You Are Loved - Episode 3 - Our Strengths

Nikki Smith is a registered Psychologist with a focus on performance and career coaching, including career change. She helps individuals to value their strengths and see them as their superpowers and give them the knowledge and tools to use them every day. In this chat, she shares some practical strengths-based tools to bring into our lives immediately to support us to remember how truly fabulous we all uniquely are!

Transcript

Hello.

My name is Liv Downing,

And you have joined me on the You Are Loved podcast.

You Are Loved is the title of my forthcoming children's book,

Due to be released in 2021.

And in this book,

I explore the possibility that love is actually always available to us.

And that maybe,

Just maybe,

We don't actually have to rely on external sources of love or other people to feel a sense of true belonging.

As you may know,

Research tells us that a sense of belonging or a deep sense of connection is really essential for us humans to thrive.

And in this series of podcasts,

I want to learn more about why that is and how we can all get more of it,

To nourish both ourselves,

Our kids,

And our beautifully broken world.

It's my deep hope that through these conversations,

It's together we can learn more about creating a more loving and wiser world.

Welcome to the You Are Loved podcast.

On the podcast today,

I am joined by the wonderful Nikki Smith.

Nikki is a coach and a psychologist,

And is incredibly powerful when it comes to her work within the realm of positive psychology.

As you'll hear in our discussion,

We cover a lot of different topics.

The main one we cover is an area of positive psych,

Which is called strengths.

So it's really where we focus on what people are good at,

Rather than what they're not good at.

Nikki has introduced this concept to me,

And it took her a while to sell me on it.

But I have to say,

Hands down,

It's one of the most powerful tools that I have used for myself and also for my kids.

So often when one of my kids does something that's not so fabulous,

We talk about how he has other strengths.

And I talk about how I have other strengths.

And I just think it's an incredibly powerful concept and tool for us to use,

Not only ourselves,

But also for our kids.

And I'm incredibly grateful for Nikki's wisdom in this area,

Which brings us to our next topic.

So it's about us gratitude and how powerful that is in helping us to flip our thinking.

And Nikki also shares with us one of her greatest life hacks,

Which is something that she's really come up with and perfected over many years,

Not only in her practice,

But also in her own life.

And this is the concept of mini experiments.

So really chunking things down and approaching them in much more palatable ways.

So I hope you enjoy our conversation.

I was,

You know,

It was refreshing for me and I remembered a lot of things we've spoken about over the years and I hope you enjoy it.

Take good care.

Welcome everybody.

It is my absolute joy and pleasure to introduce you to my dear,

Dear friend and colleague,

Nikki Smith.

Nikki and I have known each other.

How long has it been?

We met in our mid twenties.

Yeah.

So many years.

And our careers and lives have zigzagged over the globe and over different industries.

And I was really excited when you agreed to talk with me today.

And we've got a few things we're going to cover mainly around strengths and gratitude and living with our values.

And so welcome.

Thank you so much for being here.

Very happy to be here.

It's eight thirty in the morning people.

We're so committed.

Because we're talking about our favorite topics.

It's useful.

Tragic.

Seriously.

So just to get us started and for the crew to learn a bit about you,

Would love if you could start just by telling us a little bit about your career and how you've meandered across different industries and how you've ended up doing what you're doing and why you love what you do.

So I always knew I wanted to help people in some way.

I was that friend in high school that people came to and I always knew helping people in some way was on the cards.

And if I connect the dots looking back through my entire work history,

It turns out I've always been helping people to find their best fit in terms of study or work or develop their career or optimize their career,

But just in different guises.

So I started out as a mental health worker really because of supply and demand.

When you graduate as a psychologist,

You feel incredibly unemployable actually.

And mental health is one of the places that they have a high demand.

And Liv introduced me to this work actually in a psychosocial program helping 16 to 24 year olds from psychosis back into work or study.

I got burnt out royally within about three years of doing that work and realized,

Oh,

That was a big discovery for me actually.

Even though work can look perfect on paper,

That job looked like a perfect fit for me and I enjoyed aspects of it.

It drained me immensely.

And then moved across to organizational psychology absolutely as a mini experiment.

I wasn't convinced that was the work for me,

But I loved applying behavioral assessment to a corporate setting where people were high functioning.

