The Law in Lockdown and Beyond, with Hannah Beko
A series of conversations with those in the legal profession navigating the ups and downs of the law during and after lockdown. How has this changed the profession as we've emerged from the global pandemic?
The Law in Lockdown and Beyond, with Hannah Beko
Friday Conversation with Rachel Flower, lawyer, leadership mentor and advocate for female entrepreneurship
Rachel and I have created a special VE Day episode of Friday Conversations discussing so many issues we are both passionate about including women entrepreneurs, law firm wellbeing and mental health and the challenges and gifts of lockdown.
You can find out more about Rachel here.
For our video version of the conversation please visit You Tube.
Podcast host Hannah Beko is a self-employed lawyer, coach and creator of the Lawyers Business Mastermind™ (the place for entrepreneurial lawyers to grow).
If you are a legal professional, please feel free to join our free Facebook Group for networking, tips and support - Legally Speaking, a group for the legal profession by clicking here.
Visit Lawyers Business Mastermind™ for more details and to join us.
You can connect with Hannah on LinkedIn or visit www.authenticallyspeaking.co.uk.
If you'd like to take part in a #FridayConversation, please do email Hannah@authenticallyspeaking.co.uk.
Hello everyone and welcome to another Friday conversation. Today it is a huge pleasure of mine to welcome Rachel Flower who is a good friend of mine for the last, I'm not sure how many years, three, four, three or four I'm gonna guess. Rachel is a leadership mentor amongst many other things and she's going to share a bit more with us in a moment about what she does. She is also a lawyer, she has a business called Serenwood that she will probably talk to us about. So come and say hello Rachel and introduce yourself. self. Oh, Hannah,
SPEAKER_02:thank you so much for inviting me. It's always lovely to talk to you and, you know, share some of our conversation today with the people that are in your audience. And I know some of what we're going to talk about and there's lots of good stuff to explore, isn't there? I feel like this lockdown has brought such a time of reflection and reinvention and opportunity, like even in the midst of all the chaos and the difficulties in the dark days. I'm really, really excited to talk to you about some of the good stuff that's coming through as well. So yes I was and am still a qualified lawyer but I'm a non-practicing lawyer and I've not been practicing now for around 10 years. I qualified with Adelshaws and then went on to practice at DLA Piper and then I went in-house at BT. I set up my business about 10 years ago when my first child was born, she's 10 now and it was really around getting that flexibility and freedom in how I wanted to work and originally Serenwood was set up to help small businesses with everything related to legal contracts and supply chain and then it kind of changed and developed over the years and as businesses do they evolve and I also turned my hand then to business coaching mentoring and mostly what I do now as you said is leadership mentoring work with small business owners but particularly with women so my passion is supporting women to set up in business and grow their business in a really solid and sustainable way and because we have a big challenging this country with how we support and encourage women to do that, as we have in many areas with getting equality and diversity across the board. Yeah, definitely. So what do you mean by solid and sustainable? Great question. It's like a proper lawyer phrase to use, isn't it? Solid foundations is something I say a lot and then people go, what does that mean? I think it's core level. A lot of women go into business to make a difference. So they have a passion and we're different from men in that. We want to make a contribution. and we start out by doing something that we know we can do well and what happens is for a variety of reasons such as lack of funding lack of a good mentor lack of solid trusted resources lack of self-belief actually and confidence in yourself we start to just stagnate or more importantly women can give up too easily on their business so the value that i really love to bring because we know through our legal training and all these amazing experiences you have when we work in big law and big business we get this big rounded kind commercial view don't we of what it takes to succeed in business that most new business owners particularly women don't have like i tended to make an assumption when i was first working with these women that they had a good strong financial acumen and they knew about how contracts worked and they knew about how to negotiate with a supplier and they don't and that's okay you know they have all their own things that they're good at they might be creative they might be good at marketing or sales but so it's about really helping them to put that solid foundation in place and then to sustain the business for the long term because the stats tell us that so many women give up so many businesses obviously close and fail but unless your business is sustainable in which that you're always generating new revenue and you're always generating profit that it's viable then it's not really going to last the course so that's what I mean
SPEAKER_00:in a nutshell yeah absolutely absolutely and I don't know whether you'd agree with this but when you were talking about sustainability learn um and i thought this was sorry hannah sorry come here
SPEAKER_02:come here bell my little one's just come in obviously she's come here teddy
SPEAKER_00:must have heard because i've got one here too what you up to
SPEAKER_02:you did what oh dear hang on have we both got children should we pause for a second or is it going to stop right we've sorted children out we're back again so we did actually say when we were planning this didn't we that likely as not we'd be keeping it real with kiddies in the background that's how it's been hasn't it of course it is trying to work with the kids in the background yeah actually impossible to be honest
SPEAKER_00:Well, some days better than others, I suppose, isn't it? But it is that poor chap, you know, the BBC guy from ages ago with the child coming in. I mean, you know, we laughed at him. He became famous, I think, as a result. But, you know, now it's all of us.
