Welcome to the podcast. I'm Jackie Brahman, principal solicitor at to be a law and ceo of legally wise women and I'm here with Bush Janet, former corporate lawyer then head of HR and now an emotional intelligence coach. Good morning Bush morning, Jackie. How are you going? Good. It feels like ages since I've been able to say good morning to you. I know because I lost it was in the evening. Sunday night. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. How are you? I'm good in the throws of puppy training and I swear I would just have this disillusion that this puppy would come into my life fully trained. I don't know why I thought that and I'd have to do nothing. It's like expecting a newborn baby to like know how to walk, talk and eat and feed. So yeah. And it's been interesting. Thank God for dog trainers. That's all I can say. Yeah. At least they grow up quicker though. We've said that before, haven't we? It's not like you. Yes, you're not like in it for years and years of puppy training. No, no, I think it's going to be another couple of months and I think we should be good.

Yes. Yeah. How about you? Good. Yeah. Look, we're just on the cusp of december. It's so exciting. I know. Have you got christmas decorations around the place yet or anything? I haven't because it's snoopy this year because of the tree. So I thought I'm not going to risk it. And it was last year. I had marshy for like one month before christmas. So I haven't had a tree up for two years, really struggling with that because I'm like, I'm the person that would put the tree up in september if I could. So I went and bought christmas bedsheets this year. I'm like, you know what, I'm just going to look at have a bit of christmas tree in my room when there's no pets. Yes, someone's like, just put the tree up in your bedroom. I'm like, I just thought of that, that's a good idea to you just can't have those lights on. Exactly, yeah, I love christmas, I love planning all the things that you get to do now that we're catching up with everyone all over the place. There's something on every weekend and you know, the introvert in me gets very tired, but I just so focused on that at the moment and not on too many other things.

Good. Yes, exactly, exactly. So that's been exciting. So yeah, the interview today that I've got to share. Yeah, linda. Yes, fantastic. She calls herself the poster woman for the Russian woman syndrome, but that was over a decade ago. It's such an interesting thing because we've spoken to quite a few people and linda's story sort of brings together quite a few aspects of people we've already spoken to. But yes, she was a marketing manager for a very, very long time and then she Developed a chronic illness and turned her life around healed herself, became a massage therapist and a natural therapies practitioner for the last 10 years. Um, So in the show notes, she's actually given us some more resources than we usually would otherwise get. Given us some meditation and breathwork and generously given us a 20% off code to work with her.

So let's have a listen. Good afternoon linda. I'm really excited to talk to you. How are you really well, thanks Jackie, thanks so much for inviting me along. It's wonderful. I'm really looking forward to this conversation because like I was saying before we started recording, there's quite a few things in your story, I think that are going to weave together a few other journeys that we've heard from fairly recent guests, but I don't want to preempt too much because I actually haven't heard your story. What did you want to be when you're growing up? And where did you grow up? Okay, well gee, that's a, that's a great question and there's so many answers to just that two part question. What I wanted to be when I was growing up was a vet, I was really, you know, I found it so much easier to connect with animals than I did with people and you know, reading their nonverbal cues and all that sort of stuff, plus just feeling really connected to the animal kingdom. I wanted to be a vet when I grow up and my other secret passion was to be a writer.

So The way I grew up was my dad was in the army. So we moved a lot and that really impacted significantly on my schooling. So by the time I got to year 11 I had massive holes from being educated all around Australia, a couple of stints overseas and all this sort of stuff going on and I was just not able to maintain the levels required in the prerequisite subjects to get into veterinary science. So I had to let that dream go with lots of tears and angst and frustration. But writing was also has always been a huge passion of mine and I'm really thrilled to say that I'm actually a published author this year and I've got another book in the wings. So I am fulfilling at least one of my childhood dreams and it feels great. It's congratulations. It's so nice to hear as well that even though you were crushed sort of towards the end of your schooling that you actually had maintained still wanting to be a vet all the way through as well. I think that that in itself is fairly unique.

So what did you end up doing then after school? What did you study? Well, actually went into marketing and communications because I am a very good writer and I did have a really good grasp on english and all that sort of stuff. It was just kind of a natural progression. I was originally called into physiotherapy, I really wanted to do physiotherapy, but I just didn't get The marks required to get into physio and that's simply the way it was. So well, I write pretty well. I'm going to communications, so that was a really interesting time for my life. I ended up in a marketing career for the next 25 years, slowly going crazy going absolutely crazy and finding myself following a way of life, a set of precepts, expectations, all of these ideals that kind of get programmed into us through all the way through our education and living with family and, you know, white Australia and all that sort of stuff, disbelief that to be successful, we have a career, we earn a certain amount of money.