They were positive and I got to learn so much around psychometric profiling and assessment centers and interviewing people.

And I got to work here and in the UK with that role.

So it was really fascinating to me.

But I actually did sense that something was missing.

I was working 12 hour days and waking up on a Saturday in tears often,

Just feeling so tired and once again going,

This is a great job on paper.

I love many aspects of it,

But something's not quite right.

And what I suspected was that I was missing helping people on a journey.

And so as another mini experiment,

I moved across to redundancy outplacement coaching and gave that a go and loved it.

Really,

Really loved it.

Helping people move from often some surprise or shock and being made redundant to actually understanding their true strengths and competencies and opening their eyes to what was possible for them.

That's so interesting,

Nick.

It's almost like,

So that was almost the center point.

So you started at the extreme of mental illness and then you moved into high functioning,

More of a sales kind of achievement focus.

And then you've come back to somewhere in the middle,

Really where you still get to authentically help people,

But within a workplace environment.

So it's still that positive proactive.

Exactly.

Yeah,

Exactly.

And look,

And I think what's interesting is one of my dream lives is actually to work for Medicines Sans Frontieres in Sierra Leone and be on the coalface,

You know,

War zone area.

But I know because of my strengths and my sensitivity,

I just can't do that work.

So it's been this journey when I discovered my strengths in a deeper way about eight years ago,

I really realized that I had this opportunity to shape and design my work exactly around my strengths because I really wanted to have this,

You know,

Enduring motivation,

Enduring energy.

And I,

You know,

Part of my big why is that I grew up with parents who love their jobs,

You know,

Imagine having two parents who love their jobs.

They were fulfilling.

It wasn't until I was 19 that I knew there was anything about their jobs they didn't like.

And so they certainly liked a lot of their job.

And then they also seem to be able to carve out time to do other things that they love.

So I really felt like their health and relationships were supported,

Even though,

You know,

They they worked some,

You know,

My dad particularly worked significant hours,

But he still found time to surf into do other things that he loves.

I think you've touched on something really important there that's worth highlighting.

It's that energy piece.

So,

You know,

I think many of us,

You know,

We work in jobs and we think we need even if we do work 12 hour days,

We can still finish a 12 hour day feeling energized and having the capacity to connect with friends and family and do those other things.

Whereas other people work the 12 hour days and kind of come home and slump on the couch.

And I think that's a really great indicator that that energy point as to whether we're working with the in line of our value of our values and our strengths.

Would you agree that that's one a good measure?

Absolutely.

Absolutely.

And I think we,

You know,

I think there's a lot of modeling out there that it's,

It's okay to be knackered after a work day and it's,

You know,

But really the Holy grail is if we can play to our strengths for 60 to 80% of the week studies show we can significantly boost our productivity,

Our resilience,

Our energy,

Our mojo,

And even positive influence and creativity.

So having more impact,

Thinking more creatively.

So it's,

It's not a nice,

It's not a nice fluffy to have.

It's actually,

There's a real strategic imperative and invitation to get to know your strengths.

And the beauty is you can really look at reshaping what you do or you can redesign or you can make a change.

But the invitation is let's not put up with the busy badge of,

You know,

Of honor in this society and being knackered at the end of the day and thinking,

Oh God,

I can't socialize or exercise.

I just have to recover.

And you know,

As you have,

I've been burnt out trying to really live to someone else's expectations and the job I thought was going to be right for me.

And it was really through the work that I did with you as a,

As my career coach to help me work out how I can design a life that's going to help me feel more energized and satisfied.

So we've transitioned beautifully from your chat about what you've done in your career to the topic for the session,

Which is really about understanding how strengths can help us feel more connected and more energized.

And so I wonder,

Nika,

If you could tell us a little bit about what strengths are.

You know,

When I hear strengths,

I think,

Oh,

It's something that I'm good at,

But it's more than being something that you're way good at.

So could you just explain to us what strengths are,

What the definition is and,

And you know,

Maybe how you think or how you know,

After you've been doing this work for so long,

It can help us,

They can help us to become more resilient and energized and product productive as well.

Yeah.

So this is one of my all time favorite topics.

It's probably the one of the most positive and liberating topics and principles that I've come across.