SPEAKER_02:Absolutely. I mean, he's a good example because he didn't, what we just did obviously was stopped and paused and put our children kind of first. And that little clip was he tried to carry on, didn't he? And he was like pushing the child out of the way. and then the mum scooted in in the background and got a hold of him and took out and he's like trying to carry on and I think that's been our challenge hasn't it for so long you know particularly as women we try to go into that alpha way of not letting our children be you know an impediment to our career not letting them get in the way of what we want to do with our life and our business and you know certainly a lot of the leadership that I've been teaching in the last two or three years is about enough of that you know it is as important to be a parent if not more so than it is to be making a success of your job and your business and you know to be a bit cheesy about it but the cheesy ones are the best you know you're not going to be lying on your deathbed looking back thinking think of that amazing deal i did in work i'm so proud of it you know you're going to be thinking of your loved ones and your family and and i think that's a really important thing about lockdown as i said when we just started chatting you know all the amazing things that are coming out of the lockdown experience for me it's been beautiful to see so many people's eyes opening about what matters what do I really care about even being faced with your own mortality and the possible loss of loved ones you know so much room for personal growth in there which is
SPEAKER_00:my passion and yours yeah I mean I agree so much with that because I even my own journey from working from home which was actually my next question to in a moment that we'll come on to but you know so say eight years ago I started working from home and I think I've shared this on one of the other episodes and I would my sense of what professionalism was and you know a professional lawyer means you don't make it clear that you're at home you certainly don't make it clear to clients that you've got children around that would be unprofessional and I do think there's a difference between men and women with that because I noticed my husband doesn't struggle when he's working from home to say oh sorry that's my child in the background or oh sorry can i call you back in an hour because i've got to sort the baby out or whatever whereas i personally think as women because we've fought not to be going on to this topic it wasn't on today's agenda but because we fought for so long to be in the man's roles and to do the job as well as the men etc we have um put this wall up that we have to be professional which means the kids are not around And I think, like you said about lockdown, finally, all that has gone away. I mean, we've all got to be professional and carry on with our jobs, but we're doing it this way now.
SPEAKER_02:We are. I mean, I think so much to talk about in there, Hannah, because you're right in my passion point. But it's actually been interesting to see how many women, unfortunately, have been thrown back into 1950s housewife moulds during this time as well. So we've seen, yeah, incredible stories of joint childcare shares and As someone said to me, even the men taking care of the children and the woman working. And even the way he expressed it, I was like, the fact that you're expressing it as a, wow, look at that, shows, yes, we've made progress. We've still got so much more to do. And in the majority of homes, I am seeing that it's the woman taking the lion's share of that on. And we can be our own worst enemy as well, because when I've dived into that and had conversations with my clients, people, friends, myself, noticing how I behave, sometimes we are our own worst enemy. So we just roll up our sleeves and we go, right, we're going to do it all. And it's up to us to keep everything spinning and all the plates spinning. And yeah, it's been a great byproduct that some of the professional armor has been dropped. Definitely. I think it remains to be seen how much of that is embraced in the coming months or even years and you know as we said my passion is about female entrepreneurship and I'm very frightened because a lot of good progress that has been made for female founded businesses has been eroded just in two short months very hard to keep your own business afloat when you've got children at home and also whether it will discourage women to come into entrepreneurship because you know we crave safety and security at the best of times and entrepreneurship is sometimes seen as a risky choice, particularly for women. but after the 2008 recession we saw a lot of women come just through economic need perhaps because they've been made redundant so I'm ready for it I'm planning for it that's what I've been doing during lockdown is sort of getting my own house in order in my business about the services that I can provide to that pool of women those that are already established but have started to struggle I don't want them to give up and those that are entering the market and need to get a real fast solid start so that they are you know supported in those early critical critical months
SPEAKER_00:definitely definitely and i think just before we we jointly interrupted it's
SPEAKER_02:like a it
SPEAKER_00:was crazy it happened exactly
SPEAKER_02:the same time they have their radars on they're about to talk about something important we're going in
SPEAKER_00:it's all important it's all important no i was going to just touch on your point about sustainability and you reminded me of it there because for me as a business owner for the last eight years or so um what has been really key for me has been the support of other people like yourself through the business mastermind that we met in that helps me to keep going when the when it's tough you know when I'm not sure if I'm doing the right thing or when the income hasn't been there or whatever it is to keep going when you might want to give up the sustainable piece for me has definitely been support from other people and sharing that with other people because for many people you know women perhaps more so in greater numbers who are on their own in business they are on their own aren't they doing it on their own and without that support and someone to, you know, whether it's just bounce ideas off or get advice from. It's so important to keep them going.