We get married, we have kids, la la la the whole works. And it sent me off the deep end, literally by the time I was In my mid to late 30s. Yeah. Oh no, I'm at that stage now. Well, it can be an ono or it could be a thank God, it's nearly my time and I invite you to take the second option. Absolutely. And like I said earlier, I think that hopefully, you know, we're starting to become a little bit more self aware of some of those things, particularly after lockdowns. I think that a lot of people have had much more time to reflect about what they do and don't like about their lives and careers and what is, and isn't acceptable. But you're in Darwin now too. So did you study in Darwin or has that been a more recent move up north? No, I actually studied in Canberra and I actually started my working life in Sydney and I did some time in Brisbane and Cairns as well, And then ended moving to Darwin in 1992 and I came up here for two years to work in an advertising agency And here I am 30 years later, having had four Children and quite an extensive career in the public sector up here before transitioning into my true love, which is healing in the last 10 years.

So that's what I've been doing for the last decade is actually the healing work. Yeah. In many ways you almost come back full circle because vet and physio work healing more hands on invasive, potentially. But do you do hands on healing as well? I do, yes, that's part of what I do and yes, even the nature of the way I work is changing, but that's how it needs to be. Well, that's right online. Okay, so let's go back because as you said, running around in a high powered marketing career doing all the things that you think you should be doing to meet other people's expectations and I suppose to also compete with what you see around you as what is successful? Tell us a bit more about those years about how, you know, when it started sending you crazy when you actually started noticing that and you know what it was doing to your body and pressure you, I suppose, putting on yourself.

Yeah, absolutely. Look, you know, there are all those external expectations, but we actually buy into them as well. So there are a lot of internalized expectations that we used to drive ourselves even harder. And I think, you know, as women who have come through post generation of the feminists who really broke the way for us to actually move into the workforce, we now find ourselves in a place where we can have it all, but it's no longer just we can have it all to have it all. It feels like you have to do it all and you have to be all things to all people and in doing that sort of thing, you really lose sight of who you actually are. And I see this reflected, you know, I call myself the poster girl for the Russian woman syndrome because we are so busy trying to get ahead of the schedule and the program that we've created for ourselves that we just never catch up because we're always trying to get ahead, but we never do and that plays absolute havoc with the physical body, you know, the elevated stress levels from working like that over a long period of time are detrimental to our health.

And as a result of that, we're seeing particularly in women, you know, higher incidence of chronic illnesses such as chronic conditions such as osteoporosis, cancer, arthritis, back pain, blah, blah blah. We're seeing a higher level of incidents of autoimmune diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, scleroderma, you know, things like that. We're also seeing things like central sensitivity syndromes such as fibromyalgia, which is what I have inherited after all my Russian woman syndrome days and other things like chronic fatigue and irritable bowel syndrome, They sort of come under that umbrella and around the world. It's not just Australia around the world, The rates of women developing these chronic illnesses outweighs those of men. You know, it's not not restricted to men, you know, they do get it, but it's more often women and I see that as being a direct result from the way we force ourselves to work to a model that just doesn't fit us.

You know, we're not designed to work the way the modern world expects work to happen. So that's kind of my soapbox area. So I don't want to get to to launch down that pathway, but certainly for myself when I first started noticing it was when my Children were quite young and I had been through a relationship and had two Children and then found myself suddenly single, actually, I made myself single, it was a conscious choice for me to leave that relationship. And so, you know, developed co parenting arrangements with two young Children and go back to full time work. In fact, I was already back at full time work before that happened. And then I met this amazing man and fell in love again. And you know, and behold we have two more Children. But unfortunately for me, even though he was a wonderful man and he still is, we're still together, he does shift work. And so I had a full time job in the public sector. I was in middle management, so you know, not a huge executive load, but in middle management with a team, I was responsible for Managing four young Children, pretty much as a single mom, you know, because my husband was on shift work.

