Work-Life Balance and Overcoming Addiction to Stress with Naketa R. Thigpen

I'm joined by Naketa R. Thigpen, LCSW, regarded as the #1 Balance & Relationship Advisor in the World to discuss work-life balance and overcoming addiction to stress.

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Transcript

spk_0:   0:00
you're listening to Break by Design Episode five on work Life balance and overcoming addiction to stress with Nikita are Pigpen. Welcome to Brave by design. I'm your host, LL Oracle, Ill. I'm an entrepreneur, coach and speaker. I love thinking Bake. Exploring the power of personal development and sharing the best strategies from thought leaders and pioneers and business to empower ambitious women and allies to bravely rise and thrive. Let's get started. Hey, friends, this is Laura Khalil, and welcome to this episode of Brave by design. I was just really listening to this episode as I was editing it and Oh, my gosh, Do I have shivers? Please stay for this entire episode. Nikita has so much wisdom to share with you. If you have been a workaholic, work all the time struggled to find work, life balance. You are going to get a major major clue in this episode as to why you have that behavior and what can be done about it. So I'm very excited for us to kick off. In addition, I wanted to share again some of the warm praise that I'm receiving for this show. If you like the show, leave us a review. This came in email from Danielle. Danielle Rights. I am loving the new podcast. You could read the phone book, and I listened because I love your phone voice, but couple that with the subject matter that is particularly useful and relevant for me. And you've got yourself a winner in my book. Daniel, thank you so much. If I could find a phone book, I absolutely would read it to you. That would be my gift to you, but, um, I, uh you know, as a public speaker, I have really learned to train and home my voice. And certainly I'm not done with that. But I do appreciate it as one of my tools that I have to use, which is why I have the podcast. So, uh, before we get started, I want to remind you of one thing. My group coaching program is going to be kicking off on February 22nd. So who is that four. Well, if you do not want this year to be like last year and you're ready to effect profound change and nothing less, I want you to join me for group coaching. This is particularly well suited to individuals who feel stuck at a certain part of your career, are not sure what the next steps are and want to feel inspired, energized and really get clarity on where you're going. I will be teaching you how to get clear, and we will be designing your life and roadmap to achieve great things. This is a small group coaching program. It is a quarterly commitment, and we're kicking off. On February 22nd you'll be working directly with me in small Group Over Zoom. You can learn more about this at force of bad ass. Sorry dot com Our early pricing is going away on February 13th. All right, let's get to this episode with the Amazing Nikita are thick. Been everyone. Welcome to brave by design. I am so excited for today's guests. Uh, Nikita are thick. Man L. C s W. Is regarded as the number one balance and relationship advisor in the world. She is the CEO of FIG Pro Balance and Relationship Management Institute, a global personal personal development company headquartered in Philadelphia. She's a transfer formative empowerment speaker in demand to lead mainstage keynotes, create custom business accelerators. Coaching circles live retreats, and Nikita and her team set out every day to partner with analytical creative entrepreneurs and entrepreneurial leaders focused on amplifying the intimacy in their relationships so that they can have the freedom, flexibility and confidence to thrive in work. Life in Love with Big Pro, you will create your balance and create your joy. I also wanna let you know Nikita's book is coming out. Pre order will be available March 25th of the E book. It is called Selfish Permission to Pause, Live Love and Laugh Your Way to Joy. I can't tell you, Nikita how much I love that title, Um, and let's we'll talk a little bit about it now. Finally, I want you to know if you have not already figured out that Nikki is a total badass. She was featured on the Lifestyle Channel International Radio broadcast and the recipient of the N Double A C P Award as one of 101 top influencers in Philadelphia. You confined Nikita, equipping ambitious women in business and a few brave men through her seasonal balance, boldly podcast and the Intimacy Advantage show, which is coming soon, connect with Nikita on Instagram at asked Nikita. I will include that link and a link to her website in the show notes So you can follow her. And you should, because she is amazing. Hot, huh? Hello?

