Anese Cavanaugh: Intention, Energy & Presence – #301

Why you should listen –

Anese Cavanaugh is devoted to helping people show up and bring their best selves to the table in order to create significant positive impact in their lives. She is the creator of the IEP Method, an advisor and thinking partner to leaders and organizations around the world, and author of Contagious Culture: Show Up, Set the Tone, and Intentionally Create an Organization That Thrives. As a leading voice on intention, energy and presence in leadership and culture, she helps people unlock greater leadership potential and collaborate more inspiringly. Today marks her second appearance on Bulletproof Radio, as she and Dave talk about internal awareness, managing fate, right and wrong energy, hiring and firing for energetic reasons and more. Enjoy the show!

Bulletproof Executive Radio at the iTunes, App Store, iBookstore, and Mac App Store

Follow Along with Interactive Transcripts!

Click here to download a PDF of this transcript

Dave:  One of the things that I do to make my life better is I remove the number of decisions. I remove complexity wherever I can I’m kind of militant about that. One of the areas where I pay attention is when I buy something online. There’s a company SeatGeek that’s taken all the work and hassle out of shopping for tickets. I don’t like clicking around to different website and not knowing where to go and setting up profiles here and profiles there. It’s just a bother and it doesn’t add to my life. It takes away from the time I’m going to play with my kids or time that I’m going to use to write a new book or something.

 

SeatGeek puts all the tickets available on other sites into one place so you save time. You don’t miss the bill. You can set alerts for upcoming events and SeatGeek will let you know if ticket prices fall. Even better every ticket that they have is ranked based on value so you can find underpriced seats which is cool. That saves you a lot of time if you’re going to click around on things. Before you buy you can you use SeatGeek’s detailed maps to see the view from your seat. Best of all they’re always honest and up front about the price.

 

Unlike say StubHub they show you the full ticket price from start to finish and they don’t try to trick you huge fees on the checkout page which is something that’s irritating. If you think you’re going to spend $100 on a ticket and its $150 when you walk out the door, what are you on an airplane or something or at a hotel because those guys do it too. Listeners to BulletProof get a $20 rebate off their first SeatGeek purchase because I like what they’re doing. To get your $20 rebate on tickets, download the free SeatGeek app. Go to the settings tab and click add a promo code. Enter the promo code bullet. You know how to spell bullet, B-U-L-L-E-T I think. SeatGeek will send you $20 after you made your first ticket purchase. Download the free SeatGeek app and enter the promo code bullet today.

 

Speaker 1:      Bulletproof Radio a station of high performance.

 

Dave:  Hey it’s Dave Asprey with BulletProof radio. Today’s cool fact of the day is that a study out of Dartmouth recently suggest that people are 8 times more likely to blame someone for something than they are to express gratitude. This is why I recommend that every night before you go to bed that you find 3 things that you’re grateful for and you just take a second to know what they are. I do this every single night with my kids. You’ll never know what you’ll hear. Not so long ago my son when he was 5 said, “I’m grateful for the Big Bang because without it there wouldn’t be anything.” Okay that’s gratitude. I’m okay with that. Doesn’t matter what you’re grateful for that’s the whole point. You can be grateful for marshmallows. As long as you feel gratitude, you’re totally legit.

 

Hey there! It’s Dave Asprey. Before we get started with today’s show let’s talk about Casper mattresses. The startup guys at Casper are winning design awards, getting props for reinventing the humble mattress and turning the industry upside down. They started with a simple mission to create a perfectly engineered mattress that you can try in the comfort of your own home. Casper ships the mattress to you for free and gives you 100 nights to try it again risk free. They’ll come pick it up if you don’t love it and refund you everything no questions asked. Upgrading your sleep is one of the most important things you can do to increase your overall performance and Casper has created an inexpensive way to hack your restless nights.

 

Here’s what else I like about Casper mattresses. All of the foams used in a Casper have environmental certifications that ensure that they’re healthy to be around. Their materials are Certipure certified meaning they’re made without ozone depleters or PBDE flame retardants. They’re made without mercury, lead or other heavy metals. There’s no formaldehyde, no phthalates and they’re regulated by the Consumer Product Safety Commission low VOC. Take them up on their 100 night risk free trial like I did. Upgrade to a Casper with free shopping at casper.com. Use my personal referral code bulletproof to get $50 off your mattress. That’s code bulletproof for $50 off your next mattress at casper.com. Terms and conditions apply.

 

Before you go again today’s show, you should know that I’m standing instead of sitting at the studio. We had this new amazing new set design and you probably haven’t seen it because you are watching this on iTunes or more likely you’re listening to it on iTunes in your car which is what you should be doing in your car not watching or you’re at the office. If you want to see the guest, you want to see what’s going on, you can head on over to youtube.com/bulletproofexec or because I know you’re probably as lazy as I am, you can also go to bulletproofexec.com/youtube and it’ll also take you there.

 

If you do that and follow the channel I’d be grateful because when you follow it, it helps other people find it. Then when you’re on YouTube there’s other content that isn’t BulletProof radio it’ll pop up for you and it’s not like spammy weird content. It’s just stuff I do that offers free information that helps you kick more ass that’s bulletproofexec.com/youtube.

 

Today’s guest is a friend. She’s also been on BulletProof radio before but now she has a new book out. I’m talking about Anese Cavanaugh. She’s an award winning speaker, a teacher and she works on something called the IEP method. Her book is called Contagious Culture, being a force for positive impact in your business and life. It looks at leadership. I thought that you would care about this today because leadership isn’t something that only the boss does. Leadership is something that at least if your boss is very effective, your boss gives to you to do in the organization.

