All About Flow - Joanna Turner - Ep. 8

What is flow? What can you do with it? In this episode, I talk with Joanna Turner about her experience in meditation and her journey in discovering her flow. Joanna is a leading Wealth & Success Coach, Certified Reiki Practitioner, Advanced EFT & Master NLP Practitioner.
We discover the relationship between Flow & Mindfulness and find out how you can access this incredible state of awareness.

Transcript

In this episode of the Project Mindfulness Podcast,

You will hear about flow,

What it is and how to apply it in your life.

Let's find out.

Honest and open to all religions,

All traditions,

All ages and all levels of experience.

Radically accessible,

Pragmatic and eye-opening.

Simply for everyone.

Welcome to the Project Mindfulness Podcast.

We'll take you on a journey across the globe and talk with other meditators about their practice,

The lessons they have learned and what they want the world to know.

Good day and welcome.

This is episode 8 and I am Christian Nateson.

Thank you for joining us.

Today I talk with Joanna Turner about her personal experiences with meditation.

If you listen to the podcast regularly,

You will notice that this podcast is longer than the previous ones.

I want to give our guests more time so we can really dive deep into their practice and hear more of the stories they have to tell.

With more time,

We will of course continue to bring you interesting guests and quality interviews.

We love to hear from you.

Up till now,

The response has been incredible.

I'm glad to hear you get inspired by this podcast.

If you'd like to comment,

Thank,

Ask a question or do a shout out.

You can now easily do that through our Anchor FM account.

The link will be in the description.

Simply record your voice message with the app.

Let us know.

I'm always glad to hear from our listeners.

So with that,

Let's dive into the interview I had with Joanna Turner.

I'm sure you will be as inspired as I was by her words and her energy.

First of all,

Welcome to the podcast.

Thank you so much.

It's great to be here.

For the people who don't know you and who are listening to this podcast,

Would you mind introducing yourself?

Who are you and what do you do in life?

That's a great question.

I'd say I'm evolving into being my most authentic self.

I'm originally from Scotland.

Today I'm recording from Melbourne,

Australia.

I'm a nomad.

I've been on the road for three years.

I've been building my business for nearly five years.

I'm an online coach and I primarily help female entrepreneurs to grow themselves,

To grow their businesses so they can have more impact in the world.

The way I've been doing that has been evolving.

That's the really evolving part.

The core mission is still the same.

I still work with abundance and money blocks and helping people get to the core of allowing themselves to receive more,

Hold more,

Have more,

Experience more,

Happiness and joy through personal development.

It's gone a lot.

It's gone real woo-woo,

Really spiritual.

I now teach people how to access their intuitive and psychic gifts through the Akashic records so as they can bring that into their business.

They're creating this business from a really intuitive,

Really aligned place.

That journey then led me into more work within the divine feminine,

The divine masculine,

Creating sacred union within ourselves as individual beings so as we can bring that into relationship and into our businesses.

It's a very holistic,

Spiritual process to get to that place.

It's gone from the woo-woo to deep embodiment as well because I think that's a huge part that's missing from the conversation.

Even one of the biggest problems within the spiritual industry and the entrepreneur industry is that we're not embodied.

We're teaching things from our heads and not always fully getting the teachings and walking our talk and really fully integrating it through our bodies.

That is the next part of my journey,

Deep embodiment of the teachings and the truth so as we can actually bring what we're trying to bring into our physical reality because that's often the missing piece for people.

Wow,

So there's a lot going on right now in your life.

There is.

Really interesting stuff though.

I took a look at your website and I saw for instance that you do Reiki.

Is that true?

It is true.

I'm attuned to Reiki one and two through two different methods,

Shamanic Reiki and Karuna Reiki.

I have a really weird relationship with Reiki because even though I'm attuned to two different levels of two different types of Reiki,

I never went looking for it.

I accidentally got attuned to Reiki basically through four levels by accident.

I believe that I was,

It found me rather than me looking for Reiki which is kind of funny but my first ever experience with Reiki I went for an appointment with this lady in Bali that my friend recommended.

It was like a two hour appointment and she did this stuff and I felt something but I wasn't,

It was a beautiful experience.

