it all, sometimes I feel that drudge of work when I'm working. I'm like, oh, I don't want to be sitting at this computer, you know?

SPEAKER_01 28:57

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 28:57

And then I'm like, wait, have I leaned too far this direction? What if I could be at this computer in a playful environment? Like, why am I not merging the two worlds worlds together?

SPEAKER_02 29:10

Still doing the same things but engaging with them in a different way.

SPEAKER_04 29:13

Yeah, like why not go on an adventure to a new coffee house or or every work break take a walk ab around the block um to like smell flowers, literally smell flowers, or in my case, go to the beach, or the beach is a few blocks from my office. You know, like the what maybe it's I every hour or so I read, whatever's playful. Um, how could I incorporate play into my everyday life? Um including in fitness. It's like we have these goals I gotta get to the gym and I gotta do the blah blah blah blah. You know, it's so stringent, and I've always been really stringent about everything. And like, what if play is like just I have a hangbar outside of my bedroom and I do that, and then I and I play like in this way and that way, and I as long as I'm moving, like that's what moving, using my body, yeah. So yeah, uh reincorporating play, I think is uh that that and boundaries are where my focus are right now.

SPEAKER_02 30:19

Yeah, and I I think those are really good things to to focus on, and and and what you're talking about there, the the you know, in terms of playfulness, it's really about um flexibility and adapting, isn't it, during the course of a day, and and and I guess it's far too common for people to get locked into just sitting at the desk looking at emails and and team meetings all day, and and the brain locked into that so that when you're not doing that, it starts to feel uncomfortable. So this kind of switching is really, really good in terms of keeping the brain agile.

SPEAKER_04 30:53

Totally. Like yesterday, after I would I do these focus mate sessions, I use this tool called Focus Mate to have someone work on the screen with me. And in between the sessions, I would do five push-ups because that's playful. I just go in the sun, do five push-ups, just something that feels playful. Um it's important. I think a lot of people might be like, oh my gosh, this this woman probably doesn't understand work, she doesn't understand what I need to get done or something like that. I remember the interview I had with a really important investor, Arlen Hamilton, and she said, we write our own headlines. And I think this journey of business, of career, we think it needs to be a certain way because we're told this is the way it is. But what if it's not? And what if we're each writing our own headline of what our lives look like, and then we create our world around that headline? Just what if that were possible?

SPEAKER_02 31:52

Yeah, you know, fantastic, isn't it, to think that? But you know, I I don't know what you think about this, but I I think even in this day and age, so much of um the way work is structured, but also even when we have a choice to change things, the way that our brains are conditioned to think about this, it's it's almost a Victorian era that if you're not sitting in front of your computer 12 hours a day, you're not really doing what you mean to be doing. But but actually, you know, taking time out to go and do five press-ups or go to the beach or whatever, it it might mean that in the hours that you are working, actually, you're far more effective. And I know I've had that where you know I've sat looking at something for two hours and I'm just getting nowhere with it. I'll go away and do something completely different, come back and fly through it for five minutes.

SPEAKER_04 32:37

A hundred percent.

SPEAKER_02 32:38

And it's all to do with the energy and the mindset that you you you're bringing to it rather than just sitting there uh in a slavish way.

SPEAKER_04 32:45

Was it was it the Dalai Lama that said the point of life is to be happy?

SPEAKER_02 32:52

I'm gonna go with yes. I don't know, but it sounds like the kind of thing you say, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 32:56

Yeah. I'm telling you, Richard, I need to Google. I got the Navy SEALs, I got the four-minute mile, this is the last one.

SPEAKER_02 33:07

It does sound like the kind of thing that you say, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 33:10