And so strengths are characterized as,

You know,

Abilities and traits and knowledge that you not only find it useful to do,

But it's energizing.

And the theory goes that we're hardwired,

You know,

From from birth with these strengths.

But you know,

As you can imagine,

If depending on whether you've been able to demonstrate or experience them,

You know,

Will lead to whether you're knowledgeable about them as well.

So the true there will be strengths that you have,

But if they drain you,

They're not true strengths.

So there still might be things that you're good at,

You might even enjoy.

But if they drain you rather than energize you,

They're not characterized as true strengths.

And the invitation is to really build your awareness around your strengths.

It's like peeling an onion.

And the the invitation is really to design your strong week.

I've certainly been brought up to believe that I need to do everything or you know,

Should be should be get as good as many things as possible.

But the strengths,

You know,

Theory and principles,

It's not that.

So we grow more in our area of strength.

So then wouldn't we want to explore that more than growing in every single weakness area.

With weaknesses,

We actually look to mitigate,

Outsource or eliminate,

Which is so liberating.

And so different from the as you say,

The way most of us are raised,

You know,

And you have you've challenged me on this over the years,

You know,

You'll,

You know,

I'll be sitting down trying to analyze a spreadsheet or work out my social media strategy.

And you kind of say,

Live is that is that your strength?

Is that playing to your strength?

And it's like,

No,

It's not let me get someone else to help me with that.

And I'll spend time doing what I love,

Which is creating content and talking with people and teaching and you know,

Connecting.

So it's but it's been such a shift for me.

Yeah,

And it's and it's powerful.

And the first thing we need to do is to give ourselves permission to show up and play to our strengths.

And so that means we don't necessarily have time to do all the other things.

And often people say to me,

Oh,

Does that mean I have to,

You know,

Pay people to do things?

Well,

Not necessarily.

I and when I was exploring this,

Initially,

I used to trade time,

I used to trade time gives give someone my zone of genius and ask them for their sonar genius and just try time and and look at it as a mini experiment,

Do it,

You know,

Collaborate or partner up for an hour or give each other an hour's tasks to do and come back and just see if it worked.

So you know,

If you think about a lot of fabulous people have figured out that hiring a cleaner is really good for their household and their sanity and everything.

And that's a really good that's that's a really good example of what we're talking about.

If it's not your zone of genius,

If you're if time is better spent doing other things,

And you know,

It's permission to do that.

And the fun thing is,

You can just chip away at it,

You can just test out one thing at a time.

And it's interesting getting to know my strengths has changed my perception of myself from actually feeling lazy in many ways.

I grew up with a family of very academically hip hop happening people.

And I'm an applied learner.

And a lot of my strengths are around people and not knowledge from a book.

And so getting to know my strengths,

I now see myself as being a master in in,

In strategic ease.

That's such an important point.

And the end this,

You know,

Ties back in with the whole theme of this podcast,

Which is about loveability and belonging.

And I think in order for us to feel that we belong somewhere external,

So whether that's a family or a workplace or a community,

One of the most important things we can do is belong to ourselves first.

And in order for us to do that,

It's about really reframing,

I guess how we see ourselves,

And then getting rid of that dialogue.

That's like you're,

You know,

You're lazy,

You're not good,

Because you're not doing x,

Y,

And z,

And actually coming home to ourselves and celebrating what's amazing about us,

Because we've all got amazing things about us.

If only we could focus on those and really nourish and support those.

Absolutely.

And so,

You know,

There's so much,

So many directions we could go with that.

So our brains,

You know,

Really do jump to our weaknesses,

You know,

Every client session I have,

You know,

Every strengths debrief I give with clients that they go there first.

And so what are one of the practices I really help clients to see is,

Okay,

If the weakness comes up first,

That's fine,

But what is the corresponding strength?

What is the shiniest side of that,

Because there's two sides to every coin,

And there's two sides to every strength.

So it's a it's so easy to beat yourself up and to focus on the weakness,

But it doesn't serve you and it really doesn't serve the people around us.

And so I had this vision of having really big impact in the world,

But I didn't want to work a lot of hours doing it.

And I thought,

How on earth do I make that happen?

And the beauty is this strengths getting to know your strengths is the gateway to figuring that out.