spk_1:   5:36
Hello? Hello, Laura. I am so honored and thrilled and ecstatic to be here. This is super exciting.

spk_0:   5:44
I I am so happy to have you here, so our audience doesn't know you and I met. Oh, I don't know. What was that? Three,

spk_1:   5:51
three or four

spk_0:   5:51
weeks ago? Um, I was on your show the balance. Boldly podcast. Looking for that coming out in mid Feb. That episode. But you and I, we just I feel like we really jelled. Yeah, that's so

spk_1:   6:07
much juicy Sparkle ish GIs possibility. As one of my good colleagues would say, like what is possible? There's so many possibilities between us, and it showed up the minute I think we said hello.

spk_0:   6:21
And you know, when it hits, it's like the most beautiful thing ever. And so I knew after I was on your show was like, Nikita, I have to have you on brave by design because we were talking off the record, so to speak about this issue of how people, you know, people have, like, disassociated lives. There's so many people who go to work and we're sort of expected to drop this whole piece of ourselves of, you know, what's going on in our personal life, our extracurricular interests and coming to work sort of with that mask on and back until very disassociating for people. And I know that this is an area that, um, you work intimately in. And so I wanted to talk about that with you today. And I want to start by asking you about you. How did you get into this work? Why are you so passionate about this?

spk_1:   7:16
No, thank you. And you're right. It's a necessary conversation for us to 1/2 right? And a lot of it starts with us kind of redefining some of the norms that we've set upon ourselves and kind of fallen in whether it was because of cultural norms, work warms, community norms, whatever. They have brought us to this space of billing like we needed to live in someone else's thoughts. And I think a lot of us come early to that. That was part of my story and where I came from. I am a licensed clinical social worker by profession. For more than 20 years, trauma specialty was everything that I kind of grew up with. One trauma informed care specifically, especially with families dealing with bereavement violence, difficulty when their Children were in the hospital and just kind of dealing with this new normal on and all that went went instead at sexual abuse. It's all of it, Um, and because that was my normal and I was really, really good at what I what I was doing. I had a really difficult time separating myself from the previous expectations, expectation, the older Nikita. Or should I say, the younger Nikita had said, You know, when I grow up, uh, someday one day I will have my own practice. And when I was really little, that practice was a little bit, um, extraordinary and my thoughts to say the least. I'm trying not to say over the top because we want our kids to have over the top imaginations. But I literally said, I'm gonna be a pediatrician and have my psychology office on the side of my house. And as I grew up and understood that I do not like organic chemistry.

spk_0:   8:52
I got it.

spk_1:   8:54
And, you know, I just started Premed is Well, I was, uh oh, this is for the birds. I believe that part to someone else. Ah, my triple majored in psych, social anthropology at Drexel and just kind of delved into the other part of my dream, Which was that private breakfast. So I knew that eventually I would be able to just help families and individuals peak, period. Just kind of understand who they were and why they did the things that they did. The challenge, though, if I felt I don't love with that, Um, and I really had a hard time connecting with the fact that that wasn't going to be my story anymore.

spk_0:   9:30
It was really hard for you all.

spk_1:   9:32
It was horribly hard, like you're talking to, like the most Anna Little Cole, ridiculously geeked out nerd who researches everything. That was like, I really didn't understand what was wrong with Thio. And I'm the person that helps other people find out what was wrong with them, right? Like, yeah, I had such a challenge with changing my own narrative and a lot of it to be quite honest. And Frank, um, didn't occur to me. And so much much later on in my life, Even after I became an entrepreneur, I was still stuck in this kind of inner child trauma, this survival mold of feeling like I needed to save other people and to be the ones of fixed each and every person that came across because I was really just trying to fix my own parents and my hand on ships right on. And of course, I didn't know that. Obviously, it wasn't conscious and it was much more unconscious. We're going on the process. But as I moved through and gave myself permission to release those old expectations, even the ones that belong to me, those private ones up and I'm gonna have the house by this time. But two kids and a dog by that, you know, like, released myself from that and said, It's okay that I didn't go about it the right way. I was a young parent. My husband and I have been together since we were seven, seeking, for instance, 13. We definitely did not wait for marriage to handle babies and, you know, things were out of order If you go by, you know, cultural nor

spk_0:   11:04
write what people say you should D'oh!