At the end of it she's like,

Okay how long are you in town because they're telling me that I need to teach you this and we need to do it as soon as possible.

I was like,

Okay.

I went and learned two days later with her.

We spent a whole day and I learned level one from her one on one in person.

That was really the start of me accidentally discovering Reiki and being accidentally attuned to it.

It chose me.

That's interesting.

That's how things just tend to happen sometimes.

To use the word flow,

You flow from one into the other.

Actually coming to that word flow,

What's the connection with flow that you have?

It seems to be a word that resonates very much into your business and your life.

I call myself the flow alchemist.

For me flow,

I don't want to launch into a massive thing about flow but it's a beautiful thing.

I used to be a control freak.

I don't know if you can identify with that.

I was definitely in a female body.

I was operating more from my masculine energy.

Whether you're in a male or female body or whether it's non-gender specific,

Gay,

Straight or otherwise,

We all have masculine and feminine energies within our bodies.

You can call them yin yang,

The sun and the moon.

For me,

Using masculine and feminine is the easiest way.

I had been operating way more from my masculine which is much more in your head,

Very much controlling,

Planning,

Problem solving,

Organizing.

I was an accountant for 17 years before I got into the spiritual healing realms and working in this beautiful industry.

Flow is basically the opposite of being in flow.

You're thinking out how can I make money?

What is my next thing?

If you're sitting at your laptop trying to dream that up,

It's a lot harder to get any traction.

If a business plan has come from your head and then you try and hustle your way to make it happen,

There's a lot more resistance.

Things don't go viral if they've come from your head usually.

It's just pushing and it's hard and it's just difficult.

I spent my whole career doing that and then the first year and a half of my business coming from that energy,

It's like,

Well,

I worked hard and I pushed and I did well in my career.

I'm just going to apply that same thinking to my new business.

What happened was I was burning out in my business.

I'd set my business up to get out of corporate,

To get out of that energy and to not burn out.

I thought I'd be spending every day on the beach but I'd actually gone from a really big job,

More eight to eight rather than nine to five.

We worked quite a lot on the weekends and I'd gone from that into my own business.

Then I was working 12 to 16 hours a day in my new business and I was like,

Wait,

What just happened here?

I'm actually working more for myself and I was like,

I am the worst boss ever.

I'm a horrible boss.

I was coming from that real push,

Push,

Just controlling energy.

I started to discover,

I was like,

Oh wait,

There might be another way.

I cannot keep this up.

It's that old mentality of if I work,

The harder I work,

The more money I'll make.

I had to realize that that was actually not true,

Not working for me.

I want to be in this business,

I'm sure you do,

For the long term.

I have no plan B.

This is it for me and I want to build a legacy and I want to make a massive impact and really change lives.

The way I was operating was I was going to be burnt out after five minutes and not be able to actually complete that.

I see a lot of people,

They come in,

They hustle hard and then they fall off the face of the earth.

We don't see them anymore and they have to close their business up.

Some people go back and get a corporate job because it's not what they imagined and it's not what it cracked up to be.

For me,

Flow is the complete opposite.

It is being in your body.

It is bringing in the more feminine elements of your business.

It's creativity,

It's receptivity.

A lot of the time in that hustle push mode,

You have no time to receive,

To receive the finances,

To receive help,

To receive even your creative ideas and inspiration.

Flow is this beautiful state and there's micro and macro flow.

Micro flow is what a lot of the guys,

I don't know if you've heard of Steven Kotler,

He has an amazing book called Stealing Fire.

They have a flow genome project going on in Silicon Valley guys.

They're trying to hack flow.

I always find that really funny that all these men are trying to hack this process of flow,

Which is an inherently feminine process.

They're trying to hack it through all these masculine processes.

Flow in its micro state is where you suddenly become a superhuman.

It's those states where you lose track of time.

You are able to,

I once wrote 20 sales emails in one day.

You are lost in an art project.

You're speaking to your friend and suddenly it's five hours later.

Or you're just in that crazy creative mode and you can get tons done.

What happens is their frontal cortex actually shuts down.

Judgment disappears and there's about 17 different triggers that help you get into this incredible flow state where you're super creative,

Super inspired,

Getting tons done.