So if you're in a role where you think this is perfect on paper,

But it doesn't feel right,

The answer is in your strengths.

If you're frustrated with your husband about something often the answer is in your strengths.

Tell us more about that.

The husband one?

Yeah.

So I highly I'll share a free strengths guide link with live so you can all go along and investigate your strengths.

So if let's talk about even husbands and children.

So again,

It's really easy to get frustrated,

Isn't it?

With people in our household and especially during lockdown.

Yes,

Especially during lockdown is so interesting.

It's so true because you know,

If I reflect on my marriage,

We definitely both have different strengths.

One of my areas for development or weaknesses is paying bills.

I'm just terrible at it.

I'm really great at talking to people about paying bills.

I could negotiate with someone about whether they should pay the bill or not.

I could probably workshop a philosophy around a bill paying strategy,

But actually paying the bill.

No,

But that's why I married a TV producer because he's very good at doing things like that.

Yeah,

So that's a great example of you know,

Playing to your strengths.

Can you divvy up some of the domestic as many as possible the domestic tasks to playing to your strengths?

That's a really great example.

So he will do a quick mini exercise and even why don't you do it for yourself and for your partner or for a child that you're butting heads with a bit.

I'm going to read out a list of weaknesses and I invite you just to choose three.

Okay.

So disorganised,

Inflexible,

Stubborn,

Inconsistent,

Obnoxious,

Emotionless,

Shy,

Irresponsible,

Boring,

Unrealistic,

Negative,

Intimidating,

Weak,

Arrogant,

Indecisive and impatient.

That last one's one of mine.

Wow.

Excellent.

Okay.

So you've chosen three weaknesses.

Now I'm going to read through the list of the corresponding strengths of this particular framework.

So let's attach the corresponding strengths to your weakness.

So disorganised equals creative,

Inflexible equals organised,

Stubborn equals dedicated,

Stubborn equals flexible or adaptable,

Obnoxious equals enthusiastic,

Emotionless equals calm,

Shy equals reflective,

Irresponsible equals adventurous,

Boring equals responsible,

Unrealistic equals positive,

Negative equals realistic,

Intimidating equals assertive,

Weak equals humble,

Arrogant equals self-confident,

Indecisive equals patient and impatient equals passionate.

Oh,

It's so true.

Oh my goodness.

What a powerful activity to do with yourself and your partner and your kids.

And your kids.

Yeah.

So yeah,

So powerful because if you think about,

Yeah,

If you think about a child with remote learning,

Pick one of those,

They're stubborn,

But they would be dedicated.

They might just be finding something that they're more interested in doing or in more interested in the learning style.

So talk to the teacher and find out,

Okay,

This,

You know,

This style of learning isn't working.

Can we do something else?

Is there a book I can get or can we do maths in the kitchen?

But,

You know,

Talk to your teacher and get some ideas.

And then with your husband,

Yeah,

My husband is stubborn in many areas of life.

But he's also,

He's also very dedicated.

And he needs data.

And in,

So we work in a business together and he needs kind of data and evidence as to say yes to something.

So I've learned,

I would go,

I'm the impatient,

Passionate one and would go along,

Flying high with his grand plan and new idea.

And he'd come back with this really flat response of needing data and evidence.

So now I don't do that anymore.

I go into saying,

Hey,

Interesting idea.

What and what do you need to know?

Because I would go in so passionately and I would feel like he was shooting me down,

But he wasn't,

He was just working to his style of needing data and evidence.

And how powerful is that in a workplace?

I mean,

If you think about within a team,

Really knowing how your manager needs you to communicate or how your staff members respond most effectively,

That's such an empowering insight,

Really.

Absolutely.

Absolutely.

Cause we love to categorise and potentially label someone as,

You know,

But it's actually,

What do they need?

What information do they need?

The other thing is you can educate people around you on your strengths on what you need and how you thrive.

Yeah.

I'll never forget.

Sorry,

Nicole.

That's so powerful for me.

You know,

I was in a meeting recently and I was,

We were talking about doing some product development and given one of my strengths is ideation,

Which I helped,

Which you helped me find out,

Which is bringing together diverse ideas and creating something new.

I was able to actually say very confidently in this,

This meeting,

Yeah,

I'm really great at product development.