So every now and then when his shift coincided with my busy times, that was great, but more often than not they didn't. So this is kind of where we get back to the opening of the conversation where, you know, we suddenly have this world is our oyster and we can have all these things and do all these things. But as women, we don't actually have the same societal support as men to fulfill this. You know, if we do go down the pathway of having a family, it's still the bulk of the time, the women's responsibility. And you know, I've got this really clear memory that really illustrates this so well, I was working in Treasury at the time and there was a senior officers meeting that was called really late in the afternoon, probably about four o'clock in the afternoon. And I said, I can't come, sorry, put my apologies in. And my boss was like, what do you mean you can't come? Everybody else is able to come. And I said, well, you know, it's my week with the Children. This is when I was still being a single mom and I was in co parenting, it's my week with the Children.

I need more time than 10 minutes notice to make arrangements for my Children. I don't have a wife that I can ring up and say I'm going to be late. See you when I get home. Amazingly, I still had a job to come back to. But yeah, I said I've got to go. I'm the thing, I'm the one, you know, I am the wife, they're my Children and he still asked. But isn't there someone else who can look after your Children? I'm like, no, there's not there my Children. And at that point in time, you know, my youngest was probably About 14 or 15 months old and the older one was about to so you know, yeah, not ideal. Not ideal. And that kind of really illustrates, I think the way society has enabled us, but also expects us to operate the same way as a man without having to worry about the family responsibility somehow that magically takes care of itself. And that adds to the load though. That's right, We all just need a wife as well, don't we? And then all those poor women who end up being the wives of the working women.

What's the solution linda? What is it? Well, I think the solution is that we are a part of it is paying child care workers a lot more money. They absolutely deserve. You know, they're bringing up pretty much the next generation where entrusting the next generation of people into the care of strangers all day every day. You know, it's a case of like you were saying before we started the conversation, there's opportunity here for us to do things differently and now is the time for us to look at that and take advantage of it, you know, to really maximize the opportunities to explore even further different ways of working. I agree. And you know, women are generally just over 50% of the population and yet we seem to so far have sort of just gone along with the flow of how the system is set up and it's not set up for the benefit of the majority. So why is it the way that it is? I think it is the right time to be questioning all of this right now. And you're right, I like the fact that those who care for young Children are now actually being recognized as early childhood educators and not just child care, not that caring should be diminished, but at the same time, it's more than just looking after someone, it is actually developing the minds and the social skills of Children as well.

So absolutely lots in there, what's in there. Okay, so you started getting some hints that you were just burdened overburdened well and truly, how is it showing up in your body? I was basically running on my adrenals, I was drinking with about six cups of coffee a day on a good day, you know, and starting to really lose sight of who I actually was, you know, I was starting to go, well, there's no fun in my life, I'm not enjoying any aspect, even the Children, I don't enjoy it, you know, when I would be getting ready for kids, birthday parties, it wasn't fun for me, it was an absolute burden, There's just this extra thing that I had to do, there was no fun in it and I pretended I pretended to enjoy blowing out birthday candles and pretended to enjoy unwrapping presents and playing musical chairs and all that sort of stuff, You know, I really noticed that my energy levels could never catch up.

I was starting to develop really bad insomnia and having anxiety at night when I was trying to sleep, I would be waking up at three in the morning in a panic about things that I've forgotten to do the day before and things that were lined up for me to do this day, It was like, I don't want to go to work because I don't want to have to deal with this and the anxiety level it was really lifting. So there was some insomnia, there was depression, I started getting really, really depressed. It was at the point of I would drop the kids at this point, it was like, you know, two kids at Kindy and two kids at school And between the drop off and driving to work, I would be in floods of tears and I would have to sit in the car park for about 20 minutes just really pulling myself together to be in a fit stage to walk through the door without bursting into tears again. And I just thought this is ridiculous. Absolutely ridiculous. There's no fun. I looked at the other women who were my peers in the public sector, looking at them having Children and looking at them going out and just thinking, I don't even have time to draw breath.

I don't know how these women are working, managing kids and having fun. I mean, I'm not even having fun. So that's what I really noticed the absence of fun and the whole pointlessness. It really felt pointless waking up every morning going, yeah, there we go again, Oh my God, and I can imagine that so many people relate at least maybe not for years and years of doing that, but you know, there are points in time where we certainly have those moments that you explained of sitting in the car and just pulling it all together. And you know, I have spoken before on the podcast about my moments where I was on my I get on my knees in the shower when I am in that state and just sort of, I wish that the time will stand still in that moment, because I'm like, I cannot move forward, but then, you know, you you do, you do.