spk_1:   11:06
Exactly. Um things were very, very zigzag e and life threw us soul Mooney, unexpected storms and earthquakes and everything else that you can imagine to really shift us. And for a while I was in resistance to the shift. What is this? I gotta fix this. I got to control it. But the shift was really there to shake up all that kind of calcified chaos that was covering my real purpose.

spk_0:   11:34
Oh, my God. You know

spk_1:   11:36
what I mean, Laura, Like it was so much from the pet past. Traumas. I am a survivor and a driver from previous victim of multiple traumas of sexual abuse and violence growing up. So I had bad and in all the many stat Trammell's on top of that in terms of things that it kind of deterred and showed up in my being in all of my relationships, not just with my lover who's that? My husband, but also and friendships and sister ships and situation ships and on it and all those kind of things just created this chaos that calcified over my power my truth and my purpose. That was already inside B. So for years, I was outside of myself seeking, you know, What am I supposed to do when I grew up? How am I supposed to do this? You know what? What's really out here in the world for me to do, But I felt that I was meant from Warren that I was pulled to do greater in your terms, braver things. But I really I had a hard time understanding that it was already inside of me. Just just constant ified over.

spk_0:   12:39
So, Nikita, how did that affect you? I'm just so curious. How did that affect you when you went into your work and you're having trouble accessing yourself, honey, Uh, you know

spk_1:   12:53
how much Theo shortest warm? Um, the shore this way that I could say that is, it made me extremely brilliant. Um, at mastering the art of covering up. Um, my compartmentalize game is 1 25 out of tune. Go right. Like I can compartmentalize and take on the biggest, hugest, most near impossible project and accomplish it. And all that ambition was like makeup over the wounds and the scars, right? Just like, you know, not Thio. Diminish anyone who's been in any kind of physical altercation or intimate, violent, intimate, partner violent relationship with similar to that brilliance that a woman or man who's in those relationships would have when they are phenomenal people and they're just really trapped in this vicious cycle. Horrendous, Mr Cycle. But they won't let the world know they'll put Makeup one right and coming up, and no one will know this if you can't see the bruises from the stars you don't know to ask questions on. And I got really good at doing that my makeup was these crazies over stuff, schedules and ambitious projects. Um, a lot of over giving. So because I showed up with this makeup of like, everything was great. You know, apple pie in Sherry's No one acts like, Hey, check something inconsistent here

spk_0:   14:27
because you're so good at hiding. You're so good at compartmentalizing concealing, and I imagine there's a lot of people listening to this who feel the same way. You know who go into work or go into even like, let's say, networking events or interviews or presentations, and they're like, I got to stuff it down. I gotta hide it. I gotta put it in the box. And I can't allow anyone to see my weakness on Lee Armor on

spk_1:   14:54
the armor and penetrable armor always on the outside but shattered on the inside. Right? Uh and that was my truth for a really long time and entrepreneurship. Quite honestly, the order just exposed more of my inadequacies, my insecurities, my feelings of not enough. Like all of it. It just expose intimated a lot harder. Thio cover up with makeup, right? Because you know you're not an entrepreneur and you get it. You are put in some situations where the only thing that's gonna help you elevate, let alone help bring the fullest value you're meant to bring is being completely transparent.