 

Leadership is something that you can set by example but whether or not you’re high up in your company or whether or not your leadership is something that you practice at home, understanding how you can take your key values and you can make them contagious is I think a skill for life. It’s a BulletProof skill for everyone. It’s not enough to just feel really good if you can make everyone else around you feel better or perform better. That’s even better and that will feed back on you and give you more power and more energy and make you feel good. You can find out more about Anese Cavanaugh at anesecavanaugh.com. Anese, I’m just going to say it. You need a better url because no one can spell your name. I’ll spell it for them but like seriously. Just giving you a hard time.

 

Anese: I know. You should. We have a simpler one for them now. It’s iep.io. That’s it.

 

Dave:  If you want to do the masochistic thing you go to anesecavanaugh.com, A-N-E-S-E C-A-V-A-N-A-U-G-H.com

 

Anese: Thanks Dave. We’ve had a lot of request lately for me to change my name. It’s been interesting.

 

Dave:  Anese, the mystery of how to spell your name has been solved. The other mystery for people who are just tuning in if you’re looking at me I’m wearing really cool sunglasses. They are my Irlen filters. Helen Irlen was just on the show again. These are very lightly tinted indoor glasses that filter out the spectrum of light that my brain has the hardest time processing. Since I want to feel amazing all day, I’m actually just going to wear these and I think I’m just getting comfortable the fact that I have sunglasses on indoors. They’re not that sunglasses like. Either I’m in training to be a rock star or I’m a serious dork.

 

I’m also cool with either one of those. I have realize why I didn’t explain before the show but that’s fine. I’m standing here in this cool studio looking not really like a rock star because they’re not that cool a glasses but anyway Irlen.

 

Anese: I was actually going to ask so thank you for demystifying that for me.

 

Dave:  It turns out 1 in 2 people have light spectrums that mess with their brain. That now I’m certified to diagnose that and to help see that and to basically learn how to read with a lot less energy. I just did it for someone last night and it’s profound. You see people go, “I had no idea.” Then all of a sudden they have more energy. I have a lot more of my brain when I take control of my colors.

 

Anese: I seem to remember you with a glasses a couple of years ago but they were orange. Were they orange?

 

Dave:  Yeah.

 

Anese: Does it change?

 

Dave:  I got retested and I’ve done some brain upgrades stuff so I’m less sensitive than I was. Still I’m relatively severe in terms of that probably because of my background exposure to toxic mold.

 

Anese: They’re very cool.

 

Dave:  Thank you. Let’s get into the IEP method and why you wrote a book about it. What is IEP? Long term listeners may have heard the first one but I think a refresher is in order.

 

Anese: You bet. IEP stands for intentional energetic presence. It is basically about how you show up in the world. When I talk about showing, I’m talking about how you show up for yourselves in terms of how you take care of yourself but I’m also talking about how you show up as a leader in supporting other people. If you take those 3 words intention, energy and presence, I break them down looking at there’s intention what I want to have happened. There’s the energy, you know the energy I bring to the table, how I take care of myself, making sure I got sustainable energy to do all the great stuff I’m here to do.

 

Then there’s presence which I look at presence in a really holistic standpoint which is all about how present you are in this moment, your actual energetic presence, how you show up on stage or leadership presence, how present you are to the truth of your life. Those different things. I put those 3 together and you have the IEP method.

 

Dave:  If you’re listening to this right now why I like Anese’s work because intention is why you’re doing what you’re doing. Like there’s a very specific intent behind what I do with BulletProof and the intent is if someone would have just told me all this stuff when I was 16 or 20 like the amount of energy that I would waste it in my life would have been very different. That’s a cycle on energy. A lot of what I do is how do you amp up energy and how do you stop wasting energy.

 

Then presence is harder to get mind around. The ability to focus even is a core part of presence. In my world, the ability to focus comes in large part from having enough energy and then from training yourself to focus. You put all this together into a framework. That’s actually really cool and that’s why I think people listening would really appreciate your work. Walk me through each of those sections in a little bit more detail. Let’s talk about specifics of intention. What do you do in your book when you tell people to have more intention in their life?

 

Anese: We break down the actual IEP method. I started to realize a couple of years ago and this might have even been after you and I spoke. I was on your show about 2 years ago I think. I started to pull it part even more and I felt there were 3 parts to the IEP method. If you put intentional, energy, presence all together, there are 3 parts. The first part is being able to reboot your presence in the moment. That’s literally you and I sitting Dave and you swallow a coffee wrong or we get distracted or we have a snafu. It’s being able to get present to this moment and come back and show up intentionally without getting completely distracted by what just happened.

 

The first thing is rebooting your presence before you even walk into a meeting, before you walk into a conversation with your kids, before anything. The second component is the intention piece which is a framework that’s in the book which is called the 5 steps to intentional impact and that’s setting your intentions for any meeting, any conversation, any project, anything about what are the outcomes you want to create and how do you want people to feel when they’re creating them with you.

 

Then the third component is just building a really strong IEP foundation which is something that we’re doing every single day of our lives. It’s one of the reasons why I resonate so much with your work is we’re so much in alignment in terms of helping people optimize their performance. The IEP foundation to me is where BulletProof really … getting BulletProof is a really great pathway to creating a stronger IEP foundation. It’s those 3 things. Your presence, your intended impact and your IEP foundation.

 

Dave:  I’m going to ask a really rude question.

 

Anese: Great.

 

Dave:  How hard it is for someone who’s really obese to do the IEP thing?

 

Anese: I think that it starts with their intention. I don’t think that’s a rude question. I think that anybody can do it.