Yeah, there's something innate in us that, you know, I think it's part of that, whether you're a biological mother in this life or not, it's part of that mothering energy that flows through all women, that imperative that drive to get up and keep going, because there are things things people relying on you for survival. It's a really deeply ingrained instinct in all women and unfortunately it's being put to use for the wrong things. You know, it's not life saving stuff to get up and have to go to work every day. The way we do it, there is opportunity for us to do it differently. Yeah, because the way we're doing it, it's actually killing us. Yes, well, we've seen some of the country's starting to have a lower life expectancy for the first time ever. So, what conversations did you have, I suppose firstly with yourself and then with your husband and those around you about having to start changing this sort of thing, or did you actually have your mack truck moment where you got flattened like that analogy mack truck.

Look, it wasn't quite a mack truck and I don't know that there was much rational conversation or decision making involved. It was really a case of I just can't cope anymore. I cannot do this for one day more. There was a lot of time in that situation where I thought the problem was me. Actually thought I was broken. There was something wrong with me because everybody else can do it. How come I can't, you know what's wrong with me. And it took me a long time to realize the year I was broken, but not the way I thought I was broken because I was trying to make myself be something I wasn't. And you know, it took it was an unconscious blurting out to my husband. If you don't let me leave this job and do something else, you're going to be taking the kids to see me in the county ward. Now, the county ward up here is the mental health ward where people get sectioned and that sort of thing.

And that's when I heard myself say that I went, oh my God, I actually mean that I am actually going crazy, I will go crazy if I keep this up, that I will be sectioned and that that was my mack truck I suppose was absolutely realizing that no, I just cannot keep doing this. So I changed, I went, that's it. You know, the opportunity for me to study massage came up at the same time that I had that Aha moment and I just went, you either let me do this training and change my career or you put me into the county ward you choose because I can't choose anymore. But I know what I want to do and I think talking to you, it also makes it so expanding for other people who feel like they're trapped because you have survived the change. You seem to be thriving with the change. Like you haven't been kicked out of society, Your relationship is still fine, your kids are probably fine and I'm sure that you, you know, you weren't out on the street because you weren't able to earn that money either.

Like tell us that it's okay, look, it's better than okay, I'm not going to lie and say it's, it's really easy. It's the best thing you ever do in your life because it is scary. You do have to work hard. There are moments of self doubt, really deep self doubt and self questioning. There are moments of guilt when you have to say no to your kids about things that you used to say yes to, you know, it is a challenge, but when you have made a decision to open and move into a place that's expansive that allows you to explore rather than contain you and constrict you and close you in life is so much more fun and that's that's really what it boils down to. And the more that we allow ourselves the opportunity to be expansive, the easier life actually gets, the simpler things become, because we suddenly find ourselves with space with the opportunity to be still to actually stop and listen into what are my deepest needs.

My deepest truths, what is actually at my core that I really value rather than the surface super visual programming that we may have grown up with. Yeah, I thought those moments of stillness give you more capacity to be present for others around you as well, instead of just meeting their physical needs, you are actually there for them. Yeah, and I think for me, I was really grateful that at the time of my transition, you know, as I allowed myself to move into a place of expansiveness and to learn those skills. And these are part of the skills that I pass on to my clients these days. But it actually made me a better mother because at that point, you know, my two older Children were moving into teenage years and it's at the teenage years that, you know, that emotional side of things really comes into play and it's not just physical survival and physical needs. Its they really need that emotional nurturing and guidance and support and to be quite frank, I don't think I would have been able to do that if I had stayed in the state that I was no, I wouldn't have been able to do it.

So for me, you know, it was a godsend for my Children as well, that I made this decision and that my husband was okay with it. You know, I think that if he hadn't have been okay, my story would have been a little bit different, I still would have done what I did, but it might have taken me a bit longer to get back up onto an even keel if I was doing it by myself, but it's really positioned me to be a much better mother and to equip I've got four daughters. So to equip each of my daughters with the ability to look into themselves more deeply rather than making decisions on programming. Yeah, Yes, I was sort of even preempting where you were going with that as well in my mind, because I thought, what a blessing for them to not repeat history. And you've actually given them the opportunity to build self awareness and to see you as an example of being able to do something differently?