It's something that we're craving.

We've done lots of studies on happiness.

People are most happy in the world when they experience more flow states.

It's also that.

It's where risk comes.

There's an element of risk.

A lot of skiers,

If you've ever skied and you've just had the most incredible run when you're skiing and you're like,

Oh,

This is transcendent,

That's flow.

Also,

Some of the best people are getting into flow are extreme sports people because there is that element of risk for them.

So like a surfer,

Somebody doing big waves,

They have to be in the flow state or they will die.

Right.

Yeah.

So it brings you like in a heightened state of awareness,

So to say.

But what it reminds me of is,

Or actually I'm wondering is,

Could you say that is mindfulness or is it really a distinct thing from mindfulness itself?

It's interesting because I believe it's probably the most amazing state of mindfulness because everything else,

One of the ways to create flow is to have a really distinct container where there is nothing else going on.

There's no tabs open on your laptop.

You're not checking your phone.

They're all things that completely ruin flow.

So in the flow state,

You're in full mindfulness because there is nothing,

There's no critic going on.

There is no other chatter.

You're so absorbed in that one process that you are in full connection with the divine,

Whatever that is for you,

Source,

God,

Creator,

The universe.

And it's such a blissful state because you do feel superhuman because you are so connected to the other side.

And often the most,

So many like perfect authors often they want to write in that flow state because it's not even them that's bringing through the beautiful creative things or the song or the poem or the words on the page.

And so because it's such an elevated state,

It becomes quite addictive.

And in that state,

There's a whole bunch of different neurochemicals that go off in your brain that are the same like dopamine serotonin.

And there's this like crazy concoction of things that go off that you actually can't access even through drug taking or any other way.

So it can become highly addictive because it is such a transcendent place to be.

But also because it has an addictive state and because you are so hyper aware and focused,

It's not something that you can be in full time.

And a lot of entrepreneurs,

Because they are so productive and creative in this state,

And you can get sort of five times more work done in this state than any other,

They want to be in it all the time.

And that's the worst thing that you can try and do is if you are in that all the time,

Again,

That's another it's that it's ironically the other way you can lead to burn out.

So one of the key components to flow is recovery.

And it's being OK with your downtime.

And it's because you don't feel like a superhuman.

So when people fall out of flow,

They're like,

Oh,

My God,

I was so creative yesterday.

Today I'm useless.

What's my problem?

Right.

And like suddenly you've gone from being like this like super person to being sort of unable to access that same level.

And so building an active,

Conscious recovery is actually one of the most important ways to be able to come back round in the cycle and reaccess that flow state.

So that can be just a really frustrating time for people if they are used to being super productive.

But you actually can't get into that super heightened state if you are depleted and exhausted and not able and not really looking after yourself.

So a key component in that is the recovery and allowing yourself to not be in your head and be in your story about why it's wrong or fear or whatever that is.

But in it,

But just to sort of take it to a next.

So I was like,

OK,

That's amazing.

I'm excited that I can get into that state faster.

I can do more,

Be more productive.

Awesome.

I was like,

How can I live in in an even more expanded state like that?

Like,

I don't want to just have pockets of it in my day or my week and be sort of chasing this elusive feeling.

So this is where my sort of concept of the macro flow comes in.

And so for me,

Flow is it's almost like instead of just being surrendered into those moments,

It's a surrendered way of living.

And it's it's accepting that every moment is perfect and every timing is perfect.

And every thing that comes into my world is in this complete synchronicity.

And when I let go of trying to control not just those moments of creativity or productivity,

I stop trying to control my life full stop.

And I can surrender into the greater flow of existence.

Then I'm allowing myself to live into flow.

And that is where I've found the greatest gifts and the greatest release,

Because I allow everything to be perfect.

And yes,

I can still be productive and creative and plan,

But I'm not I'm not controlling the shit out of my life anymore.

Could you say it's more cyclical that it's going into cycles of high productivity and then resting period?

Absolutely.

So they still rest within this.

But it's it's it's a surrender dress period.

So it's like surrendering to the whole process.

And it's for me,

Like one of the most amazing things and to be mindful and to to not be controlling.