spk_0:   15:34
It's on you

spk_1:   15:36
and it's on you completely not so much about what the other person is or isn't willing to. D'oh! You have to show up and show out fully. And that meant being honest about your girl. You brilliant. But you are very unbalanced. Me, my eso hits you. No need being really interested. And not just from an emotional science and behavioral science perspective. Um, balance and work life balance and relationship management and all of that. But individually, as a person, I knew that something was really wrong, and I was. I was kind of slowing down the funnel of greatness that I had to pull out to the world because I didn't have much left for myself. Um,

spk_0:   16:23
so was there a moment that you were Memory said, This is going to change? Or were you just felt like I can't do this anymore?

spk_1:   16:31
Yeah, I had, uhm and I think for most people listening, it's a lot of little moments that add up to that one moment where you just say, That's it. Enough is enough, right? And I had a lot, a lot of little moments, a little moments when I was incorporate and working as a clinician and, you know, justifying the crazy 16 18 hour days and multiple other shifts that you had to pick up because, you know, it's a social worker. You don't, you know, make that much running right. Yeah, And no matter how great the work is, you still have to live and take care of your family outside of it in school and all those kind of stressors that I've packed on all of those, created these little shits and was shaking up, shaking some of that past the fight chaos loose a little bit, and then I would play around a little bit with like, Well, you know, let me go back to school for my doctorate, So that would be like a chisel. Get some of the chaos to figure out what Wa So you know. Whoa, it I don't know. It's network marketing. My thing. Would that be another chisel? Like there were these little smaller chisel like shift that I would D'oh! But my complete utter this is it was when I decided to divorce myself. Quite honestly, Um,

spk_0:   17:43
what I buy that

spk_1:   17:44
well, my old self, which I'll call Kia because that was my nickname. Growing up my full name Nikita. Right. But my nickname was Kia for friends and family who knew? Man of a certain age. Kia was really nice girls Really smart, really cute. You know, all that good stuff, but I wasn't right kind. Um because I think nice can be really superficial and not transparent.

spk_0:   18:09
Oh, my God. Say it again. Right and place

spk_1:   18:12
Nice Could be ready superficial and not very transparent. Um, amen. Wear nice toe homeless people that we walk by. We wantto help in some kind of way, but we're not taking him home and inviting them in or sitting down and saying, like, you know, uh, here's full carte blanche should my life and my secrets. But when you are kind, you are extremely transparent and open to just trust and go to another level with someone including yourself. And Kia was not kind to herself. So having having all of those layers of me that were broken but stacked on top of each other and kind of hardened into this armor, it was painted over with this ambition writing the er, niceness and all of that. When I decided to divorce myself, it wasn't because my husband was blaring in my ear. They're our relationship wasn't working. Um, I was becoming so distant, physically, intimately, you know, emotionally, sexually, all of a young girl. I was scheduling our sex days like I mean, just everything was so calculated just to try to grasp some level of control. And he is a creatives, so that was not working for him. He doesn't how bout scheduled anything, right? Let alone that. My kids were just getting older and being We raised them to speak their mind. And they were speaking her mind telling me, you know, listen, like, I don't want to go to these 5000 activities anymore. And all the things that I have packed on our schedule toe, I feel like a good parent, you know?

spk_0:   19:49
Right, And do

spk_1:   19:50
all those things, Um, and the lack straw waas probably I have, like, two or three regrets in my life. And the last straw was my last regret. I chose to survive. I completely troll survival molds, and I was quite addicted to the stress of survival mold over my Children. Um,

spk_0:   20:12
okay. And that's really just want people to hear that addicted to the stress, because that is an addiction.