Very powerful for for a young woman, that's for sure, Because one of my usual questions is what would your advice be back to your 21 year old self? So you could answer that for yourself, but potentially your daughters or maybe, you know, they're so different that they don't need the same advice, you would have. Well, maybe I think, You know, for my 21 year old self, the advice would have been look for happiness, not money. Look for happiness in self fulfillment as opposed to an idea of what success is, you know, back then, I equated the two is the same thing. If I was successful, I'd be happy. And I think that that's a notion that gets a lot of people stuck in a lot of pain and struggle for an extended period of time. That's completely unnecessary. Yeah. So I think that's what I would have told my 21 year old self, certainly it's the message I give my daughters at the moment about you can do anything that you want, you know, you could, you can earn money doing anything that makes you happy, don't do it the other way around, don't go looking for the money and then expect that you're going to be happy.

You know, life is not about the money. The money makes life a lot easier and a lot more fun in some respects, but it's not the whole reason. And I think in the Western society in particular, our socio economic framework has put money as the central God and we exchange our life pretty much for money, but we don't actually live a fulfilling and enjoyable life often. Yeah. Do you think that as well as the way society sort of structured like that. Do you think that there's a lot of fear that sort of fix us into that? Absolutely, absolutely. I know for a fact that that kept me locked in my career for a very long time because I had a fixed income, I had you know, all the bonuses and the entitlements and holiday, you know paid leave, I don't get paid leave anymore if I'm not working, I don't get paid. That's scary. So you know, Yeah, it is a bit of interesting.

I had this conversation with my friend the other day about fear and how it keeps it stuck, you know, because that's our basic human instinct is to keep ourselves safe and unfortunately we are so clever that we can think ourselves unsafe, you know, even just the thought of making change is scary and triggers the fear response. So yeah, fear is a really big one, a really big one. And I don't have a quick, easy answer for you to check in with yourself and I suppose how what you tell people your clients now, how do you, what advice would you give to check in with yourself to make sure that you're not, you know, succumbing to the comparison itis or the sugars in your life? Do you have little tips about how to make sure that you can on a daily basis or weekly or however regularly just correct course.

Yeah, absolutely the most powerful thing that anybody can do right now is to move out of your head and back into your body. Most of us spend about 99% of our life from here up occupying this space here. And we've actually got from here, right down to the ground to occupy. And it's once you're in connection with the body, the body tells you what it needs, the body tells you when you're stepping off track, when you feel pain, when you feel fatigue, you know, that's the body giving you a signal, there's something wrong and that's when you can stop and look and start asking, okay, what what is this about? And I think what we're seeing with chronic illness in particular is how good we are at ignoring the body's signals. We ignore it for so long that it actually becomes a pathology in the body that then becomes a chronic illness that we have to deal with for the rest of our lives. So checking in with the body and the way to do that is to connect with the breath.

The breath is the quickest easiest way to get you back in the present moment to calm the nervous system and to just be able to relax and experience what's happening for me right now. So to expand on that, I would encourage everybody to develop a mindfulness practice because it's through the ability of sitting in the moment and developing the skill of noticing, that's where you start empowering yourself with choice. It's when you notice what you're feeling, what you're thinking, what you're going through. It's when you notice that you're in your programming, that you give yourself the choice to move out of it lovely. As you said, you were talking about being in your body. I certainly came right back down into my body and my feet were tingling, which was lovely. Awesome. Yeah. So for those women who are listening for men who really relate to Russian woman syndrome and all the fear of feeling stuck where they are and the anxiety and now they realize that it's not normal and that no, we're not all living that way.

Yes. If someone wants to get in touch with you, what's the best way to do that? Okay. Probably through my website which is Love Lolly, that's L O V for victor. L A L I dot com. And I've actually got a 10 minute guided mindfulness practice that if it's okay, I'd like to send the link through to you so that you can be with the show notes for this episode. So anybody listening can just download it and use it whenever they want to. Yeah, that would be really nice. Amazing. What a great thing to have. Thank you so much. Yeah, this was a great conversation and it's always like half an hour is just absolutely flown because I feel like I could talk at least another half an hour if not more because there was so much we could have dived into, but I'm grateful that we found each other because as we were saying before we recorded, it's funny that we came across each other and yet we had quite a few common links. So yeah, as it happens, it was great to connect and thank you so much for sharing your story and what you've learned.