I've had to.

And the most unexpected thing about my whole path is I've had to trust in a higher power.

And that's I was sort of a bit of an atheist,

Nonbeliever,

Not interested in in any of that.

And I didn't I didn't say I looking for I thought there was something bigger,

But I wasn't looking to find my faith.

Like I wasn't interested in that.

But but to surrender to a higher into flow,

You need to have a level of faith and trust that something bigger at work knows better than you do.

Right.

And it's and it allows it doesn't mean that only amazing things ever happen.

But in the moments where things look like they're falling apart or the or something that I would have labeled as bad in the past happens,

I'm able to like not freak out,

Not go into like shut down mode and go,

Oh,

This is interesting.

Why is this happening?

And so I can I can meet every moment with a different level of mindfulness because I don't go into a big story or if I'm about to miss a flight.

I'm like,

Oh,

This is interesting.

I must be supposed to be in this place longer.

Who am I supposed to meet in this moment where I'm delayed or what am I supposed to achieve?

Or perhaps,

You know,

Something was going to go wrong with the flight and maybe I'm supposed to be stuck in Texas for a night or,

You know,

Maybe I'm not supposed to have that happen for me.

And I have this trust that in every moment that the best and most ideal thing is happening for me,

Not to be.

And for me,

Being able to relax into that is the highest level of mindfulness.

So not just in those pockets of of feeling super creative,

But in every moment of my life,

I can surrender into it and be OK with with everything.

And I think that's the difference between somebody that can teach a yoga class and then have road rage.

Right.

Right.

And then the classic.

Right.

Like totally classic.

And so for me,

I'm like,

Well,

If I'm in traffic,

I'm like,

And which I rarely allow,

I've managed to very blessed manufacturing my life where I rarely ever be in traffic.

But if I am,

I know I'm like,

I just don't commute.

That's like my thing.

I don't do traffic.

But like if I was,

I'm like surrendered into it and I'm OK with however,

Like I trust that whatever time I get there is the perfect time.

And I trust if I'm two minutes late for something,

It suits the other person as well.

And so everything is OK.

And if something doesn't work,

Then it's for the best.

Does that make sense?

And so it's this sort of allowing and unfolding.

Without the control.

Right.

So it's it's a total acceptance of the moment and what is happening.

But there's also an aspect of confidence or faith in that whatever is happening is supposed to happen.

So to me,

It sounds like you're almost balancing between a sort of deterministic idea,

But then also one where you control everything.

And it's in between those two,

Because in a way you control certain things,

But then certain things are also the way they are.

And it seems like a perfect balance between those two,

Or at least it sounds like that,

Because the idea of a God or a divine being is usually connected with destiny,

Too.

Right.

Is that you're going somewhere and some things happen in your life that are supposed to happen to bring you on a certain path.

So going to that more maybe divine aspect,

Did that get get more shape for you in in the time that you worked with this flow?

Or is it still a notion of something is in control or something or it's supposed to be like this?

Or did it also get shape into a certain box or maybe religion or idea?

Great question.

And there's one piece I was just going to go back to.

Being in flow doesn't mean you don't do anything.

Like,

I'm still there's still both the elements there,

But I'm creating from a different I'm creating from an inspired place.

I'm creating from a place.

Then I am taking action.

I'm still putting like I might have this like aha download,

But I still have to then,

You know,

Pull the emails together,

Get my team to,

You know,

Pull all the different parts of the process together.

So I still have to take action,

But it's from a very different place if that makes sense.

So there's still that exactly that total balance between doing but but allowing at the same time.

So that's that's where the flow comes in.

But yeah,

Like I it's not about religion for me.

And it's interesting because when I've worked with different people,

It is about the relationship though to the higher power,

I think.

And I've been so surprised that I've helped people.

You know,

I have religious clients from all sorts of different backgrounds and very blessed with a very diverse crew of people.

And I've helped some with the relationship with God who maybe come from a more Christian background.

And then on the other hand,

I'm helping someone with their relationship with Allah.

And so I'm like,

Oh,

This is interesting.

Of course we are.

And I'm just not whatever end of the spectrum we're on.

I don't care who your thing is with as long as it's a great relationship.