spk_1:   20:20
Yeah, it And it was definitely my addiction on my parents are actual, like drug addicts, right? Like heroin, cocaine and alcohol and everything. And that's what I grew up with. And, um, I vowed to not do that and not be them, but I definitely fell into my own trample the diction, which was the stress of surviving that that constant fight or flight. You got a user and I could use some of my gifts in the right lane. My gift is a problem solvers and designing solutions. And I use that and I got a high from there was another problem and I had to figure out a solution is constant cycle that, of course, if you're a spiritual person, you understand who outranks all that you're constantly thinking of, right? You want to be in survivor mode, the universe is gonna throw you lots of opportunities to live, right? Um, And for me, it came down to my son's high school graduation about a month or so out from graduation, and you should, you know, the size of the facility they were using or something. They changed the date. And my calendar is my second Bible. I had everything headed locked in, and there was no conflict. And when they changed the date, the new date conflicted with a networking conference that I had out out of town with my mentor, who was also Kino. So my loyalty issues came up like I'm loyal to a fault. Like almost stuff. All my stuff was coming to a head in that moment And of course, that I didn't want to tell her because I knew that she would just say, Oh, don't worry about it. But then people say that, but don't mean, you know, like I had all this people pleasing stuff come up, everything that I have been battling and trying to just stuff stuff stuff down was Comet was like rising up with a rush way to the top because I was forced to Do you go to your son's graduation? You're his high school graduation. Or do you go to this networking conference where you know you're in the right room of these high level ambitious women that you have plenty of tools and resources to help and all that stuff, and we were dealing with a lot of scarcity at the time, like in the first few years of my business with, you know, if I don't show up, Bible says a man who doesn't work doesn't eat right. I'm taking things out of context. I'm just doing it all. I'm a hot mess, honey. I'm a cop

spk_0:   22:37
and then you're still in. So wait, what did you decide to d'oh?

spk_1:   22:40
I went to the conference. Okay? I went to the conference. I told my son I was like, Listen, Mommy has to work. I gotta work out of town. And, you know, my son's used to my crazy schedules. He was literally on my hip. I gave birth to him and under Grant. So he was, like, used to me being more than ridiculous. And it gave me the standard teen answer of like, Okay, you know, that's what you have to D'oh. Um, And I went and I was I felt sick. I felt nauseous the whole time. My mind was completely not at the conference. Right. So I'm, like, showing up not full, fully present my husband or my daughter. I forget who they sent me. A text message. A picture of them, like standing on the on the atrium steps of the graduation. Um, you know, they look nice. The head. My my son's got mom go in my stead so he would have a mother figure hair, which has been, um so in my mind, I'm problem solving, right? Like I planned, like a fixed it. So I talked to my son and I said, Hey, you know, congratulations. How was it? No, he's telling me. And I was like, I'm so sorry. I can't be there. And this was when I heard him. His truth pour through his words. He said, No problem. Mom, I understand you had to go to work, but I heard his disappointing it were before I had justified it. Like if this if I was his dad, nobody would have any questions. Right now I'm a man. No one says anything like, Oh, the father has to work, not a big deal. But as the mother, it's It is expected that you will move mountains and streams and rivers to be there and to do what no one else in the world would sacrifice doing. You're expected to do it. And that was an expectation that I had for myself. But because I was living in this limited belief of scarcity mindset, the stress of all of the how can I be in three places at once and have you believe the conference and get to the dinner that we want to You know, all of that, that coordination and overscheduled that that high was powerful and I tapped into it

spk_0:   24:43
so I that thank you for sharing that. I really honor that story And you being so vulnerable and ensuring this regret that you have because there are so many people who I'm sure listening who are feeling cold in many different directions and kind of like you will they just they show up at the conference, They show up at work the next day, and they're like, Well, this is what I have to dio and they appear But they're not even appearing as thumb holds their whole Selves. Their mind is somewhere else. Their body is somewhere else. There are emotions or somewhere else. And then they're engaging with people in a professional way. Um, who have no idea that anything of this is happening in the background, right? But we're all sort of like silently suffering through it. And so, for those types of folks who feel like, as you put it at the beginning of the show, they are living in someone else's box. How can we start to take steps towards bringing more authenticity and more vulnerability into our professional lives, feeling like it's okay to say, no dealing like, You know what, I'm having a tough day, and it has nothing to do with work. Maybe it has to do with an intimacy issue I'm experiencing at home. I it could be any 1,000,000 of things, but we're not talking about it. So everyone's just armoring up.