 

Dave:  I don’t want to pick on obese people having been one a good portion of my life. I found both in working with obese clients and in my own experience, energy regulation is broken when your body stores fat like that. You have periods where you’re strong and you have period where you’re weak but your average might be okay but your consistency is all over the map. Even if you have the best of intention, then the E part is highly variable and unpredictable. I don’t think it’s easy to have P, the presence without enough E. I found when I was fat like when I was on like okay I’m on but then there’s a lot of times like I want to be on but I’m not there. Then I just yell at the people and tell them to go away then later when I have energy, they don’t want to talk to me.

 

Anese: I’ve never been asked that question before. I think that’s a really interesting question. My relationship with that question would be that the intention and the presence is even more important than the energy when a person starting out with that. If I’m obese and I’m really present to my obese state right now and what’s going on with my life and how I’m feeling if I’m really present to that and then I have an intention that I want to feel better, those 2 things book ending it are going to make the energy piece a little bit easier but it’s going to take more time. I think that you’d have to have intention, the presence to your current state in order to state making changes in the energy.

 

Dave:  You won’t upgrade your energy there until you realize that you want to do it and that you have the presence to know that you need to do it.

 

Anese: I think so. I could line up with that. I think that once somebody knows … 70% of this work is on awareness I believe. What I’ve noticed is that once somebody notices that they’re not satisfied with where they’re at in their current state, that if they set an intention to start shifting like to get present and they set an intention to start shifting it, it becomes easier to start paying attention to. The food that I’m putting in my body, is it fueling me? Is the way I’m spending my time is that adding or detracting from my energetic state? I’d have to think about some more but I think an alignment with that the intention and the presence is the most important starting point.

 

Dave:  One of my favorite things to do is to work with or just talk with people who were morbidly obese and then just upgrade the energy first. Then at least in my case and I may be generalizing with what I felt like and I’m a corner case in a lot of ways. It was like you have this desperate desire to show up more and you want to have more energy but it’s just like it’s so much. I had someone show up at the book signing of the BulletProof coffee shop and she had just lost 70 pounds on the BulletProof diet. She actually started crying when she was telling me about it. She wasn’t crying because she lost the weight. She was crying because I got my brain back. I got my energy back. The cravings went away. When the cravings went away, I had more energy. Then I could go to this and then I could go to that.

 

It was like you’re pulling this heavy sled behind you and you don’t know it and then you drop that and all of a sudden you make all the progress at once which is why I asked the question. That was how I felt when I was really obese was that it was just too much work to show up this way so I could do it. It was like I’m in front of a classroom and I’m teaching so I’m going to just pour everything in and then I’m done I’m like, “Oh!” I’m just a zombie. I’m spent. That wasn’t very sustainable. It feels just that first get more energy in the system. We’ll just fix that. That’s cool. You start with the intent or the presence first you’re saying.

 

Anese: I put it all together. There’s the 3 things that you put together but then there’s also just you take it as a whole intentional energetic presence. That’s just deciding how I want to show up in every moment. The breaking intention, energy and presence down that kind of helps give it more stepping stones but I stay start wherever it resonates most for you. In your example about obesity, when you’re talking about showing up for other people, I would also be asking in that moment Dave when you were teaching and you were getting exhausted and everything, what would be the littlest thing that you can be doing to be showing up for yourself even more? What I hear is your intention was so much on how are you showing up for everybody else and then you get exhausted. An interesting place to look is how am I showing up for myself. What’s the littlest thing I need to do right now so I can feel a little bit energetically better?

 

Dave:  Pretty much at the time that would just be coffee like a lot of …

 

Anese: Was it coffee?

 

Dave:  At least for most. This was before I knew about BulletProof coffee. It was also I’m teaching at 7:00 at night like a roomful of engineering people. You really shouldn’t have coffee at 7:00 at night unless it decaf but I was like, “No, I need this energy. I’m just going to bring it.” It was definitely not sustainable. I may have a bias towards maintaining physiological energy because I believe that’s the root of all the stuff that happens in your brain. If the mitochondria don’t fire like nothing happens in your brain. I also have brain damage from neurotoxin exposure at the time. It was just more apparent to me. It was an amplified signal.

 

What would you say? If someone is like, “I want to show up more.” It sit there in a hyper situation in front of the classroom. They give me a presentation at work. They’re doing something at school whatever. How would you counsel someone in the IEP framework to have more of whatever that internal awareness is?

 

Anese: You bring up a really interesting point about like the brain damage with the neurotoxins. As we’re talking about this and thinking every time I work with the client one of the first things I’m asking them is, what are they eating? How are they taking care of themselves? A lot of times I’ll go and do work with leaders in order to do coaching or whatever we’re doing and they’re surprised that before I show up there’s … I often will have BulletProof coffee there. I’ll have all the time. You have no idea how many off-sites I’ve led where I’ve brought my Vitamix and a bunch of butter and your products.

 

Dave:  Thank you.

 

Anese: It’s all the time. You’re welcome. Thank you. It makes my life easier. It’s interesting because I think that if your energy is not clear, it’s harder to be clear about your intention. It really is like a Mobius strip that is continuously working together. My thinking is start wherever you can. Start wherever it resonates. Intention feels really intimidating, then great do the littlest thing you can to amplify your energy. If presence feels scary … like just go wherever it feels right so it makes sense.

 

When I work people, I’ll look at how are you eating, how are you sleeping, what are you doing and so I want to know … They’re often really surprised because they’re like, “You’re not a personal trainer. You’re not my nutritionist. I want you to be my leadership coach.” The thing is that you can’t extract that out. The way the book builds is it starts with the fundamentals of your contagious and why that’s important and what showing up actually means.

 

It has people really look at what is showing up mean for them. I might have my description of what I think showing up is but I think we all have to really decide what that means for us personally. It moves the next section is moving into their physiology and their mindset and all the things that people tend to put on the backburner because they want to get into leadership and then it builds into leadership.