You know,

Like that that's the most important thing to me.

I'm not I mean,

It's there's no judgment for me about who who that person is to you.

But I want you to have a really great relationship with it.

And so if you think it's source or just universal truth or,

You know,

God,

Like that,

That doesn't it's not important.

That part isn't important.

The important part is,

Is if you if you like trust and have the faith and you don't feel like you're being punished or that they're out to get you for some reason.

And so for me that I wasn't expecting it.

But when I let go of control,

I can see that it's there at such a divine level.

And I remember after one of I did this big live event a couple of years ago in L.

A.

And it was the craziest thing to try and pull off.

But it came through as a very divinely guided thing to try and do.

And so it's this three day event.

I've promised I've got speakers and sponsors and,

You know,

A hotel booked and the whole thing.

And I had to surrender so many times to that and to let go of my ego during the process of planning of then it became the most expensive fricking process in the whole world.

Like photographers and audio guys and,

You know,

The hotel and tickets and all like photography,

Like there's videographers and like it just became this huge production.

And I was like,

What have I got myself into?

And two months I think we'd sold 17 tickets or something.

And I was like,

I have these big speakers coming.

They're expecting a room of at least 100 people.

What have I done?

Like this is the craziest thing.

I'm on the road.

I'm not even planning this from from a base.

I don't I've never even been to the event hotel.

So I'm planning the whole thing on the fly.

Basically,

I'm like,

This is completely insane.

I've never I've only been to LA once in my life before.

It's not like I even have a community of people in LA.

Like it's the stupidest thing ever.

And I'm just spending more and more money on this thing.

And I had to just go into this complete surrender.

And I was and when I did that,

Suddenly I let go and I was like,

This will happen no matter what.

I'm OK with the outcome.

And before I went to the event hotel,

I had this moment and I just had to I said I was like,

OK,

I was on Venice Beach in LA.

And I was like,

Whatever happens over the next three days,

If people turn up,

If people don't turn up,

I I am going to continue doing this work.

But on Monday morning,

The sun will rise.

And whatever has happened over the next three or four days,

I'm going to have to just accept and move on with.

And so I'd had this moment of reckoning of completely completely letting go.

And it worked out so incredibly like pretty much we'd sold one hundred hundred and twenty tickets,

But twenty people didn't show up.

So we had the exact number of people in the room.

We had one hundred people.

Every speaker showed up.

Everyone had to create incredible breakthroughs.

All of the kit turned up,

The hotel,

Everything like I couldn't have run a more seamless,

Amazing event,

Especially for a first timer.

You know,

And the whole thing was just perfect.

And like I walked out of that space with the deepest trust that I've ever experienced in my whole life.

And I put every cent into that event.

Every dollar I had went into that event.

And it just all worked out perfectly.

And it just and I was like,

Oh,

My gosh,

Down to the frickin dollar.

This worked.

And I walked out the other side and I was like,

I have this strong and I was in a tack and Uber like a couple of days later.

And the taxi driver said to me,

He's like,

Do you have faith?

And I just looked at him.

I said,

For the first time in my life,

I can tell you that I have such complete faith in a higher divine power that I will never doubt again.

I'm so fully supported in this mission.

And he was like,

I'm so glad to hear that.

And I was like,

Well,

If you'd asked me any minute sooner,

You would have got a different response.

But I had to go for a big risk.

Let go.

Let myself be supported.

And I was like,

Wow.

And so I really feel like if you're on a mission to help people to make a difference,

You will and let go and don't just try and control the absolute shit out of it.

You will be supported and guided on that mission.

Like,

I really fully believe that with every cell of my body.

Right.

That makes a lot of sense.

It reminds me of what Ram Dass once said.

I think about when you want something,

You know,

You can't have it.

And then once you let it go,

You actually it comes to you.

It's sort of it seems almost a universal principle of of having and not having and desire and not desiring where if you let it go,

It you allow it sort of space to happen by itself.

But you still got to do the work,

Right?

You still got to set your intention.

You still got to like make the call,

Send the email.

As you said before,

You still have to do something.

You're not just sitting back on the couch waiting for it to happen.

Absolutely.

Absolutely.