Thank you linda, you're most welcome and thank you so much for making the time for me to be on your show. It's just been a wonderful experience. Thank you. Yeah, it was great. I really like this one. I was listening to it in the car on the way back from an appointment and it was, it was about 14 minutes left and I literally just sat in the car in the car park in my apartment. I didn't want to get up and go and like not finished listening to it. So I was sort of sitting in the car in the dark. It was really cool. I really like the interview and I think you're right, it really does touch on some of those other points that we've talked about and it's almost like she's brought it all together in her own one story, hasn't she? Yeah, very much so. Yeah, the Russian woman syndrome and the burnout stuff and the chronic illnesses that when even the women's the inequality in women and men, you know what I I really resonated. That was sort of laughing to myself in the car because I remember being in a meeting once and you know, the person that was in the meeting was like, oh yeah, we're just running a bit late, you know, and it was just literally this expectation that you were just going to stay and at that time jay was really young and she was in daycare, it wasn't even school and it was daycare where you have to pick them up by six or you know, you get charged stupid amounts of money per minute when you're late.

And it's same as linda's conversation, this person goes, but can't someone else go well, no, because I don't have family in this country remember saying that to him, I'm like I don't have anyone here and yeah, I could probably bring a friend or something, but at that last minute it's hard, everyone put their own kids right? So I've I've been through that, I know exactly what that feels like. And even now with JIA being older and she can now walk home from school, they're still sometimes that feeling of, you know when someone's like, oh can you just do this and stay late and it's like you almost go back and put yourself into that time to go, can I? Or can I do I have to go pick my child, what do I have to do? It sort of just ingrained in you, I wonder as well if that keeps women particularly in the early years of motherhood in like these lower paid more certain jobs that are only restricted to certain hours because as soon as you try and do consulting or you try to be in a leadership role, you are expected that your role just sort of morphs into your life rather than being confined to certain hours.

But then again, I mean having firm boundaries probably is the solution there. Well it's easier said than done though. I think you can say I want firm boundaries but then let's be honest, you're correct. You're committing career suicide by putting in those firm boundaries. So you can't say oh I need to leave at this time every day or and I mean you know it's a little bit easier now, But I think those conversations 10 years ago were just impossible to to even apply for a role that required travel and for you to say can I have a bit of notice on travel or something? They were like no, it's just like no. So I think it's definitely a lot easier now compared to where it was 10 years ago. For sure. Yeah, there were so many other things, weren't they? Yeah, I was just going to say also the underlying anxiety that I think women feel that again isn't talked about in those sorts of situations. So not only are trying to do your job and then run your home, it's that underlying anxiety around you know work and linda mentioned it in that theme of anxiety of when you know she was running around and having that feeling in the morning or sorry at night waking up knowing that she hadn't done certain things on that list, but it's not just that that's causing the anxiety, it's almost like there's other things in your life that come to that moment, it's actually nothing to do with the fact that she didn't do one thing on the list because that in itself alone isn't enough to cause anxiety, that's what I was going to say as well, like the mental load and so many people have been talking more about the mental load over the last couple of years um but yeah, it's just that I think she said really early on in the interview that it's were now expected because we can have it all, that you must do it all and so No one else is picking up and supporting those extra parts of your life.

But the other thing is as well, like we don't create our lives to have a family unit or a community around us to help us anymore. We do go out independently and try and do it all ourselves, so it's it's a little bit black, we do create that in a way for ourselves in some way again, like linda was talking about at the beginning, we see other women around us and we take on what we believe to be success. So we expect that we have to have all these aspects in our lives and that we just have to cope with all the things that we think we should have and we look at other women like like linda was doing and they have kids and they have a family and they were still going out and still doing things in their life and she's like how are they doing all this? Like there's no way that I can go out and have fun.

But we look at women and we see we think that they're doing it all. Some of those women might not have been doing at all or have had much of as much of a mental load. I don't know, we just compare behind the scenes help. That's right. I've got a friend of mine who's like really successful in her business and she does work late hours and then I initially when I first met her I thought she must have a really cool husband that has flexible hours. Her husband works more hours than she does. But they have two nannies. So they have a nanny that does the school stuff and then the nanny that picks them up and does the cooking, but that's their choice that they've made to be able to run their businesses and their Children are looked after but but you wouldn't know that on the outside if you see her, you go hang on a minute, How are you running your business? 12 hours a day going home cooking, seeing photos of your family together on the weekends and evenings. Like how, how the hell do you do that? But there are some days I'm just gonna be freaking eating cereal for dinner. I'm like tired running my business right?