SPEAKER_02:It's possibly the most important thing that you've hit on there. And yeah, everything that I put in place from a solution perspective is based around community and collaboration. I have a 12 C, I call it, methodology for leadership. All words starting with a C, you know, just trying to make them easy for people to remember. Probably could have done 30, right? Because it's so multifaceted. But, you know, collaboration and community, what you've just alluded to, getting a good, strong mentor, getting really solid peer support. And in particular, we know that we're the product of who we surround ourselves with. So one of the challenges for many women setting up in business is that perhaps they're not that well supported by their partner. Perhaps they don't have any friends that are already running businesses at that time. And we actually come under a lot of either subtle or quite overt criticism and pressure. And the number of women I've spoken to who not just in the early years but later get hit with statements when you say it's hard i'm having a difficult month why don't you just go back and get a job do you you know and particularly if you've got qualifications like we have temptation is like just go back and get a nice secure job in a law firm and it's quite interesting during this pandemic to see and be reminded that no job is secure actually you know swathes of people being furloughed um and it's made me reflect on how much i value being an entrepreneur because in so many ways it's up to to create my own destiny and my own results and outcomes. But that sense of mindset that you're referring to by being surrounded and supported by a group of people is absolutely critical. And then it comes into things like being inspired, getting your hands on the right resources at the right time. I sound like Boris Johnson, doing the right things at the right time. Accountability, a really healthy challenge. So amazing things we get from peer support is inner supporting safe space somebody that goes that's good but what about this or you promised you'd do that last month so let's talk about why you haven't done it yet you know massively powerful and it comes back to your working from home question so many women in business end up working from home because we're trying to get flexibility around the kids and the immediate byproduct of that is you end up isolating yourself and you're immediately lonely disastrous you know so technology can really help to connect us but we need to get back in the room at some point
SPEAKER_00:yeah we do and you and i talked about that one of the first things we talked about actually wasn't it was about we both miss that energy of a room we both like presenting training all those sorts of things it is one of my absolute favorite things to do and um yes we can do it online and i'm doing quite a bit of it online i know you're doing some as well but it's not the same it's not the same energy as having those people in the room is it
SPEAKER_02:it's not the same and you know this comes back to human connection again something one I hope is going to come out of the pandemic. We are tribe people. We want to feel connected. We want to be in that sense of community. And actually for the future of business, we need to be able to be really honest and vulnerable and raw about the many challenges that face us as well as the many opportunities. And that is easier to do when we're face to face, you know, even the very human things that have been affected by COVID, you know, the ability to reach out and give someone a hug or hold their hands or just really sit with them quietly on a bad day. And the energy, like you say, of being in a room training and facilitating, they're incredibly powerful tools of human connection. And I think we all entered, well, you and I are very used to working on Zoom, you know, not new tools to us, but those people that entered and really bravely took on these tools very quickly got jaded. Because it's like, you get so tired on Zoom all day, you know, energetically, it's a completely different kettle of fish.
SPEAKER_00:It is. Absolutely. Absolutely. So the question that I've asked others, but I think we've already pretty much answered was about how much you work from home before. Now, I know that you've run your business from home, but obviously you're out and about doing a lot of a lot of other things as well. And you're missing that. That's what I can hear.