It's that attachment,

Right?

Like our attachment to everything.

Like I've been nomadic now for three years and I don't even have stuff.

Like I have like two suitcases and that's it.

A world like possessions.

I have nothing in storage.

I actually have a suitcase in Singapore with a friend.

But beyond that,

Everything I own is with me and I travel with it.

And that's it.

And I used to have the house and the car and all the stuff.

And I just I'm not attached.

Like I like nice things.

Don't get me wrong.

But I'm not I'm not defining myself by what car I'm driving or like the I actually got rid of all my watches.

I used to have this where this giant gold watch and like I just got rid of it.

I was like,

This is too heavy to carry everywhere.

I'm like not doing this anymore.

So I just like got rid of all these things.

I was like getting status and like defining myself by.

And yeah,

It's so interesting when you let go of stuff like amazing things will come come to me,

But I'm not I can let go.

I'm OK with it.

Not not having it.

You know what I mean?

And so that's been a huge,

A huge thing for me.

And it's that exact thing,

Right?

Like as soon as you let go,

As soon as you say that desperate energy,

If you go on a date,

Right?

Like as soon as somebody feels that they're like,

Oh God,

But if you couldn't care less,

They're like,

Oh,

Hey,

This person's attractive.

And it's the same thing with clients.

Like if you get on a sales call with a client and you're like attached to the outcome and you're attached to them being your client and like maybe you like if you don't get this client,

You can't pay your rent.

And then you're going to have to give up your business.

And if you ever get on a call with that energy,

Like they're going to feel that and run for the fricking hills.

And I've been in that situation and got on that call.

And I was like,

I'm like,

Oh,

My God,

Like I feel like this person holds my entire destiny and fate in their hands.

And I'm the one that's trying to coach them.

I was like,

This is horrible.

So,

Yeah,

It's like it's that balance of in all areas,

Right?

In your personal life,

In your coaching life,

If that's what you do or your business.

We just cannot rely on somebody else or have attachment to somebody or somebody else showing up and doing something or being that thing for us.

Like it's a horrible place to be.

It's really not good.

No,

Right.

I definitely know what you mean.

It's even with animals,

Right?

That you send off a certain scent that animals smell and they can even react to it because you're afraid or you're desperate or whatever.

And I feel that people subconsciously pick up all these small signals that you're sending out.

And it could be,

You know,

It's also connected that to me,

It really makes sense that if you are desperate,

It's just not going to work.

Maybe you once have luck,

But then it's just,

You know,

Then you're going to get too attached.

It's just going to get messy.

And once you,

Yeah,

It's amazing that you share about how letting go actually brings you what maybe you've always wanted or in a way always even wanted to be.

So to say.

It's so powerful.

It's detaching from the outcome.

And it's that is the secret to all manifesting is detaching from how it comes when it comes and how it's and how the way it shows up.

Right.

Like we've got to let go of it being that certain way,

Like,

Or it just won't happen.

100 percent.

Yeah.

It's so opposite and it's so counterintuitive.

But if you think about it,

The way we've been trying to do things all our life hasn't worked.

Right.

We're like,

Oh,

Wait,

Actually,

That hasn't worked.

Yeah.

Yeah.

But it's also a matter of pride,

Right?

No,

But I always did it like this.

And yeah.

But how did you how did you move from a point of I want to control everything to a point of I'm not in control?

How did that was that a big step?

Was that a sudden moment of enlightenment or was it something gradual that happened throughout time?

Oh,

I it's been a combination.

I've had multiple ego deaths,

Like a little part of you that is attached.

So a lot of that,

Which I've been waking up to recently is about story,

Right?

Like the story we tell ourselves,

I have to do it this way.

My life is like this.

This is who I am.

This is my identity.

I've had to let go of all of that.

Right.

And I like my parents loved that I was an account as a chartered accountant for and I worked in that field and studied it for 17 years.

Like that was my identity.

It gave me my steady paycheck,

The nice house,

The nice car,

All the things.

And and letting go of that for like that was my first like ego death.

I was like,

I have to attach myself from from this and this definition of success.

And so I've been humbled over and over again,

Right?

Every time I think my way is better or I think I know I'm like massively humbled basically.