But I think it's, it's that thing isn't that we don't know what sort of support people have and we also don't know if they are coping or not. We're presuming that they are. Yes, Very true. And people would have probably been looking at Linda and thinking herself when she was doing all those things for 20 years and had four kids at home because she did for years pull it all together and give the semblance of coping but inside it was gradually falling apart. Yeah. And I think it's great that she had that awareness aha moment, you know where she could speak to her husband saying, you know, something needs to change here and and it was good that she went in going this is what needs to change because I think a lot of the time we're just in that we don't know, I don't know what it is that needs to happen, but she was really clear that she needed to shift years in her career and I think that also makes it easier for the person supporting you, isn't it to go, okay, great, let's try this because you know what it is that you think is going to help you as I think sometimes just going on and on and on about, oh my God, I don't know what needs to change is also hard because you're stuck in that right?

Of the unknown. Yeah, very true. But again, that's not easy either. Like I was thinking ship, but imagine I sort of put myself in her shoes going right, imagine I woke up today and go, right, no Eq academy, I'm going to go be a massage therapist. Not that I could ever do a massage therapy course. But yeah, just to start again in a new career, it's like, whoa, mm hmm. But there's also a whole lot of identity caught up in that too. Which I think is a lot of what linda works with as well. Because firstly we're scared of changing careers because we have to have a certain level of income. But also we've built up a certain level of status and knowledge and so we don't want to go back to the beginning, you know, we we get self worth and value out of the level that we've achieved. Which I think is part of the problem as well, isn't it? Mhm Yeah, I think for me it's not about the self worth and identity. I think for me it's that whole security aspect and again, it goes back to your stories and paradigms of, you know, if you go back to like Maslow's hierarchy from single parent, you can go, you know, what would be really nice just to go and shift careers and do something I love because it's a hobby, but if that's not going to pay your bills and you are a single parent, I'm not talking if you've got some support, but to be honest, it's not an option.

It's the case that suck it up princess, like you can't do that, you've got responsibilities. So I think there's that element of it as well. I I think, you know, we, we do romanticize a lot of, well you follow your dreams, you know, follow your passion, but hey, there's real life behind that as well, that means what be homeless and follow your passion. Okay, let's give that a go. Yeah. And the cost of living significantly higher than it ever has been. And like I think back to other generations as well and the quality of work, you know, I think people, You know, maybe 50 years ago, certainly didn't expect to enjoy the work that they did, they knew they just had to do it. They had to do it. Yeah. And then you go even further back 200 years ago before we had unions and regulated hours and so people were just, you know, working to live and you know, they were doing not enjoyable work then either.

So and it's also it's also the practicalities, isn't it? Like I remember a friend of mine had had a similar situation where she had a dream of doing interior design and she put her career on hold and she wasn't in interior design, she wasn't there another totally different career and then she had like a six month break when she had her first child and then she was like I actually don't want to go back to work in the same industry and say in Korea and she had that conversation with her husband and her husband had made all these plans based on her salary. So like they wanted to go you know put their kids in private school and all this stuff that he had just plan in his head and when she said that he's like hang on a minute, You've just like literally written off the next 10 years of my future and the plans I had for our life and our Children and she's like really? And he's like yeah and he goes it's not that it's a no, but he's like I just need to sort of process that that we're not our life isn't going to go in the trajectory that I thought it was going to go in so that there is so many different conversations and practicalities to have and I think anyone that's done it and I think you know the fact that linda's done, it's just it's huge and amazing and I think she gives hope to other people that are thinking of doing the same thing.

Yes, certainly I agree. What do you think about all the chronic illness? So that she was talking about like the the fact that the way we work these days is really driving a chronic health problem. Yeah, it is. And I also think there's something I was talking to someone about the other day in a coaching session is fear about resting. Yes. And literally the conversation we had was, she was like, well, I can't rest. And then I was like, what are you talking about? And she's like, well, no, there's all this stuff to do when I'm worried about what's gonna happen when I stop and it's almost like she feels she's going to be hit with an illness if she stops, but continuing to move is going to stop that illness. Do you know what I mean? It's like the reality of I'm actually scared to stop. Like there was this fear to stop and slow down. So I think there is absolutely, there is and I think also our, the generation we're now compared to how it was before is our tolerance. We've sort of increased, increased, increased it. But then it's also pushing us to breaking point as well.