Yeah. So if the point of life is to be happy, it's you know, I I reflect on that each day. I'm like, when I'm feeling like the drudge of whatever of the irritating dish, washing the dishes like responsibility or the constant meeting requests or you know, emails or whatever it may be, reports, all the stuff, the drudge. Even, even sometimes, you know, there was a time a family member of mine uh was um ill, and that was a very heavy, energetically taxing uh period of my life. And I remember whenever I would drive to the hospital or drive any anywhere related to this person, I would say, I am so lucky that I get to be uh, you know, doing this with them. I'm so lucky that they're still here. I would just like really lean in to the gratitude of it because the pain was so heavy and so exhausting that it was my lifeline, it was my fuel source to to focus on the what is thankful within it all, you know? And so yeah, this our whole life is to be molded, the the little bits and pieces that and I I particularly think social apps, um, and I have this problem just like the rest of us, social apps, Instagram, YouTube, you know, all this stuff. I feel like they want our mind control, they want us to stay asleep because it means more advertising dollars. And they want us to be lost in nonsense controversy that doesn't matter because it distracts us from what's important. Money is a powerful thing in a lot of different ways, and some people abuse money, and then some people use it to do really great things. And I don't think anything is inherently wrong with money. I think how people utilize it or maneuver around it is what the problem is. And that's a person behind it. It's not the money, the money's just sitting there. Like, and so a lot of these social apps, I think, are all about um distracting us from ourselves because the more that we're distracted from self, the more that we can be manipulated, suaded, distracted, you know, like like not pay attention to things that we should be paying attention to. And um, so I do my best. I have like two phones. One phone has no cell service, it only has learning apps, and then the other one's my main phone, and even on my main phone, I have a custom screen called present, and only my mom and my two best girlfriends can get through. And so, no notifications, anything. And so um I do my best and I still find my brain like, and this has been you know proven that that social apps are like a form of drug addiction, and my brain is like craving. Like, I'm like, why? Why is it craving this like BS? Like, this is crazy. And I'm still working, I'll still find myself in bed at night, knowing how I sleep really well, and I still won't do the thing to sleep really well, and I'll watch YouTube or whatever, and like do the thing. Yeah, and I have to remember that this is what these apps want. They built these because these have become a drug addiction. I am addicted and I need to wean myself off. We're all addicted as a society because that is literally how these things are built for us to be addicted. And if we don't take full alertness to the addiction that we're all experiencing and take control of our lives, the social apps will control us. Like that is what they're doing. They're they're like Instagram has become QVC, like the sales machine.

SPEAKER_03 37:17

Yeah, um, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 37:19

And and sometimes after I watch some of this content, I ask myself, did that enhance my life in any way? Is my life any better for watching that dramatic conversation on, you know, on some salacious podcast? I'm like, no. I'm like, okay, is that a choice? Um, am I any better knowing the knowledge of whose boyfriend was whose on what reality TV show? You know, like no. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, what do if our body is almost like this vessel and we could input into it anything we want, nutritious foods, great information. Do I want to be inserting that BS into this vessel? No. So I need to, as we all do, work on completely overcoming this addiction so that I utilize it as a tool, a utility, a billboard, something to grow my business and in an authentic way, but like that I have intentionality with the tools available to me rather than.

SPEAKER_02 38:26

Making mindful choices rather than just drifting into these things. And you know, if you know that you're going into it and you know what the risks are, you're more likely to know when to pull pull back from it. But some of you just don't, don't you when we're tired and we're very, very busy. We have less capacity to stop and think about these things. It's another reason why we need to think about how we construct our day rather than just putting the hours in. Totally. How do we use those hours? Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 38:52

I mean, the social apps are also, you know, our nervous system, as we talked about earlier, keeping us safe. We use the social apps because we're in pain, and maybe that's a dramatic word, but over something. We're trying to like hide from something, some sort of stressor. And so we use the social app so we don't have to feel anything because it feels soothing to not feel, but really, what's it the only ways through? Something like that.

SPEAKER_02 39:18

It's probably self-medicating, isn't it? Some people will come home and you know, drink crack beers or yeah, exactly. For a while, you don't have to clear. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 39:30

And the more we think the more we move through it, the more empowered we are. At the in the the consequence of moving through rather than trying to nullify, is feeling incredibly clear and empowered. It's a really beautiful state that that I feel very thankful I've been able to experience several times, especially in the last year. And the opposite of that is this kind of like it sounds like TV static. It's like this TV static state, kind of a little tired, and just like this buzz. You don't feel but like you're just kind of like checked out, you know. I rather have this amazing, like superpower, clarity-empowered state than that like TV static state.

SPEAKER_02 40:23

Yeah, yeah, and to and to know that you've got to you've got to be in tune with yourself a little bit, haven't you? To to to because I guess sometimes that can be quite low-level response that if you're not looking for it, you don't you don't notice it and and you carry on doing all the wrong things. So, you know, I think I think it's a really such a great example for for people of the kind of thing to start to tune in for because that you know, you think about it for millions of years, that was the primary way that we we interacted with the world around us, we gauged our uh well-being, wasn't it? You know, that the the higher functions of the brain are a relatively recent addition, and yet we rely so heavily on our cognitive functioning, don't we? It has a place, absolutely, but it's not the biggest part of our experience by any means.