And I've had to eat a whole bunch of humble pie.

Like I remember I tried to go into I've done a bunch of plant medicine.

I went into an ayahuasca ceremony.

I was trying thinking I knew my outcome,

Thinking I knew what I wanted to get from it.

Right.

So I was even trying to control,

You know,

The biggest power on earth.

Right.

Like,

Who do I think I am?

Come on.

Like,

That's just crazy.

And so the beauty of that was I didn't get what I wanted or expected.

And it wasn't until I realized I'd put all of this expectation on it that that I got my lesson.

And I was like,

Oh,

I don't get to control that.

Oh,

OK.

And so again,

This humbling and humbling and admitting I'm wrong,

Admitting my way doesn't work.

And like and going for a failure,

Like allowing myself to fail has been massive.

Not everything I've done in my in my business has worked.

Like there's some like I had to accept that that big event might fail and be OK with it,

Even if it did.

And like I exposed myself even on stage,

Like doing live coaching for people.

Like I pulled them up on stage and I didn't know the person.

And I was like,

I'm going to have to I'm going for a breakthrough here.

But I have to like just like I might be exposed as not being able to do this live on stage in front of 100 people.

And,

You know,

It was these risks after risks.

And I was available to humble myself.

But also we had the most beautiful,

Amazing breakthroughs and it was all perfect.

But this like a bill,

Like one of the most amazing things I heard,

Like I go to this event called A-Fest.

It's run by Mindvalley and Vishen Lakhyani was speaking.

He has a brilliant book called Code of the Extraordinary Mind.

But one of the things he shared was the way Google operates.

And he said that they the way when they do their goal setting,

They create these giant goals.

So they allow their staff to dream so big that they actually expect them to not meet like 40%,

50% of their goals.

And if they are meeting like 100% of their goals,

They're like,

Well,

You didn't dream big enough.

You didn't go you didn't go hard enough for that.

Right.

And so their compensation is not based on whether they meet these crazy big dream goals.

Because they're and by doing that,

They're actually making failure safe within their organization.

And so they're like,

If we're not failing like 40% of the time,

We're doing something wrong here.

Like we're not dreaming big enough.

We're not trying things.

We're not thinking outside of the box.

And so this this this concept of making failure safe and not making it about who we are like blows my mind.

Because I was so terrified to me failure equaled I was going to die.

Like I was like,

Right.

Like we I think we apocalypse.

Right.

Like holy crap.

Who am I in this terrible failure person?

And and that concept of making failure safe and okay.

And like I've launched things and like nobody has bought it.

You know,

And I'm like,

Okay,

Interesting.

I thought that was a guided plan.

What am I supposed to learn here?

Actually,

I'm that's actually not what I really want to do.

Like,

Okay,

I thought that was a guided idea,

But that didn't work.

And instead of being like boohoo,

Nobody loves me.

I'm like,

What else can I do?

What will work?

Right.

Maybe I should ask people what they want instead of deciding what I think people need.

You know,

So yeah.

So you you learn a lot and you you learn through failing.

Yeah.

Also,

It's it's an amazing story and I hate to sort of bring it to a closer,

But for one last question,

We heard about flow state and we heard about letting go and actually coming to a place of where you should be or at least where you are most effective for anyone listening right now.

What would you give to them as an advice?

Oh,

Such a good thing.

So I gosh,

Where do I start?

I really for me,

The journey has been about my inner journey.

I think we we define success.

I've had clients who are like,

Hey,

Joe,

Guess what?

I'm now.

Thank you.

I'm living the vision board life.

I have you know,

Then they do have the house and the car and all the things and their business is like rocking and making like a million dollars.

And they're like,

I'm miserable.

I'm sad.

And I'm like,

Whoa,

Whoa,

Whoa,

Whoa,

Whoa.

Right.

So I think we have to like look at that and go,

OK,

How are you defining success?

Whose success are you even chasing?

Right.

And just get really honest and be like,

Is this fulfilling me?

And if it's not,

Then that's going to lead you down a different path.

And you don't have to go full woo woo.

And I'm not I never would suggest anyone does any plant medicine.

That's not I actually don't recommend it.