SPEAKER_02:yeah um so for years we did have an office with sarah and words and it was a you know a hub we used to call it where my team of lawyers not practicing lawyers but we were all qualified lawyers we'd be able to meet um and have meetings there and then we'd go off to client offices and come back and return we had the office for a number of years but eventually i let it go um for a number of reasons i was actually scaling back that side of the business but also it was kind of an overhead that we weren't using that much with the advance of technology we were out clients and then we were easily or more easily able to connect over technology like zoom so we let the physical office go and of course i did miss it and there is no replacement when you have a team for being able to physically get together but we were then able to use hot desking kind of facilities and central hubs live near leeds so there's plenty of places that have popped up like that really really powerful in the latter years i'd say two to three years and this is a new reflection for me i've ended up at home much more and too much with hindsight so trying to get that balance around the kids being there for them in the morning and being there for them after school has meant that my compressed hours my working hours and that natural desire to let's be productive and get things done it's always once you set up it's really easy to work from home so yeah when the pandemic hit none of that was new for me but I have noticed really quickly how much the balance with also getting out being with clients running shows trainings go into hot seat facilities uh it just it's really really i found that extremely difficult yeah
SPEAKER_00:yeah no i i totally agree and that's why i think a lot of the conversation i've seen about you know are we changing the face of it forever in terms of working from home and yes to some extent we probably are because all the businesses that said no you can't do this job from home have suddenly obviously been proven wrong which i'm pleased about yay absolutely but i don't think any of us want to be at home 100% of the time I've yet to speak to anybody that wants to do it all the time you know I miss my I go into my office about once a week and I miss that so much and I miss going I work in the coffee shop at least once a week just to get out and be around other people and have a change of scenery and I find it's good for me not to have all my papers around me and just take my computer and what I need to do that day and that's all I've got so I can't be distracted by anything else and I miss that I miss the coffee shop a lot
SPEAKER_02:it's just you know again another topic i talk about a lot is the holy grail of balance so that's it for us as women really and particularly as working parents and i don't really like the word balance but we can't ever find a better one it's like everything in moderation and when i left the security of you know i was in a really really well paid job with um you know a large company working in-house and i i left to set up my own business and i vividly remember a conversation where they were trying to persuade me not to go and all the different ways that they would make it flexible for me over the years and one of my managers said to me we know that women are the most diligent performers you know because you have got these end of the day constraints so when you're in work you're focused and you're productive and you're working so and he was trying to say a positive thing in terms of you know anti-presenteeism as in we're not expecting you to be here at the time because our data shows you that when women are here they really focus and they work because they've got to get out the door for nursery pickup and then and it wasn't enough to persuade me but I often reflect back on that conversation and think it's a really beautiful example of you know how when you want flexible working to work because it fits in with the rest of your life then we will make it work but we need the powers that be to meet us halfway with that and this you know the sadness that I have from the lawyers that I've spoken to have been turned down for job shares turned down for flexible working have been told to go and get a nanny instead of being given you know yeah and left under compromise agreements That was my passion when I set up Serenwood. It was about providing a home for those really super talented lawyers to come and work in a different way. And in the early years of Serenwood, it was very much about a blank slate. You know, if I had a super talented lawyer, I'd say to them, how many hours do you want to work? What sort of clients do you want to work with? You know, how can we make this work? And I think over the years, that was 10 years ago, but over the years, we have seen law firms move more towards that type of conversation, but we've still got so far to go. Yeah. Huge distances still to cover.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Oh, couldn't agree more. I mean, it was 10 years because I think our children are very, very similar ages, the eldest. Teddy's 10 as well. So it was 10 years ago. I asked for flexible working. I asked for job share. You know, I even had a colleague who was exactly the same level as me. We worked on the same clients together. You know, we would have been perfect. But, you know, those sorts of things just were always turned down 10 years ago. But there is there's a lot more out there now, more flexibility, more job share. But, yeah, still still a long way to go. go and it will be so interesting after this. I mean you
SPEAKER_02:and I do both do a lot of work around D&I and diversity and I particularly did a big study last year around the law firms and what they needed to do because I was working for a D&I client who was providing services around leadership training and one of the questions we were asking was how do we increase those figures in the law firm and what are the barriers and they're multifaceted to be honest and one of the biggest barriers we know is that many you know, at partnership equity level, there is a predominantly male seat and also, you know, older generation often. So very traditional views on what's acceptable and what is not. And there's also this feeling that for the clients, you know, they want to have their lawyers available kind of 24 seven and that certain deals won't support that. The really interesting seed change that we've been seeing in the last year is as our clients, the big corporates, are having to meet those D&I agendas as well. And they're starting to put requirements, say when they're building their panels or when they're deciding who to appoint in a pitch, they want the law firms to be being diverse. So as women, what we do need to be careful of as well is that we're not being rolled out as kind of the token female in the pitch and that we're not just being used as a representative to show that the law firm is progressive when it's not. And I mean, again, I could talk about these things all day long because they've been very topical for me. But I think the pandemic's given us an amazing opportunity to really pick back up with renewed vigor these conversations as we not me because i'm not an employee anymore but as the employees are going back into the workforce not to slip right back into those old conversations to be willing to raise our voices and ask for more progressive policies