 

Dave:  What is showing up mean for you personally then?

 

Anese: For me personally showing up means honoring my agreements for myself. Agreements that I have around how I want to show up in a world my values. Showing up for me means choosing my attitude. It means choosing how I want to interact with things. We’re talking earlier and I mentioned I just got stranded in Denver airport overnight. Have you ever spent the night in a terminal before?

 

Dave:  Absolutely.

 

Anese: It’s an experience. That’s a really silly example but showing up for me meant that I chose to make that as good of an experience as possible and to be a positive in it as opposed to what was happening with some of the other people. Literally I saw luggage get thrown because people were so upset. Showing up for me means showing up for myself so I feel happy and joyful and healthy and alive.

 

Then also using that to make a positive impact in the world because to me personally if I’m taking care of myself and I feel great and I’m happy and all that stuff but I’m not making a positive impact for other people or for my kids, then it doesn’t matter. Like it’s not enough. If I’m making great impact on other people but I’m completely fried and burned out then that doesn’t work either. Its 2 sides.

 

Dave:  You read about holding your faith. Leadership, culture, management, business people now you got faith in there. Are you like a closet hippie Anese? What’s going on here?

 

Anese: I’m not. Closet hippie? Oh no. I’m not a hippie, no.

 

Dave:  Intent and faith. You actually start your book out talking about holding your faith. What is the deal with faith? Right now all the skeptic minded people are like, “I don’t know about this Anese.” What do you mean by that?

 

Anese: I mean that we get to choose. We get to choose how we want to interact with our lives. Things happen to us all the time Dave as we all know. We’re listening to this and we’re watching this, we all know things happen all the time that suck, that are out of our control. It’s very difficult to deal with. At the same time, we still get to choose how we want to interact with them. We still get to choose in that how we want to talk ourselves, how kind we want to be, how we want to take accountability for what littlest piece we might have had in making that thing happen.

 

For example I can have a working relationship or whatever that’s really, really challenging and maybe the person is unkind or they’re not a great person on the team or whatever. I hold my faith. They might be “doing things to me all the time or doing things to the team.” I still I’m in control of how I interact with that person. I may control what kind of request I make. I may control if I remove them from the team or if I leave the team and so I do believe that we I guess we have bigger powers always happening that are controlling so much of what’s happening that we don’t have control over. Ultimately when it comes down to it, we have always a choice about how we take care of ourselves and we have a choice about how we decide to interact with other people and show up. I believe very strongly.

 

Dave:  The first two-thirds of my career I did very well in Silicon Valley and I had multiple opportunities to be in the executive staff weekly meeting and board meeting and all that stuff and there’s a set of behaviors the courtesan behaviors if you read like Robert Greene’s 48 Laws of Power. This is what powerful people do to get in power and stay in power and whether they know they’re doing it or not like the reason that they got there is in part because they learn like the hidden code of behavior.

 

That’s how you show up externally but what I’ve learned in the latter third of my career is that if how you show up externally and how you show up internally are not in alignment, what is happening is people know “The guy is like doing all the things right but there’s something that lacks integrity.” There’s something insincere or the infamous I don’t know why I just don’t trust that person. I’ve actually done a lot of work on making sure that what I’m doing externally I’m doing internally or in alignment and if it’s not in alignment internally I’m not just going to do it externally. That removes a lot of discomfort from my life and it means that I solve problems more quickly rather than just letting them drag on.

 

When you’re talking about showing up like this, are you talking about the external? I had enough control to do the right thing thinking that I was pissed off. I didn’t act pissed off and I said, “Thank you mam.” or whatever you’re supposed to say. Give me more on this.

 

Anese: You’re just talking right back to what I was mentioning about the showing up piece for me it’s about what’s happening externally and how I’m showing up for the world but also how I’m handling myself. To me that’s the same thing what you’re talking about and being congruent. How I show up internally my beliefs, my values, my regard for other human beings that has to be congruent with how I show up in the rest of the world and the way I treat people and if that is, then we have the outcome you’re talking about where you’ve got credibility and people trust you.

 

Thinking about if I’m really angry about something and internally I’m seething but I want to go and be really “Hey there. Hi there. Ho there it’s all fine.” Yeah nobody is going to trust for me that. They’re going to sense that. I have a responsibility in that moment showing up for me might be to very authentically process what’s happening to go call a friend, to go call, “Hey Dave this thing just happened. I’m really upset about it. Can we talk about it?” I process that feeling. I have authentic emotion around it. Then I get to decide how I what to interact in it.

 

In that moment it might be taking a time out and literally saying, “Actually I need a little bit of a break.” It’s not about being an authentic internally, it’s being authentic but a lot of times like let’s just say before you and I have this chat today and right before you get on the call, something happens that really upsets me. It ruins my day or whatever and then we’re going on and I have a couple of choices. I can cancel. I can tell you, “Dave I don’t feel like I’m in a really bad mood.”

 

I can come on and be really authentic and be just like “Hey Dave everything is great.” You’re going to feel it or I can reboot and I can look at getting really, really present in this moment and trusting that whatever just happened I’m going to go take care after this call. I have a choice in this moment to show up and be really present with you, to hopefully contribute to your audience.

 

Dave:  That makes sense. Before I go on stage or if I’m going to do something that’s high drama I don’t actually have that many things that are high drama just because of the level of neurologic calmness that I’ve taught myself but if there’s something that really requires that level of performance I do the heart rate variability thing where I literally calm my fight or flight response going to parasympathetic mode and then I can go … it doesn’t really matter if it’s like an annoying thing. I’m not going to go into the reactionary mode. Then I’m internally in control as well as externally in control and that makes it easy. If either one of those 2 isn’t matched, it doesn’t work.