spk_1:   26:13
Yeah. No. And thank you, Lord, for providing the space. Because I will say this is the first time I have ever shared that story. Um,

spk_0:   26:22
every day of

spk_1:   26:22
my life, the first time ever. Um,

spk_0:   26:26
I'm still honored.

spk_1:   26:27
Thank you. It really it wasn't until I was flushing through my own kind of personal transformation story, which is in the book, which isn't selfish, um, that it occurred to me that that was, in fact, something that needed to be shared. It was always just kind of the secret secret thing on I proposed, for instance, say a secret chain might do I with teaching people how to shake the shame, right? Like in an hour's like all those things. But just like of the the doctor who's the worst patient, right? Exactly. I definitely had to maneuver through that, and I would say for anyone out there who is dealing with anything that even feels remotely close to what I expressed to you here. And it doesn't matter if you have kids or dogs or pet, sir, or spouses or lovers or not. But if you've had a situation where you feel like this is a recurring thing that's coming up, um, my remedy is literally for you to get selfish literally.

spk_0:   27:31
So tell us more about what does that mean? Because people have such a negative connotation around the word selfish. So let's break that down, Nikki, to tell us what that means.

spk_1:   27:40
It's really in the redefining so we can change the conversation of what selfishness is. Obviously, I don't mean for people to be egoistic and, you know, just so self absorbed that they are non sympathetic to anyone or compassionate for anyone's situation or issues. I need that for the same language that we've heard over and over and over again. Put the mask on yourself first. We don't do it. We we dry, we not drive. We get a high off of feeling like everyone needs me. I'm taking care of all this stuff. I'm doing all this that right, like especially in this world in 2020

spk_0:   28:20
and in our culture. Absolutely

spk_1:   28:22
exactly right, like we're just like we're sold frickin busy all the time. And it's a badge of honor. Um, as much as we will complain about it, we'll complain about it. We'll go home was still sitting a frickin driveway for 45 minutes. I want to go in. We have all this weight space time because we're feeling exhausted where bottomless vessels that have nothing else to give. And it's because we're living in this constant hypocrisy. We're not dealing with our own trauma are issues or scars or wounds, emotional or otherwise. But we're focused on helping other people with theirs, right? Like we're constantly in this space where there's this pushing pool and avoid dealing with our own self. We just go harder with giving or showing up for other people. And the reality is, no matter how good you look when you show up or you finish that project and you did it so well, it was probably like 60% of the capacity that you really could have if you were full in the first place. Um, so when I say selfish, I'm really saying it's an another level of deeper intimacy in yourself love with yourself so that you can start to give real self care and not the self care that we give one frickin instagram photos, right? Like I'm getting a mani pedi up. I'm over here having dinner with my boo like the boot. You're not.

spk_0:   29:43
I tell me about it. I am so done with those instagram quotes.

spk_1:   29:47
Listen, yes. You know, I was about to say, Listen, Linda, from the way things in my head, right, Um, yeah, I'm with you, but that's what we do. Like, that's the life that we've been living for years and the most quote unquote authentic of us are not being transparent because we're authentic when it comes to telling someone about themselves and and showing up just the way we are. But the way you are is broken. You're not being transparent, and you're not really ready for the transformation because you're avoiding the root issue inside whatever those layered, because it's usually not one, right? Like those layered issues, um, that are there, So I could be selfish. I mean, it's time to just put up some boundaries and the boundaries are as simple as saying no toe all the opportunities that you created for yourself an overflow when you were trying to medicate your pain.

spk_0:   30:45
Oh, my gosh. I hope everyone heard that. That is a powerful statement. Thank you. It's so boundaries. Yeah, appropriate boundaries. Can you give the audience? So I always say, when I when I talked to my clients, I say, Listen, it's about understanding your boundaries, but then you gotta hold the boundary after state it and then you gotta hold it because that's the part that people have trouble with. Is understanding howto, at least in my experience. And I love to hear more from you around. How do we set healthy boundaries and how do we maintain those?