SPEAKER_00:yes definitely something i do feel really strongly about as you know is is doing these things not just for a tick box not just because you know we want to look good to clients who are looking at panels or you know tick the right boxes but because there's a genuine desire you know in the firm to look after people to want them to stay um you know to be you know it's a bit of a buzz phrase at the moment but to be the firm of choice you know if you've got really good people out there looking for firms then all the recruiters are saying to me these are the almost the top agenda for people you know not not money particularly not even just you know asking flexible working was all they were asking for before but now they're asking what are your well-being um systems in place you know how are you looking after people and i think the firms that genuinely buy into that and not just to tick a box are going to stand out um
SPEAKER_02:definitely
SPEAKER_00:and the way they deal with this
SPEAKER_02:it's so interesting i mean obviously i'm getting older now never ask a lady her age but i reflect a lot that i i don't think i can go back into a traditional law firm like i used to work in the hours that i used to do um the lack of role models that i had um and you know the pressure that it put me under i have kind of slowed down and purposely within my business and got so used to kind of calling the shots on the way that I work that I don't think I would be able to be employed in that way and I think this is the big challenge for lawyers is that you know a we're kind of indoctrinated into a system and we start to feel like that's normal and that's how the whole world is and it isn't and also we are risk averse by nature and we're trained to be risk averse and one of my biggest challenges in entrepreneurship and remains to be is my lawyer brain that over analyzes and over things and goes through all the different scenarios and potentially catastrophizes, you know, from a commercial contracts perspective, that's what we're trying to do all the time. We're trying to mitigate all the risks and shoehorn and all the clauses that make sure our clients protected against every single eventuality. And unfortunately, from an entrepreneurial perspective, that doesn't work. Like as entrepreneur, as an entrepreneur, I've had to shed a lot of that or as much as I can and be much more commercial. and business and human, actually. You know, there's something quite robotic can emerge in a lawyer after a long time. A bit like, as I was thinking about the NHS and we've been hearing about, what do they call it? Compassion? can't think of the word but when you basically become immune to showing compassion compassion because you're seeing so much bad stuff all the time um it's the same i think for many lawyers when we've got a long way along the route and we become effectively institutionalized and accept things that's how it's always been that's how it will always be and not show emotion around that
SPEAKER_00:yes yeah that's that's what i see and i find the most challenging actually with with people who you know they're not my coat clients because otherwise I'll be able to help them but I come across them in some other guys and I can see that they're in like you say that institutionalized mode and they've sort of accepted it you know when people in any walk of life you can come into this sort of acceptance of your situation like giving up almost yeah it's that this is my career this is the path I chose I'm stuck to it now
SPEAKER_02:They might become your coaching clients though. Because the other interesting thing about us as humans is that, you know, we're always growing and we're always changing and we're affected by what goes on around us. And sometimes I've noticed it's seeds, you know, that are planted over time. And I've had people that have come to me for coaching maybe two or three years after I first met them. And I would never have thought they would be my ideal clients, but they've planted seeds and maybe they've been watching me from afar or receiving my emails or seeing me talk about something. I did a couple of lives. I have this, you know, picture in the back that says love so you know it's really weird for a lawyer to be going out talking about leading with love most people would say and i had to step into yeah right why me and you on the same page but like why the hell would we not want to talk about love it's what makes the world go around you know and you know from a business perspective you know i want people to love their businesses i want them to love their clients i want them to love the work that they do every single day when you talk about that in a room of lawyers most of them are like what is this woman talking about and i'm mean a deep human connection I think they get it but they're like looking around and they might be uncomfortable and seeing how other people are reacting and yeah I did a load of lives over on LinkedIn and one of the things and people were saying to me like was oh you knew you had your little love picture in the background but it was almost patronizing in the way they said it and trying to just break down some of those norms because they don't have to be norms. They're norms from a societal and cultural point of view that we live in and it's what we were born into. But way back in ancient wisdom, everybody accepted that what you're talking about, well-being and mental and emotional health and being part of a tribe, being safe within a community, supporting one another, is literally what makes the world go round.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. yeah and as though we lawyers like to think we're different somehow to other people we're not you know we're people like you say we need that tribe that community that to be looked after probably
SPEAKER_02:more than ever than any other places to be honest and i know this is your passion point you know but we have a massive problem with burnout and stress in the in the lawyer community and a massive problem with pushing down emotions and suppressing feelings and not asking for help and it's seen as you know a weakness if you don't know the answers so you have lawyers always blagging it essentially you know pretending that you know the answers and then running off and looking for holsberries and trying to work it all out in the you know wee hours of the morning it's it's a very difficult environment to be in um let's make no bones about it it can be very rewarding but i think it's the relationships that then make it rewarding so just as you said being part of an incredible progressive law firm is naturally going to be better than being stuck in one where you feel stifled or not valued not a pretty is.