 

That also means for me one of the hardest things to do is when it’s an appropriate thing is to act angry to send a strong signal but I’m actually not angry, I might be a little bit disappointed that things didn’t go the way I wanted but if someone needs to see anger to motivate them and I’m not feeling it like I’m not going to do that. It’s just too unauthentic so I just won’t do it. I’ll just make look I’m not really happy about this. Do it better next time, okay? Versus like you know I’m really rah! Sometimes the tantrum is what motivates people but I think I was manipulative. If I’m not feeling it then I’m not going to do it. What’s your advice on that? Should I be doing that if that’s what the situation really calls for?

 

Anese: Not if it’s fake.

 

Dave:  Here you go. We agree on that.

 

Anese: I don’t think so. I’m a huge proponent of be authentic and be responsible for your impact. Sometimes anger that’s one of the most important things that can happen on a team. Your team messes something up and you’re angry and you come from an authentic place about. You name it and then you work through it. Sometimes that anger is really important to expand the team’s ability and also to create more trust because you’re willing as a leader to come back to the table afterwards but in service of just … I remember meeting somebody his way of managing his people was to throw phones at them. That was it. He was like, “This is the way I do it. I throw phones at my people. They’re totally motivated.”

 

Dave:  Is like those little Zoolander tiny flip phones like those little ones so it doesn’t hurt too much?

 

Anese: Like the big ones, the big phones.

 

Dave:  I can’t imagine. If I had a manager … I had some really abusive managers in the past. How could not catch the phone and then throw it back? Like that. It might be your last move at the job but it would be worth it, right?

 

Anese: Right, totally. This guy thought that his leadership prowess was like awesome because he said, “They were really high up and just won an award for their performance as a business.” They hit a certain financial … they were like at the Inc. 500. He was really proud of it. He said, “My people are terrified of me and that’s how I lead and that works for me.” That’s authentic. They weren’t on the list next year. I don’t know what happened to him but …

 

Dave:  What happened is all of his employees basically slit his throat when he wasn’t looking on the business perspective because that’s what happens when you’re a total jerk like that. You can’t run a company that way. Come on!

 

Anese: It’s not sustainable.

 

Dave:  Maybe you can but it’s like your life will suck and so will that of everyone around you so you shouldn’t run a company that way.

 

Anese: Then they’re not giving you their best thinking. They’re not giving you their best creativity. They are there for a J-O-B. They’re there to punch the clock, to do what they have the bare minimum what they have to do because they need a job versus they’re inspired and excited and they go home and rave about how great it is to work at the company. The stuff that you and I are talking when you talked about the 38 different behaviors. Was it … ?

 

Dave:  48 laws of power.

 

Anese: 48 laws of power so a lot of times when people come to me for help they’re really, really brilliant. They’ve got their advanced degrees or making great money. They’re all these things but they can’t figure out why they’re not having the impact that they want to have and 9 times out of 10 Dave it’s the stuff that we’re talking about. It’s their intention, their energy and their presence. It’s just not congruent.

 

Dave:  There’s a large number of people Anese who don’t believe in energy. Can you walk me through what happens when someone with “the wrong energy” walks into a room?

 

Anese: Anybody listening to this has had the experience of being in a room where somebody walks in and the room changes or they’re in a grocery store and they run into somebody and the person just starts talking about how busy they are or how hard life is or whatever and they feel a shift in their state. They feel a shift in that. They’re either compelled by it or repelled by it. Everybody listening to this I think I would hope has had that experience of something shifting or you get in the car with your kids and you’re in a really, really good mood and you’re … this happens to me all the time.

 

One of your kids is in a really bad mood and then all of a sudden before you know it the energy of the car has started to shift. Everyone in the room, they’re a little bit quieter. There’s a little bit more ick. We see this and meeting is a lie. You guys are in a meeting. You got 8 people, 6 of you are super high energy. You’re getting a lot of work done and you’re really productive. You’re on purpose and there’s 2 people in the corner that just seem completely devoted to syncing their own. That’s what we’re talking about when I talk about energy in terms of vibe.

 

Dave:  You walk into a room and you identified there’s 1 or 2 people who are screwing up the energy in the room. Do you like smudge them with sage? No, I’m kidding. What do you do?

 

Anese: I can’t have a conversation like that without glasses. Next time we do I’m wearing glasses too. I feel like I could battle the hippie comments a little bit better with glasses. Do I smudge on? Yes I walk over and I put my crystals all around them and then we do a big smudging and then we do some chanting.

 

Dave:  You got crystal balls.

 

Anese: Crystal balls and we do the little gong. I ask them about their aura and yes … we could do that Dave. We could do that. Maybe I’ll try that with my next offsite just really freak them out. It will totally freak them out. What we’ll do instead is there’s a couple of ways. One is you walk in and you just notice it. You don’t make it wrong. You just notice it. It’s like you notice it and as the leader of that meeting you hold your own state so you don’t sink down. You don’t match that energy. You hold your own state and you continue to lead the meeting.

 

Then if it doesn’t shift, sometimes that’s enough to start shifting and people will start to pop up because the lowest vibration will win unless the leader of the room is really good at holding that state. A lot of times that will be enough to shift it. If it doesn’t, my next step will be to get curious about it and to name what’s happening in the room. Just say, “Hey guys how are we doing? How are you guys feeling? Hey George I’m noticing, what’s going on for you? Do you need anything? How are you feeling about this project?” Just to engage them from a state of curiosity.