You know,

Ideation is one of my absolute strengths.

I love it and I'm passionate about it.

And my colleague who I was with said to me after the session,

I wish that I could speak about myself like that.

And I said,

It's all about strengths.

That's what you need to work out.

It is,

It's incredibly powerful.

And I think,

And if you,

If you're not able to articulate your strengths today,

You're in such good company.

I coach a lot of corporate workers from middle management to executive level,

And that's one of the things I help them to do.

Even HR managers,

Even heads of department.

So again,

Don't beat yourself up if you don't know what this is.

It is life changing and it's worth getting on board.

And Nannika,

When you first started talking to me about strengths,

I was always quite hesitant about getting into the positive psychology branch of psychology.

I guess I was more interested in the murky and dark side of psychology.

So psychopathology,

And I was more interested in kind of illness and why it happens and trauma and all this kind of stuff.

And I think your bench always been more in the positive side.

And I remember,

You know,

Throughout our relationship,

You were over the years trying to explain a lot of these concepts to me.

And I kind of wrote it off as pretty colours and rainbows.

Always loved and respected you,

Of course,

But always just thought it was all a bit shiny and pretty.

But over the years,

What I've realised is there's obviously room for both.

We need to understand the murky waters of pain and difficulty.

But we can feed the good.

We can play to our strengths,

As you say.

And one of the other areas that came up was really around gratitude.

You were talking with me about the power of gratitude and sharing some really interesting research with me,

Which was in the end what got me over the line.

I wondered if you could share with our listeners a bit about how you talk about gratitude and how you talk about it with your clients,

I guess.

Yeah,

I'd love to.

So I think one of the reasons positive psychology appeals to me is that it's really talking about what works in terms of optimal performance.

And I am impatient and passionate.

And one of my strengths is maximiser,

Which is taking people and projects from OK to superb.

So if there is something that's kind of quick and fast and works,

I'm really interested.

And that's why it can look,

I think,

A little bit like rainbows and fuzzy things,

Because it's not necessarily the deep,

Reflective work that's also very helpful.

So yeah,

I read about a study that talked about it was actually some,

I think some retirees,

They got a sample where they invited them to do one of three things,

Either to think of three things they were grateful for,

Or to thank someone,

Either in person,

I got the phone,

Text or email,

Or to spend two minutes writing down a memory for a positive event past or future.

So either a memory or something they were looking forward to.

And to do that for 21 days in a row,

And I actually found that their happiness was boosted by 30%.

And that that really got me over the line.

And I think the thing for me was I understood there was enough science behind gratitude to show it worked.

But personally,

I felt a bit bored with the three things a day.

And if you can do it,

All power to you.

And I actually do it with my kids most days of the week.

And I find just adding that value of kind of family and helping them to grow and learn means that I'm more motivated to do it.

But what I loved is we've got alternatives.

So it's a sort of writing down three things you're grateful a day sends you into a much rather do anything else,

But kind of dialogue,

Then you've got alternatives.

So the thank you one I find really fun.

You can thank someone in,

Like I said,

In any of those modes.

And also,

There's another study that also suggests that you can even write a letter and not send it and still get the benefit.

So if you don't have the courage or time yet to do it interactively,

Then actually,

There's even power doing that.

And the last one is the writing down for two minutes,

A past memory or imagining a future future event.

So you've got options,

Which I love.

And again,

It can match your strengths,

You know,

If you're into talking or writing or thinking,

You know,

You can really match up your strengths there.

And the you know,

The science talks about that when we do spend time there,

Then our prefrontal cortex is activated.

We know most of us know by now that our brain is plastic and it can be molded.

And so you can really strengthen the neural pathways there to not only enjoy those positive events,

But it means that your brain will then scan more readily for positive events in the future.

And that boosts your happiness.

And one of the great things from positive psychology,

We know is that happiness predicts success not the other way around.

So is there a way that you can boost your happiness now because I'm just going to stop you there,

Nika,

Could you say that again?

And just labor that point?

Sure.

I remember you saying that to me,

And that was quite profound.

Yeah,

One of Yeah,

One of the principles of positive psychology is that that scientifically proven that happiness predicts success.

And we've been trained to strive for something to set a goal and to then be happy from that.