SPEAKER_00:Yes, absolutely. Absolutely. Oh, goodness. We could talk about this all day, if not for days, I think, couldn't we? Yeah, correct. Maybe that's what we
SPEAKER_02:should do through the pandemic.
SPEAKER_00:We should, yes. We could start a whole series about that. Let's think about that. But what I wanted to ask you about personally is what have your highs and lows been of lockdown? Now, I've been following what you've been putting on Facebook and some of your trainings and everything. Now, I know for those who don't know you, actually, Rachel at the start of lockdown was doing an amazing service for all of us by watching these terrible news briefings every evening weren't you and summarizing them for us in a nice little neat post because I'm someone who doesn't like the news I do keep away from the news for my own mental health but I felt like I was keeping up to date with your update so I thank you very much and I know there were lots of people who were following those I know you've chosen for your own mental health to stop doing those now and I completely understand but what would have been your your ups and your downs throughout lockdown so far?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, to be honest, I was started to slide into lockdown mentality from sort of January. I was watching events unfolding in China. And I know you know, but for the benefit of other people, my little one, our little daughter, Bella, she went through leukemia. She was on treatment for two and a half years. So we've been very vigilant for quite a long time, really, about infectious disease and seeing the damage that it can do, particularly people with immune system problems and so on. So we were already starting a slowly lockdown during February and by the time it became official in March we were like already on our journey and we had all this experience from before to call upon you know we'd locked down with Bella for weeks on end actually when she was in the worst of her leukemia treatment so I don't think it's been as hard a transition for us as a family as it has for others and one of my deep desires was to help other people as ever that's my default position and what we did notice is everybody went to the default position so if you're ordinarily an anxious person you became more anxious if you're always an angry person who likes to talk about conspiracy theories then that's what you'll go off and talk about and if you're a server like i am you're looking for ways to serve and i think the one of the low points in the original aftermath was that i felt so helpless i made the choice years ago between being a lawyer and a doctor because those are the two choices that you're given when you're an a grade student i ate the sight of blood so i was like oh all right i'll become a lawyer
SPEAKER_00:it's the same for
SPEAKER_02:me it's the same for many of us but this was probably the first time ever that I've wished I was a doctor because I wanted to have this deep desire to be on the front line and really making a difference and saving lives essentially and so my hashtag flower news was like just a tiny effort in that like I was serving my clients obviously and serving people with commercial contract business related issues but I looked out at my friends and saw them plunged into the darkness of what something I'd already experienced and thought how can I help them right number one tip do not go on the news so and you know I'm a lawyer like we're brilliant at summarizing facts aren't we so people used to say to me oh you must have taken your ages not really it's a superpower you know we can sit in a meeting can't we and do a summary like in real time send it out and I think you forget how these gifts that you have that other people don't have and we tend to underestimate them so you know the lows of the highs I always think with everything there's darkness and there's light isn't there so you know some of the highlights obviously being with my kids having them at home with me I class that as a real gift. But then the dark side of that has been having my kids at home with me 24-7, you know, living on top of each other and the strain and the stress that comes with that. And, you know, I think... I did a training, which, you know, I spoke about, you know, on the change curve. Yes, I caught that. It's very good. Yeah. I mean, it's a brilliant concept and it's really bedded in grief, which is why I'm familiar with it because I've been through a lot of bereavements in my life. So I've had counseling and I'm a coach as well. And I help people to deal with adversity every day, but seeing everybody on the change curve at the same time, but the whole point of the change curve is that we very rarely are on it at the same time. Like somebody can be still in the chaos and feeling despairing and depressed and and down someone else is starting to embrace the new normal and is looking for opportunities and and that brings conflict so you know I think the low point and the high point for me are almost always two sides of the same coin you know we're going through this horrendous pandemic and we've seen all this horrendous death and loss of life but then on the light side of that I've found a real joy that we are talking about those things. They're normally taboo. And I've released some of my videos talking about grief and death. People don't always watch them because we're still in the mindset of, well, I'm not gonna think about that. I'm not gonna talk about that. we have to you know because every experience in life is both light and dark and it's pain suffering versus beautiful gifts and you know I know you know what I'm trying to say so yeah yeah I just end up going on and on and on