spk_1:   31:26
I think the backing up a little bit. It goes into how we redefine what work life balance is, right, like people. And I think you and I have talked about this offline previously, either before or after our, um, our podcast. Other other podcasts. Your balance is not about 50 50. 37 is not about any of it. You've never been in a relationship where it was completely equal. At one hour or another, someone was giving or receiving more than the other in energy and resource is in time or in its inattention. Your balance is really just admitting the truth of what you really want, not your old key yourself. Your new Makita, right? Like yourself is right now that those previous I'ma do this by this age and you know, whatever or my parents said I should be a lawyer or my my sister is constantly tell me telling me I'm not going to be as good as her, you know, whatever it is that you're comparing yourself to or whatever that previous expectation was that old That's not your truth, not anything before. Now that you know 35 40 to 55 whatever you are, you're very different human. Then what you were before because you've changed, do the life circumstances and hopefully you've also involved in the process of that. And some of those things have evolved with you and just become shiny or representations of what they are. Some of them don't belong in your story anymore, not in this new chapter of your life. So if your new truth is you know what I'm going to be Ah, I don't know a Mobile and I want a portfolio of businesses and that's your new truth. Or, you know, a certain leader that's rising into certain levels where you used to want to be an entrepreneur. Whatever your truth is, now you have to create bound breathing, allowing to achieve the reality of truth and distractions that pull you away from truth out. So if my reality is I'm a mobile in the making more, that's my goal. I wanna have a KN institute that's global and, you know, a slew of investment and X y z a ABC else on my portfolio. Then I can't show up to everybody's third wedding and their fourth divorce party and their fifth baby shower. I can tell it I need to send you a gift, maybe take you to a private dinner, depending on you know, how close you are in mine. My network. I can celebrate with you in some other way. That's true and kind and and really all in quality of time. Not necessarily the quantity of quantity of time. And I have to be okay with the reality that most people aren't used to that so I'm gonna look like the black sheep or the bag I or the one that is never around. I'm gonna look like that to some people for a little while, and that little while could be a year or five years or 10. But it's worth it if I'm literally living my balance, living my best life, going after the truth of what I want now and not my old self. And when you do that, the boundary has become easier and easier to hold because they're not just about you wanting to just not go somewhere right there about you living in your purpose and moving towards something that's pulling you for your truth is connected to your purpose. If it's not your purpose, exactly, it's connected to it. It's a white bear, and it's pulling you and it's calling you. But if you keep choosing to please everyone and to show up at the parties and to keep signing up because you want to be validated by someone else that you join seven leadership boards and all these other things that are just distractions from where you're going, then whose fault is it when your life is ending and you don't have a legacy. It's not everybody else's is not all the leadership award is not all the people who invited you to the baby shower. They gave the invitation. You had a choice to say No. I love you, girl. Hey, bro, I'm feeling you. Congratulations. I'll send something to you in the next 30 days. You know, I'll take you know privately later it's on you. So part of the the positioning, if you will, of getting yourself to that place where you want to create those boundaries is being unapologetic about the fact that you are doing what you're supposed to do and not what other people want you to do.

spk_0:   35:44
What I love about this is a few things. First thing is that when you give yourself permission to set and hold those boundaries, you also show other people they have permission to do the same thing. Okay, so you're the you're the example. And what I hear you saying in this is that when I set a healthy boundary and I really decided what my priorities are and where the current version of me wants to go, which can change and is okay that I am bringing my whole self to activities, to work, to the Children's events, to the meetings, wherever it may be, because I have fully invested in being there.