The happiness,

Unfortunately,

Is quite fleeting from any goal attainment.

So what I love is that there's this invitation to flip our thinking again.

And so the more we can boost our joy or happiness,

They're more likely will be successful in any kind of transition in any kind of shift,

You know,

Physical or mentally about things.

So it's a really,

And it's quite a gentle practice,

I think,

Yeah,

It's quite achievable and gentle to do.

And one of the ways I use it with my clients is at the start of each session,

I say,

What are we celebrating?

Because clients often come to me,

I'm using me for accountability,

As well as,

You know,

Strategic insights and such,

And are thinking about what they haven't done.

Again,

Going to the weak side,

They're thinking about what they haven't done.

But when we start with what they're celebrating,

We generally uncover seven to 12 things.

And so they've always,

You know,

Done more than they think they have in terms of their project around we're often looking at career optimization or career change,

And they surprise themselves.

And then they're much,

Can you think about how that affects their mental state going into the rest of the session?

I'm,

Oh,

Look at everything that I've done.

Absolutely,

They're standing up on the mountain,

Looking at everything they've done as opposed to standing down in the valley,

Which is just,

You know,

A much less powered,

Powerful and empowered position.

Now,

I'd love to talk a little bit more about you and about,

You know,

Some of the changes that you've made in your life and some of the choices that you've made.

And one of the things that has really inspired me is the way you moved from the city from a very inner city lifestyle,

Both you and your husband working in in big corporate jobs,

And then you moved to the country.

Tell us a little bit about how that came about and what inspired that.

My husband grew up in the country.

And we had we lived in London for four years.

And when we came back from London,

He said to me,

I think I think I'm creating space again,

I think I need to move to the country.

And we just come back from being in London.

And we had a beautiful daughter who wasn't the best of sleepers.

And I thought of myself being sleep deprived,

Possibly depressed and isolated in the country.

And I was filled with dread.

And I said,

Look,

Could you wait a few years until we get this sleeping stuff under control,

Which did take two years,

Unfortunately.

And but also,

I said,

We've just come back to our tribe,

You know,

Can let's enjoy the people who are near and dear to us in Melbourne.

And he was he was totally on board with that.

And so I said,

Can you wait for actually say,

Can you wait three years?

I just thought I've got tiny kids.

I'm the one at home.

I want to be around my people.

Can you just wait three years?

And I think I hope that he might forget or assimilate back into Melbourne and just let it go.

Remember how much he loves wine and cheese and all those fabulous things,

And cool little bars and you know,

Theater and great restaurants.

And so the dream was when I we are when we moved back from London,

I had this dream of living by the sea with him and a baby.

And so we moved face side.

And so we fulfilled that dream.

So I thought I was set to be honest,

I thought that was it.

And we lived in an area where a lot of friends and family went,

You can't live there,

It's too expensive.

And somehow we made it happen.

And again,

So I felt really,

You know,

Proud and that you can design your life and make it happen.

And I was used to setting the vision for our life.

And so when he at the three year mark,

When he remembered and said,

It's three years,

Let's do it.

I was really surprised and thank God for Liv because she turned around to me and said,

You know how you coach your clients on mini experiments?

Surely you have to test this out.

And I was laughing and I think almost crying and I felt so humbled but in the best way I went,

Oh,

You're so right,

I have to,

I have to acknowledge his dream and test it out.

And the beauty around mini experiments is there are three levels to mini experiment.

The top level is 10 minutes to one hour to really test out an idea and to do it with joy and ease.

And it's the antidote to assumptions and perfectionism and self sabotage and really helps you to take action on an idea.

Now we jumped to the third level,

Which is a year long experiment because it was,

You know,

All the activities that have to do with moving location,

You know,

You need to stay there for more than 10 minutes or an hour or three months.

You do need to stay for a year.

So I actually committed to a year.

And the interesting flip that came with that was it became an adventure.

So I agreed to a year.

I thought I would love aspects of it,

But I didn't think it could trump my tribe in Melbourne.

I didn't think it could be better than that.

But I thought this is his dream.

I love adventures,

Flipped my mindset.

Let's go for a year.

We rented out our house in Melbourne,

We rented down in Barwood Heads and we gave it a year.