 

It’s not about making them wrong. It’s not about judging them. It’s not about going to like, “Oh you’re the damper in the room.” It’s just, “Hey what’s going on over there?” Then oftentimes George having a little bit of space to start talking about that that will shift it. If that doesn’t shift it, then it’ll often take a break and I’ll pull George aside and ask him like, “What’s going on for you? Do you realize the impact you’re having on the room?”

 

Dave:  I was hoping that you’re going to say I could use pepper spray because that would make it so easy. Like, “You!” and you just spray.

 

Anese: That is step 8. That’s on the next book. It’s the violent IEP method.

 

Dave:  Better IEP through violence. I’m telling you there’s a market for this. What you’re saying is absolutely true in my experience. This didn’t come naturally to me. I don’t think like it took a lot of work. You can figure out when something is wrong in the room or a person is just bringing it down. You can actually stop that from impacting you. At least a model that I use is that when you’re dealing waves there’s this thing called amplitude which is the height of the wave. A tidal wave has very big. It’s very powerful. It has a high amplitude and there’s also like a level of chaos.

 

If you’re surfing there’s regular sets like a 9 waves come in and the regular and then they stop and then 9 waves come in but it’s very rhythmic. If it’s choppy like 2 waves, 4 waves they’re closely spaced or unclosely spaced that’s the difference that you can have there. If your energy is the high amplitude like look I’m a tidal wave. I’m a tidal wave that turns out has a little bit more choppiness to it, that’s the right state. If your heart rate is that way it’s a magnetic field but there’s things you can do.

 

If you walk into the room and you have the highest amplitude heart rate and you are in the zone, that’s going to be infectious. Even if you have a downer in the room, as long as they’re not a downer that also has high amplitude waves. You could say oh my god now we’ve been gone off into hippie land except I’m talking about waves that I can measure with my iPhone. There appears to be evidence.

 

Anese: There’s evidence and there’s evidence and by the way it takes one to know one.

 

Dave:  For people listening like this it’s okay to notice. You know what like that guy has a bad vibe. That’s another way to say it. if you acknowledge that as a leader whether you acknowledge that loud or just to yourself and then you’re like okay I’m like not going to take that on right now I feel like it makes a difference. That’s why I’m a fan of the way you lay this stuff out in your book. You write about contagious culture but a lot of that contagiousness is like look you bring a bad apple into the room and the meeting can go all to hell.

 

If you’re in the room and you see it happening and you have this presence and you have the energy, you can actually block that. It’s not done cognitively. At least for me it’s more of a felt sense but it’s something that good leaders do whether they know they’re doing it or not but they always do it in my experience.

 

Anese: What you’re talking about I think about … I talk about this in the book and I actually include the extras too but it’s called bubbling up. It’s noticing what’s around you bubbling up so that you get to choose what you want to allow into your space and if you want to match that or not so you bubble up. That whole idea of bubbling up is its bringing awareness back that we all have our own energetic space and that we have a choice with how we want to interact with whatever is happening.

 

The other piece I would add is talking about that guy over there has a bad vibe. For everyone listening to this or watching it and also one of the shortcuts in my mind is to notice that guy has got a bad vibe but I want to check how am I doing, what am I putting out there and how might I be contributing to that in some way. If I start to make him wrong or judge him for it, then that’s a way of also doing an energetic match. It’s not going to contribute to helping things go right. It’s just really having awareness where it doesn’t get into blame or putting it off there but just noticing from a state of curiosity. His energy is really low. It doesn’t feel good to be around him or it’s really, really toxic and how am I doing? How am I taking of myself? How am I showing up with him? Just always have that awareness both ways I think.

 

Dave:  We’re in alignment there.

 

Anese: Totally.

 

Dave:  You talk about some other stuff in your book that’s unusual and I admire that you went to the long and difficult amount of work it takes to write a book because most of this stuff is the words ineffable. There aren’t really good words to describe it which is the case for leadership. In fact at Wharton they had us do calculus in the leadership class once. I’m like how exactly do you calculus in leadership because as far as I know leadership has nothing to do with the area under a curve but that was almost like a bastardization of leadership not that they didn’t have a good leadership program. They did but I just didn’t like doing math in it.

 

What you’re doing is you’re taking on the squishier parts of it and putting a framework in it which makes it easier to understand. You talk about some specific things that I think would work for everyone whether they feel comfortable and they’re looking to grow as leaders or just as human beings. You talk about outgracing, busy and burn out. You have this idea of leadership optimizers. Can you walk listeners through a few of your leadership outliners? How do you outgrace this stuff? What does outgracing mean?

 

Anese: It’s not going to require sage and crystal. Outgracing in my mind is I started to notice a couple of years ago I’m sure you can see this this whole thing about busy. I almost feel like we’re going to be on the other side of this issue pretty soon. Maybe 2016 we’ll conquer busy. I started to notice that if you ask somebody how they’re doing, 9 times out of 10 the response you get is like, “Oh my gosh I’m so busy. Is so hard. I’m so busy.” Have you noticed?

 

Dave:  Oh yeah.

 

Anese: I was grocery store one day and I ran into one of my daughter’s friend’s parents. Literally chasing me down the aisle talking about how busy they are and I’m backing away, backing away, backing away. Anyway, I just think that busy has become this thing of it’s the new fine. It’s this badge of honor. We’re perpetuated culturally that the leaders talk about how busy they are. It is like a badge of honor like I’m so busy. They’re trying to outbusy each other. I just think its completely unnecessary.

 

The way I look at it is we all have the same amount of time. We all are doing things hopefully that are meaningful and important. Really looking at the language to me outgracing busy is looking at how busy are you actually, why are you speaking in that term, what is the language that you’re using around is it really supporting you. I started switching my language a couple of years ago to I’m richly scheduled or I’m feeling on purpose or I’m feeling really well used or whatever it was for me that felt right in the moment. It really changed my relationship with busy.