There's other ways to access the divine without having to go to those lengths and extremes.

It's something I felt like a guinea pig doing.

But I'm like,

Just ask yourself those questions.

If that's where you need to start,

Be like,

Whose definition of success am I?

Am I even chasing?

Am I really going after what I want or what somebody else wants?

Like,

What is what is important to me?

And from there,

If you if you really are awesome,

Fabulous,

Carry on.

Well done.

But if you're not,

Then it's like,

OK,

What do I need to change or look at?

So is that what do I even want?

What would what do I what do I want?

And I think just start there.

And then that will probably lead down the path of some self discovery and inner work.

And,

You know,

I've done a ton of,

You know,

Working with coaches,

Therapists,

Healers,

Not actually.

I've never actually worked with a therapist,

But I've done a lot of work that's akin to therapy.

And there's no shame in that.

Like,

I think everybody should have a coach and a healer and a therapist and a,

You know,

A shaman and,

You know,

Whatever.

But one process will probably be your gateway.

So for some,

It's meditation.

I love meditation.

I think it's incredibly powerful.

For some,

It might be dance.

It might be yoga.

It might be it might be Reiki.

It might be sound healing.

It might be NLP.

Right.

You'll find like find something that works for you.

It doesn't like not one way works for everybody.

And I sort of started with with with different access points.

And then what I love and what works for me in the moment changes.

Right.

So if you're frustrated and meditation doesn't work for you,

That's OK.

Maybe you need to go and like do some crazy like bashing a pillow with a baseball bat.

I've done that too.

Right.

So it's these two two levels of the spectrum.

I can sit in the in beautiful stillness,

But also I have to like move it through my body.

Sometimes I need to dance and sometimes I need to cry.

And like,

You know,

So it's just finding finding what works for the individual,

I think,

Is the most important thing and not one way works.

If something doesn't work for you and you don't like resonate with a guru or a teacher,

Go just find somebody you do resonate with.

Like there's so many people out there,

You know,

And there's some people I'm like,

Oh,

I don't know if I think,

You know,

Agree with this.

And that's OK,

Too.

But sometimes they're your biggest teachers.

There are sometimes the people that you actually should be learning from are the people that trick you the most.

Yeah,

No,

Yeah,

Definitely.

Well,

That's a that's a very solid advice.

I mean,

It's it's very easy to think,

Oh,

Because it worked for this person,

It must work for me.

But apparently that's not how it works.

Yeah.

You think you're bad or wrong.

My friend's like,

I can't meditate.

There must be something wrong with me.

But,

You know,

He thought that meditating,

He had to have a completely no thoughts.

And he was just getting more and more frustrated with himself and more pissed off that he couldn't do that.

And I'm like,

Hey,

Well,

Maybe something else is right for you right now.

Maybe that's not your access point to this.

And so,

Yeah,

Just being OK with that,

That there's different things will work at different times and and trusting that you find the right thing at the right time.

Awesome.

OK,

Well,

Amazing advice.

And thank you for the insights about flow and letting go.

And also the access points.

I think that's a very solid point to make,

Because it seems to be very normal to assume that if one thing works for someone,

It works for everyone.

And by looking at yourself and looking at where you are and finding what works for you at that moment,

At that place,

That might go a little bit better.

Right.

100 percent.

Right.

Like,

Yeah.

Thank you so much.

And it was great to have you on the podcast.

Thank you.

That's great.

Thank you.

Make sure to check out Joanne's website if you feel inspired by her story.

The link will be in the description.

Don't forget to subscribe to this podcast if you enjoyed this talk.

And thank you for listening.

Have a great day.

Reviews

She’s amazing! So much of what she said resonated so deeply with me. Definitely will listen again 🙏🏾✨♥️

That was a lovely talk that spoke to me.
Thank you for sharing 🤗

Great advice. Her initial description of herself as a new business owner sounded very familiar! Thank you.

I love the discussion around surrender as entry point to flow. Thank u! 🙏❤️

What a great podcast! Thanks for having Joanna on; her words were exactly what I needed to hear today. 🙂

A great explanation and some good examples of flow. I recognised where I can make improvements. Many thanks.