And he was sold within three days.

Three days.

And he told me.

And so I felt like I had an exit at auction at the end of the year.

But after three days,

I wasn't so sure that was available or how we would negotiate that,

To be honest.

I was a little bit.

Yeah.

But I thought,

Let's just engage with the adventure because that was the attitude we took in London.

We actually went for a year and every year we said we're definitely staying for a year and then we'll see.

And it made each year an adventure.

It made that made us really look at each year,

Like let's make the most of it.

We don't know if we'll still be here next year.

And so I really adopted that attitude for this move as well.

How can we make it into an adventure?

That's a really great point,

Especially with everything that us Melbournians are going through at the moment is looking at chunking things down and looking at things within certain time frame as a mini experiment,

As you've so beautifully talked about.

What a wonderful tip for us fellow Victorians at the moment to really consider everything in time blocks rather than it's all going to go on forever.

You know,

Absolutely.

You know,

One of the best ways to avoid circling into depression or strong anxiety is to really look at things as being temporary and putting a timeline on it.

So for example,

When the COVID first happened,

I remember thinking really in terms of 24 or 48 hour time periods,

You know,

When we went into the first lockdown,

And that was really,

Really helped me a lot.

And so I with the move,

The sea change,

I thought of what kind of Yeah,

Time increment can I cope with?

What can I and how can we make it?

How can we make it positive?

How can we make it an adventure?

And I think that's because the thing is we when we think about a change,

We make a lot of assumptions.

And we don't necessarily have evidence for any of them.

So many stories,

Stories,

Stories in the field.

So yeah,

And I do talk to a lot of a lot of people do ask us about the sea change.

And usually one person in a couple is more interested than than the other.

And so that's,

I think,

Pretty normal.

And so that's that those are the top tips I share,

You know,

Break it down into something that feels like an adventure and it feels like you can test it out.

And you don't actually know what will happen.

And and that's,

That's,

It's good to be okay with that,

Too.

And so tell us the end of the story has it ended up.

So it took me three months to kind of see the benefits.

My life had changed more than he's at the time.

And because he was working up in Melbourne,

And I was working very part time.

And so my whole week change,

Whereas really his leisure time change.

So it took me longer,

I think,

To adjust to that certainly took me a good year or two to find my tribe.

And but what I,

I do love surfing.

And I realised that surfing makes me a better human,

A better friend,

A better mum,

A better coach,

A better partner.

And I thought,

Wow,

This is really worth yeah,

Continuing with this.

This makes me a better human.

I really love I do love the pace.

That is different in regional Victoria.

I think we feel really lucky.

We feel really lucky and grateful.

I think it's there are a lot of positives for our kids as well,

That just that more natural outdoor living barefoot lifestyle going on.

And we're certainly feeling lucky during these pandemic times as well,

Because we've got more of nature on our doorstep that we can access.

That's such an interesting point,

Nick,

You know,

One of my favourite books that I've read,

Excuse me,

In the last couple of years is called Lost Connections by Johan Hari.

And and,

You know,

Given the theme for this,

The series,

Or these episodes of podcasts is really around connection.

And one of his key points is connection to nature.

And that's something that so many of us need for our mental wellness and to stay well to forest bathe to get all of the wonderful,

I think it's hormones or endorphins or something that the trees secrete that we that settles our nervous system.

And I think that's something that as modern,

Modern Aussies we've many of us have lost that and we're,

You know,

It's like,

Guys,

Get out for a hike,

You know,

Go to the park,

Go stand at the tree under a tree,

You know,

Get barefoot into nature.

Take your shoes off.

Yeah,

And do it do it with a friend or a child or a partner,

You know,

One of you recommended that book to me.

And it's a fantastic book if you haven't read it.

And it also talks about Yeah,

Connection to people connection to nature.

And then I thought,

What if you combine them both?

So I used to surf a lot on my own.

And now I've created a little group and with another woman and there's now 60 women surfers in that group.

So I really see zero.

Yeah.

And it and that's,

I didn't know of them the first two years I was here.

But it just and it's interesting how I can feel that mental boost from not only surf,

But if you surf with someone else.

Yeah.

And you know,

I have the same with my swim club.

That's been a huge impact.