 

What I’ve noticed is I’ve had teams start to eliminate that word and that badge of honor from their vocabulary and from their team agreements and it really opens up a ton of space. One way of outgracing it is to really start noticing your relationship with busy and what’s going on. Is it because you were exhausted because you’re not taking care of your energy? Is it because you’re really bad at holding boundaries? Is it because you’re not clear of what you’re supposed to be doing and so you’re saying yes to everything. Its lot of different pieces.

 

Dave:  I tend to say working hard or doing my best because those are very different than being busy. If you’re being busy, you might be busy not working hard, you’re just like wasting time you’re busy. I tend to work to avoid business as well just because … as the way thinking about my life that’s not what I want. I am very tightly scheduled and every 15 minutes have something. That’s cool and I asked for that. In fact I pay my team to do that for me so I don’t waste time because I believe in working hard and doing my best.

 

Anese: You’re super intentional about it. You being as intentional as you are about how you want to be scheduled and working with your team and being still on purpose, to me that alleviates a lot of the energy of busy that so many people are stressed out by. I hear your language is being different but also there’s a lot of intention around the way that you schedule yourself out.

 

Dave:  That’s true. I would have known that. That’s one thing. Quit being busy even if like you’re working really hard and you don’t have lots of free time it doesn’t mean that you’re busy. It means that you’re doing something. Busy isn’t actually accomplishing anything. I hear you.

 

Anese: Another one is turning your complaints. Anything that you’re not happy about in your life or in your team or in your organization, you look at that complaint and instead of complaining about it which is completely unproductive, you flip it over and you look underneath it and there’s always some kind of an uncommunicated request or suggestion. If you can take your complaints and turn them into some kind of a request, all of a sudden you have a lot more power to start changing whatever is happening in that organization or with your team or that relationship.

 

Dave:  You can also do what I do is you look at your complaints and they just start a company around solving them.

 

Anese: That is another way to do it.

 

Dave:  Why is this coffee make me jittery and cranky and angry? I’ll fix that.

 

Anese: No, I love that. Actually perfect example I love that.

 

Dave:  That’s what I did.

 

Anese: No, it’s brilliant. It’s a perfect example. It wasn’t working for you so you look okay what would I like instead and then you did it. You went out and you did it. It’s taking huge ownership for a complaint that you had. You turn the complaint into request. If you want to go and make it really good especially in relationship dynamics, underneath that request is what I call some kind of a dream or a tender agenda. For example a complaint …

 

Dave:  Tinder like the dating app or …?

 

Anese: No. Tender agenda. It’s the tender agenda. That’s another IEP book. We’ll talk about that one later. There’s the complaint. “Dave, you never call. You never write. You never email me back. It’s horrible. I can’t stand it.” There’s my complaint. How compelling am I to you right now? You’re like, “Anese, I really want to call you more.” That doesn’t really work versus I look at the request that’s underneath that which is “Dave, I would love it if you and I could interact more.” or “I would it when I email you if you can get back to me within 3 days and just let me know that you’ve even got the email that would be amazing.” Just because I made the request doesn’t mean this is not real by the way you’re amazing at email but just because I made the request I think in my experience you are.

 

Dave:  My people are amazing in email. I suck at it.

 

Anese: We’ll great! There you go. They’re very good at it. I thought you were great at it.

 

Dave:  Thanks.

 

Anese: Just because I made the request doesn’t mean that you have to say yes to it but we’re back in a position of collaboration where you can “Anese, I can’t do that but here my people get back to you in 3 days.” If you look underneath that request and you go a little bit deeper, there’s a tender agenda or there’s a dream which is I want to have a better working relationship. I want to know you better. Whatever it might be. In your relationships with the people that you work with, first of all we always start with ourselves. If I’m complaining a lot, what are request instead and what do I want to do to make them happen so that’s one side of it.

 

Then in my relationships if I’ve got people complaining to me a lot, if I was a leader of the team I can say that, “I hear your complaint, what would you like instead?” That’s a way of giving them back their power where they get to go, “Wait a second I actually could have a choice here.” If they start to look at what they want instead now they’re in a different position of power where they can now start to get action around it.

 

One of the things I see people all the time is they go “Anese, if I turn every one of my employee’s complaints into request I will be so busy I’ll be exhausted. I’ll be running around with a handcuff trying to honor them.” It’s not about that. It’s about the person complains to you asking them what they like instead and then you give it back to them and say “Great! What’s the next thing you do to start making that happen.” or “Hey actually we really can’t do this as a company. Here’s why. Let’s talk about some alternatives.” The idea again is get people out f the complaining energy which is completely contagious. Its super toxic and you get them into a state of really looking at “What do I want instead and how can I contribute to making it happen?”

 

Dave:  That sounds really legit. We have a rule at BulletProof that’s like no gossiping. If you’re going to complain about something about someone else, you should be willing to say that to their face so we can work on it especially we all have a shared mission here. Everyone in the company knows that we’re helping literally millions of people now just to have our energy, just to get a little bit more control of what’s happening in their own bodies. Most of them have experienced that themselves dramatically which is why they joined.

 

That works well with the kind of culture we have at BulletProof but it may not work so well if you’re working at Dell or something like not to pick on Dell it’s just like they’re a ginormous company that makes I guess the computers not beige anymore they’re finally gray. They’re not that exciting. Sorry Dell.

 

Anese: So you’re saying that Dell would potentially… bigger company yes.

 

Dave:  If you have 50,000 employees like it’s a very different problem is all I’m saying. If you’re in a mature industry.