spk_1:   36:29
So true. The reality is when you start creating that, you don't find it and it doesn't show up on your lap. You create your balance, right? Your truth, your boundaries. You're creating it. This is your reality. When you create your balance, you're on your way to creating your joy, and your joy is literal religious. I have a formula for it. It's your balance, plus healthy relationships. Times intimacy squared, huh? Solid is that joy? You don't have to go seek it. You don't have to curate it. You created if you created your balance and you're constantly and that's a that's an everyday thing, right? Like there's some days when the boundaries were a little hard. Implement that day, you know, because you want it all into, you know, a different mould yourself, for which he's you're not half the complex, but you're constantly like in the space of holding up your truth and creating those boundaries for them. Been having those healthy relationships in creating the deeper connections with, um, that's the interest e. Now I'm not excluding sexual intimacy, right? Like that's right, boxes consensual and you feel good and all that. But the intimacy is really the deepening of the connection with the people who matter moves in your life. Ending your work. You can create intimate city at work as well, like look, someone in the eyes when you talk to them. Be kind. When you send an email, you don't have the, you know, give up five sentence. Thank you for every little thing. What you can use someone's name. I hate when I open an email and someone just jumps right into it and don't they? Don't say hi, Nikita. I think that's the most. The smallest thing that you could do to be kind, that the most precious thing, that someone working here is their own name. Like, let's be very vague about it. Say my name and I perk up right

spk_0:   38:17
thing. But it's true, these air small things to foster intimacy over just a transactional exchange, and I think a lot of times at work, it's all you know. We get in this mode of transactions. If you're in sales, I need to send out X number of e mails a day. I need to cold call X number of people on and everyone has the sort of, uh, types of goals. But how about these little things? How about little moments of authenticity and vulnerability in connection? And I'll tell you for myself, you know, because I do kind of all my cold outreach to people. And the simplest thing you can d'oh spend five minutes learning about someone before you get on the call or then the email learn about them. Who are they? And then project fat back with joy, enthusiasm and interest. And I'm gonna tell you what. And you know this. People appreciate it because you've seen them.

spk_1:   39:20
Yes, we do. We always appreciate it because we're seeing that at least you took a few whatever seconds, Whether it was to go to the website to see their digital social media footprint toe Look at an article that they recently looked at, whatever it was that you did and kind of like what we say as an entrepreneur the professional stalking way. D'oh! Right! Check someone out If it matters that you did your due diligence and you cared enough to do it. I'm definitely one of paying more attention to something that I noticed involved. Me then something that was just like, Hey, you know, Are you the right person to, you know? Yes. Send this s e o forms don't like, do Did you do them? Look, about What's that? You know what I mean. What exactly? Definitely be dismissive, but bringing your whole self floor the way that you bring your whole self. You're a well rounded woman with a lot of expertise and a lot of different areas, and you're able to tack into those expertise when you go when you look at someone's linked in profile and you start to see like Oh, okay, well, I see Nikita is about love. Well, guess what? I know a lot about it.

spk_0:   40:28
So let's connect on that on it. And don't be afraid to. It's okay. That's how we actually build riel. If people feel disconnected, I was think they feel disconnected at work. They feel lonely at work. They feel like nobody understands them. Listen to what Nikita is saying. Rewind this episode because it's about falling in love and getting to note yourself first. Okay? And then you can more easily feel that connection to others. But you're just connection to others is simply a reflection of a disconnection to yourself.

spk_1:   41:03
Come on, say, that's life. I don't think the people in the back heard you.

spk_0:   41:05
Okay, one more time. Your disconnection to others is simply a reflection of your disconnection to yourself, to your being, to your essence, to your brilliance and genius on this planet. And I say that I don't care if you're a religious person, spiritually atheist. You are here for a reason, right? I believe it. And let's tap into that. Wow, that Nikita. It's been such a pleasure to have you on the show.

spk_1:   41:34
Thank you. You know, I love showing up and show went out with you. We definitely have to do this again.

spk_0:   41:39
I love to absolutely