SPEAKER_04 41:08

Right. Yeah. Yeah, I'm sure you guys have the same thing over there. I imagine that we have over here that now, like the plumber, the contract, the people who can do the manual labor are the high value people. Like for a while, it was it was the profession of uh of engineering and this and that, that you know, a computer engineer. That was like the how and now it's like here plumbers, the rate for a plumber is actually.

SPEAKER_02 41:38

And getting them to come, and even if you're willing to supply the money, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 41:41

Yeah, yeah. Because people aren't picking up the trade. It's so it's fast, it's like using our bodies and um using our bodies is really important, like knowing how to do things, like the more, the more disconnected we are from the computer and from social networks, the more connected we are to ourselves, and it's important. So true. So I think that's so true. That's probably the greatest change in the last you know X amount of years since the uh the advent of this digital world is just the disconnection from self.

SPEAKER_02 42:20

Yeah, yeah, I totally totally agree, totally agree. We're just sort of coming up towards the end of today. It's been a fantastic topic. We've gone in so many different directions. I love it. Absolutely love it. Um tell us a little bit about uh what what you're working on at the moment. Have you got anything interesting coming up? Any any projects, anything that people might want to find out more about?

SPEAKER_04 42:39

Oh, well, nothing. I mean, I'm working on my Los Angeles Tech Walks, but for your audience, that that wouldn't um that wouldn't jive. I'm working on my book. I don't there's nothing to promote. I'm I'm really just here because I uh I wanted to be. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 42:56

It's been been been great to have you. What's what's the book gonna be about?

SPEAKER_04 43:00

You know, it's so interesting. I it was originally, or maybe it still is, and maybe your audience may be able to share with me what they have in mind. It was originally how I built Los Angeles to be the third top startup city in the world. And um there was something really insincere for me in the book. Something was off, like, because I didn't start doing community work to be a thought leader. I became, I gained credibility, but that wasn't my MO. And so I don't want to write a book on thought leadership. I I wrote the draft already, by the way. And as I like reread the draft, I'm like, no, like this isn't it. Like, I can't, this is just not it. And so lately I've been thinking about redoing it so that it's more a principle based book, kind of like I was telling you about reality transsurfing. I'm so inspired. There's this other book I picked up when I was a kid, I happen to have it in front of me. It's called If I Knew Then What I Know Now. And it's just these like little blurbs of like quotes. And I'm like, what if I change my book into something a little bit more digestible like that? But I'm really um initially it was about teaching people how to build a startup community, like how I did it, like wherever they live around the world. But there just there was something that was lacking sincerity because it felt like all of it ended up leading back to thought leadership when that is just wasn't even in the equation for me. So I didn't feel good about putting like it's not about anyone's ego. Like that's not, you know, and so I'm I'm uh I've been working with someone named Alex in Books. I don't know if you've heard of him. He's uh a business book, like he's so passionate about business books. Um, Alex and Books, he's great. So we meet once a month and discuss my book, and I know that it will be published by the end of the year because I'm being very intentional about it. Yeah, but I I'm I'm very frustrated. I've been writing this book for several years, and so um it's been a it's been a very uh challenging process. I've dreamed of being a writer since I was in elementary school. So this is one of those things where my nervous system, what Stephen Pressfield say, like when you feel all the resistance, it's when you're on the right path. Um uh but yeah, I don't know. I it's been a difficult journey for me, this book writing. But that that is Yeah, it sounds like it's gonna do a few different iterations.

SPEAKER_02 45:32

It sounds like you maybe a little bit closer to where it needs to be.

SPEAKER_04 45:35

I hope so. And if anybody has any suggestions, they could email me at esprithay.com. It's E-S-P-R-E-E at H E Y.com.

unknown 45:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 45:46

So you heard it here, so do get in touch if you've got any suggestions.

unknown 45:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 45:50

Esprit. But thank you for having me, Richard. This is been really enjoyed.

SPEAKER_02 45:57

So just say one more time, just so people know.

SPEAKER_04 45:59

Um, at Esprit Devora on all social media.

SPEAKER_02 46:03

Fantastic.

unknown 46:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 46:04

Esprit, it's been been great having you on. We'd love to have you on again at some point in the future. Hopefully, when you finish that book and we can talk more about what it looks like. That would be amazing. Uh because it's published. Yeah, yes.

SPEAKER_04 46:17

That'd be great.

SPEAKER_02 46:18

And you promised by the end of the year, okay.

SPEAKER_04 46:21

Yes, no, that is that is my uh that my promise to myself.

SPEAKER_00 46:26

Brilliant, fantastic. This is the business of thinking. Mastery doesn't end here. See you in the next episode.