Mhm. Yeah, very much so. I was thinking as linda was talking about, you know, potential chronic illnesses and going looking around me at the staff that I've got and there's a couple of them who already have chronic illnesses and I know that I have to be aware of that and not push or expect too much that pushes them into worse pain or fatigue. And then I think to myself, well what a blessing that I'm able bodied and really well and there's no signs of anything beginning. But then I start to think, well actually like I don't have pain, I don't have other things, but auto immune can happen suddenly. So many more people are sensitive to what they eat. Um I haven't had that start, but you know, irritable bowel can also start quite quickly.

So you do have to think, well, what's the most important thing, don't you? Your health because at the moment I think I take it for granted, Yeah, you do, isn't it? You're right because if you're still just functioning, you just go home all right. And then you're not really paying attention to subtle signs that can come up, right? Because you're not present, you're not aware, you just moving literally moving all the time, right? Or it's just not bad enough that it does force you to stop because like your client that you're talking to, I think I'm also, well, it's partly that I'm afraid to stop because there's so much to do and if you stop you lose momentum and you don't get because I feel like I'm already behind sort of like what linda was talking about as well. You you are always trying to get ahead and you never do. So I always feel behind and then if you stop how much further behind you'll get. So there's there's that aspect of not wanting to stop.

And then there's also um I think partly the addiction to the adrenaline. Mm hmm. Yeah. I used to feel that though like that I'm behind it. I'm gonna stop. But I've realized now that when I do, even if it's just for a day, it gives me that reset to do more in the next few days. So I'm definitely, you know, reprogram myself to go rest is okay. Um even if it's just half and half a day or something on a weekend of not touching work. Um and I did that this weekend. I was like a whole day of light. Just not even thinking about work, not going to do work and just did other stuff and it was it was good. It feels good. You know? So yeah, I just got to try and be mindful to do more of that. But it's not easy. No, no, it's not easy when you work for yourself particularly because you've got you've got goals. Exactly. Just stuff that has to get done all the time. Mhm. Mm hmm. Yeah. Well what a great interview. I agree.

Uh you know linda is very articulate and she's thought pretty deeply about some of the things that causes these problems and the problems themselves and and her story does draw on so many elements of what we've spoken about before. Mm hmm. It's great interview. I loved it. And so generous. And the resources definitely be checking those out. Yeah. Good. Yeah, I was going to mention those again. So the A couple of links that she's got there for a meditation and breathing exercise and then the other 20% off to work with her. She's constructed that around a three week program Where you get 3 90 minute sessions with her is in Darwin. So you can do them remotely because you know, she it does holistic natural therapies. And so a lot of it is techniques to be able to deal with pain, fatigue, anxiety and those sort of things as well.

So yeah, jump on check linda out. And of course if the conversation resonated with you, we'd love to hear from you and and talk about some of these things that I don't think I've talked about enough. You can find us at like you mix eq dot com dot au. Our episodes are posted there. We post them on linkedin as well, which is probably the better place to have a more open discussion. But you can also reach out to us directly. So whereabouts can people find you? I'm on e cubed Academy. Wonderful. Thank you. And the best email for me is Jackie at legally wise women dot com dot au. We've both had our pups come in and visit us in the last two minutes there. But if you hear the snuffling yeah. Excuse us. So otherwise what have you got on for the next week or two? I'm finishing up with a client that I've been working with for seven months. So literally it's my last day with them today and then just doing a little bit of work on the next few clients and I'm looking to bring in so just a little bit of client work for me this week.

Yeah. Wonderful. Was it a successful seven months? It was I did it's just gone so quick mm mm mm mm mm mm mm. Yeah I'm sure you supported them a lot through the lockdown as well. Exactly yeah. It's just gone too quick though. Well this year has gone quickly, hasn't it? I think a lot of us are potentially wishing it away because it feels exactly like 2020. It does. I was having the same conversation. Last christmas remember? Yes that's right. So I hope that everyone is getting out there and seeing people again and and celebrating this time of year and yeah we'll catch you next episode. Catch you later. Thank you. Mhm.