It's made a huge impact on my mental health and my feeling of connection to the local community and getting into nature.

Now,

Every week,

We're there and we're feeling the freezing cold water and we're doing it with other people.

I wouldn't do it if it wasn't for them.

Oh,

Exactly.

Yeah,

Huge impact.

So you know,

For those of you who are listening to our chat,

Guys,

Find what you love doing,

Go and do it.

And the chances are you'll probably find your tribe as well.

Absolutely.

And just and just start inviting people.

And someone will say yes.

Yeah.

At some point.

Hopefully,

Fingers crossed.

So that's such a great story,

Nick,

And so inspiring about how you you chunked down that thing that probably would be quite scary for many people.

And it was scary for me too.

Yeah.

I felt like I was giving up a lot.

Yeah.

How did you manage that?

By honestly just looking at it as a year's adventure.

We had been back for three years.

So I was a little bit ready for another adventure.

And also,

I think understanding,

You know,

I coach people to make their dreams come true.

And I couldn't ignore my partner's dream.

I think I was really conscious of,

We were in a tiny place,

Bayside,

And he had a dream where he could open up the fridge and the fridge door didn't hit a wall,

You know,

He was creating space.

I couldn't ignore my partner's dream.

I had to test it out.

And I think,

And,

And,

You know,

Live,

You know,

Beautifully shown back my work on me and said,

Yeah,

It was that really helped because I think the resistance I felt was that it wasn't my dream.

It's so interesting,

Which brings me to the next area I'd love to just chat with you about,

Which is that,

You know,

I have learned through my own experience,

We always have a choice to follow love or to follow fear.

And the example you've just given us is you chose love.

So the fear would have been no,

I'm happy where I am,

I'm going to stay where I am,

You know,

What if I get there and I don't make any friends or I can't get work or the kids don't settle in a new school,

That's the fear commentary.

But you chose the love commentary,

Which is about I love this man,

I want to follow,

You know,

Respect his dream.

Let's at least give it a go.

So you know,

How can we make that conscious choice more often to choose the love option,

The love route?

I really,

I really feel like mini experiments is it plays well in this space as well.

Because all the work that I do with clients is around mini experiments and listening to their heart and under uncovering their dream ideas or dream roles or dream jobs or dream ideas and testing them out.

And with an often there's a lot of fear there.

So there's love is in these ideas that come from their heart,

But then there's a tonne of fear of like that.

I don't know if I can do it.

I don't know if I can make money from that.

That's going to take up too much time.

I can't see how this will work out.

So mini experiments means that you can actually listen to your heart take tiny as tiny bite size pieces as you need to from that.

And the thing is,

When you do a mini experiment,

You collect evidence as to why you want to do more of something or less of something.

And that fuels the love over the fear because you've got evidence.

When you don't have evidence,

The fear can rule really easily.

Yeah.

And that's partly just because as we've touched on earlier,

That's the way our brains are wired.

We have this negativity bias,

You know,

Where we are wired for the negative and that supported us in our survival as a human species.

But it doesn't always serve us as modern humans.

So you know,

Having to make that conscious choice and we can do that through so many of your tips.

Well then to finish up,

I would love just for you to share how listeners can learn a bit about bit more about what you do and the services you offer.

I know you've got lots of great things on the go.

Where can they find more information about you?

Absolutely.

So I have a website.

It's NickiSmithCoach.

Com.

So it's www.

NickiSmithCoach.

Com.

And I help fed up,

Stressed corporate workers uncover their dream job and make it happen.

You can join me on one or two free monthly webinars.

You can book in for a free chat via the website.

And I also have a podcast where I interview clients and other people who have created their dream life best fit role and their mini experiments and strengths and how they made it happen.

And as I mentioned,

I'll,

I'll,

We'll put a link to the free strengths guide in the show notes as well.

So just come and connect with me.

Ask me a question.

Yeah.

Awesome.

Thank you so much,

Nicki Smith for joining us today on the,

I love podcast.

It's been an absolute joy and thank you for enlightening us about things like gratitude and playing to our strengths and mini experiments.

I've really loved it and I'm sure our listeners have to enjoy the nature out there in beautiful Bowen heads.

Thank you.

I will.

It's been so much fun.

Thanks Lou.

I'll see you next time.