SPEAKER_00:because i know no i i think you're absolutely right i like that idea that it's the two it's two sides of almost the same coin there isn't highs and like there's the the dark times and the lighter times which i told you somebody said something i think it was this morning and it actually put into words what i've been feeling which is sometimes i can be high as a kite i think that was the phrase they use like high as a kite you know if i if after i've just done a training or a great coaching session um i'm like wow you know i'm i'm doing what i really love to do i'm making a difference to people this is amazing you know feeling on top of the world and then another time I mean I was just I was just watching because it is VE day today and when people catch our recording it obviously we might move forward but I was just watching the two minute silence and I was I was it made me quite emotional because I thought you know really what would have been happening would have been big you know events throughout the country on streets and I know people are doing their own social distancing ones but it was just that sense of oh my goodness you know how sad that when we would have been doing something amazing and big and it was just you know Prince Charles and Camilla laying down a wreath I found that really emotional so I think it is that up and down from literally high as a kite to deep sort of sadness for what what we're in at the moment you know and that's that's it isn't it that's life that's what we're all going through
SPEAKER_02:Yes and no, because that's what we're going through is the shared experience. And it is that for the grief curve and for the change curve. And that's what's so marked about what you're saying is that we're all going through it together. Most people's life generally aren't like that. A lot of people have a sense of they've created safety and routine and they kind of go from day to day, almost half asleep, you know, driven by their subconscious and just doing the same things over and over and over. And our job as coaches is actually to start to break those patterns and go deeper and challenge people to come outside their comfort zone so and yeah life as a journey creates these massive traumatic experiences you can't live and love and not go through pain and grief that's a fact but most of us that can be years apart you know you have a traumatic event but then it might be another 10 years this pandemic has brought everything like into really sharp focus and exactly as you say one day high as a kite the next day completely crashed and low down and and the the return to chaos normally comes when we feel our safety compromised and that's what you've just described something will have triggered the the low point and it's normally a fear for your safety it's survival instinct and then your brain getting triggered into fight flight and freeze and i just hope you know my deepest hope is that we can all be growing through this time and that we don't go back to being asleep and going back to the old routines and suddenly consumerism kicks back in and materialism and I mean we've I've already seen that start to happen I don't know about you and it makes me sad but as a movement I think that thirst for change that thirst for growth is going to be an incredible thing to come out of this together
SPEAKER_00:yeah yeah no absolutely it's going to be a very very interesting time to see well over the next year or two I guess as we come out of this um it's a marathon not a
SPEAKER_02:sprint and I think that's what's been causing people to feel quite low as well um you know this week has been particularly difficult for nearly everyone I've spoken to and in the UK I think that's because we're awaiting some sort of grand plan to be revealed on Sunday yeah and and almost like when you're going through a tunnel and there's light at the end it's like running a marathon isn't it or actually probably more pertinently to say that we know it's going to go for a long time we're probably at like 12 kilometers you know just when it's getting really tough and you can't quite breathe and are you going to give up you know and what is your feeling like that this week
SPEAKER_00:yes yeah no i agree i think um well we will wait and see what the announcement is i suspect it won't be quite what people are expecting and i think as you say it's that anticipation that might have put people into a made this week harder
SPEAKER_02:everybody's got different expectations i mean we were chatting on on facebook this morning weren't we with jay rawborn i was saying you know is there anybody here that isn't ready for the lockdown me when you were like yeah we're not ready to be released no and so that diversity of views like the conspiracy theorists who are like this is all a hoax let's all go and snog each other and then and then you know at the other end of the spectrum we've got obviously the shielded people who are not going to be able to leave for maybe until a vaccine you know that's a long road ahead and that need to be really respectful of where everybody else else is at with their lens on the situation so important
SPEAKER_00:absolutely absolutely yes it's such an unknown and all we can do is as you say be respectful for each person's experience and what they're going to need coming out of this
SPEAKER_02:yeah and this is sorry to bang on about the change curve but that's where it can really help us because then when we have a sense of where they are we can be more empathetic and we can meet them where they are instead of reacting from a knee-jerk well that's not right You shouldn't be feeling like that. It's like, well, that's how they feel because that's where they're at right now. And that's a completely different conversation, isn't it?
SPEAKER_00:Yes.
SPEAKER_02:You know, and going to bring more of this tolerance and they're really, really looking out for each other. I think such a beautiful byproduct as well has been that interdependency and interconnection where we looked at the health workers and the key workers and realized how much we rely on each other. Take it for granted. Oh,
SPEAKER_00:absolutely. Absolutely. I mean, I've started doing this. I don't know if I've spoken to you about it. I've started doing this coffee and coaching session for lawyers on a Wednesday. And it's just been so beautiful. The group that has grown together. I mean, we have different people pop in and out each week, but you know, there's a lot of people who've been there for a few weeks and the way they're supporting each other, the way they're sharing their experiences. And, you know, we could have one person who's furloughed and who's got all that issue. And then we could have someone who owns a lower firm and she's furloughed people. So they can talk to each other about how they're feeling and learn from each other. and you know some of the feedback about how someone's feeling more supported by her profession than she ever has because she's never had that support from from other people in the profession is just is wonderful and you know that that has come out of lockdown that wouldn't have happened before beautiful
SPEAKER_02:and i'm sure you'll continue that won't it yes questions about what am i going to let go of and not do ever again because i've realized it wasn't serving me versus what am i going to do more of that sense coming back to balance you know the more of the lesser those are the decisions as coaches I think we want people to be really diving into in the coming weeks
SPEAKER_00:oh definitely definitely yes so what have you learned what top tip would you share with us that you think people could benefit from what have you learned about yourself your business your family in lockdown oh
SPEAKER_02:my god I mean so much and I'm conscious I've already spoken too much and this this stuff is all my passion but yeah I think let's just stay on that point I think that's really tight focus on what really matters. What are your priorities? You know, coming back to what I said about when you're on your deathbed and you look back, you know, many of us have had to confront that as a possibility during that time. Many have lost loved ones, you know, suddenly and before the end of life. And these are really tough topics, but the gift in there is always that it forces you to step back from the day to day, from the hamster wheel, from the roller coaster. And as I say, from being asleep and ask yourself what really matters what do i really care about who do i really care about which relationships are precious to me what's the impact i want to make through me turning up in my job or in my business every single day so for me just that massive fire the fire is always there but someone sometimes it's more of an ember and then you know somebody blows on the ember and it's you know they're pissed on your bonfire essentially but you know i've felt that fire growing in the last two or three weeks you know my passion is about empowering and supporting business owners to succeed and not give up and my content's been you know just coming out of my ears and recording video and that's beautiful but you have to let it you know I've kind of done enough personal development to let that happen and to feel it come in and it's really really powerful and you know the sort of the thing I'd love people who perhaps aren't doing as much personal development in the day to day is whether they can let some of that creativity and let that inner passion and that inner purpose if they can reconnect with it and listen to their inner voice and start to make different choices and decisions that would be awesome wouldn't it
SPEAKER_00:that really would be awesome yeah that would that would that's a fantastic note to end on thank you so much rachel for coming to join me
SPEAKER_02:I love talking to you we've had so many lovely face-to-face experiences haven't we spent time together and I you know I really miss that it's been lovely to talk to you it's just not the same as sitting as we have many times side by side and putting the world to right so absolutely
SPEAKER_00:and we
SPEAKER_02:again soon
SPEAKER_00:we will do it again yes we will oh well thank you very much I'm just going to um stop recording now