 

Anese: I’ve noticed is related a little off topic but here’s another thing I’ve noticed. The bigger the company, the more room there is for the gossip and the complaint and everything because they have more time. You take a smaller company, I’ve really noticed the difference startups, smaller, entrepreneurial minded companies they don’t have a lot of time for this stuff. They’re better about being really quick at turning the complaints into request, how they really clear agreement with each other around what you’re talking about no gossip, direct engagement.

 

You have a bigger, bigger organization it’s just harder to get a handle on it and there’s a lot of bureaucracy and a lot of free time. I tend to see a lot more that that’s harder to break through than a company the size of yours or smaller entrepreneurial … Purpose minded companies I think are quicker to grab onto this stuff and really go, “What are the agreements we need as a team in order to function at our very best?” Direct engagement, time integrity, turn complaints in the request these are all different kinds of agreements I have seen people put into their leadership teams and then to build that as a culture to really support them in having great relationships. Not to ding on big companies either because …

 

Dave:  It’s just culturally they are different and …

 

Anese: It’s just different.

 

Dave:  Management is different too. You talk about towards the end of your book about hiring and firing for the energetic good of all. Walk me through what that means. Just start with the crystal ball. I already know that now.

 

Anese: I wish I had a crystal ball. You know what actually look at this

 

Dave:  No way!

 

Anese: It’s not a crystal ball. Its amethyst.

 

Dave:  Just because you did that I see your amethyst and I raise you a tourmaline.

 

Anese: Well guess what? I raise you a labradorite.

 

Dave:  Actually this might be a labradorite. I don’t even know.

 

Anese: I think that’s a labradorite.

 

Dave:  Is it? Look at that.

 

Anese: Raise you a labradorite.

 

Dave:  That is insane.

 

Anese: That’s awesome. Wait, hold yours up again. Look at this I think we have the same …

 

Dave:  The same rocks.

 

Anese: The same rocks interesting.

 

Dave:  You know what that means?

 

Anese: What does that mean?

 

Dave:  It means we totally rock. Sorry, I had to say it.

 

Anese: We still rock.

 

Dave:  If anyone doubt my level of dorkiness I proved it right there. Without a doubt.

 

Anese: Again, if I just had the glasses we would be like … hiring and firing for the energetic good of all I loved writing that chapter. Here’s what I’ve noticed is this is happen all the time where companies get into hostage situations. Like all the hostage situation. They got somebody in the company who is maybe really, really good at what they do and they’re bringing in good money. They’re a huge add to the results of the company but they treat people really, really badly. The company gets in this position where they’re like, “I can’t let go of this person because if we let go of Dave our sales are going to really suffer.” We’re going to tolerate what Dave is doing and we’re going to let him run around and leave dead bodies all over the place because he’s such a good performer.

 

Then what happens is the rest of the culture, the rest of the team starts to really react to that. The chapter talks about the hostage situation where you’re not firing someday because you either want to be too nice, you’re too dependent on them. You don’t want to rock the boat culturally. You don’t want to hurt morale so you hang on to them but it’s actually doing the opposite of what you wanted to do because you’re ruining your credibility with the rest of your staff.

 

I talk about some of the things that people won’t look at which is making agreements as a leadership team of what behaviors are not acceptable and where do you guys draw the line. Even if somebody is your top performer but they’re really, really behaving badly and treating people poorly in the company and they’re “toxic” where do you draw the line? What is your system for that? Do you give them feedback directly? It’s another piece is that so often somebody is having negative impact and nobody is really giving them the honest direct feedback about it so they continue doing it. Then when the person gets fired or they quit because they miserable now because everybody doesn’t like them, it’s just not fair.

 

The whole chapter goes through helping people really look at why are you holding on to opinion that you shouldn’t be, where would it actually be and energetic service to let them go because 9 times out of 10 the people that aren’t performing well or that are toxic in the organization they don’t feel good about it either and so just looking at energetically how do you hire the right people and really look at their values and like the criteria you’re sorting fo and then also how do you let them go from a state of grace and care and contribution versus having it be this really horrible ugly thing at the end.

 

Dave:  There’s 2 different groups of people listening. There’s some percentages of BulletProof audience who are either leaders or working to be leaders and there’s probably a much larger percentage of people who are both leaders but also employees or being led. You and me like I have a board of directors and I’m part of a team and I just happen to be a leadership role more often than not.

 

Anese: We all work for someone.

 

Dave:  Exactly if you’re married especially, right? How would someone know if they’re one of the people who well needs to be fired for the energetic good of the organization in other words how could you do this? Assuming that you want to know, how would you know?

 

Anese: I’m the employee and I need to know?

 

Dave:  If you’re the employee, how do you know that like wow I guess I’m actually not contributing in the way I should be and I’m probably on a list somewhere of people who aren’t a cultural fit. What are the signs I should look for?

 

Anese: I think the first step is in awareness and being really honest with yourself about the impact that you’re having on other people. Just noticing being aware of when into the room are people excited that I’m there, what is the impact I have on people, how are they responding to me? Think of we really are aware of how people react to us that gives us a lot of information of even just intuitively so that’s one piece.

 

Another piece would be go to my boss or my business partner whoever and to get some feedback to really ask them like “I have this sense. I want to make sure that I’m showing up in a way that’s really contributing to the organization. What do you think? How am I doing?” That would be another way just to have a really honest conversation. Then the other piece would be to go and get some collaborative feedback where you go to your HR department or your talent department or whatever probably learning and development … it depends on different organizations but to really go and ask them, “Can you get some really good feedback for me and collect …”

 

I always tell people when they get feedback if they’re going to do it for themselves or they’re going to have somebody else do it for them it doesn’t matter. I want them to get at least 5 to 7 people to give them some core feedback around 3 or 4 key questions that I give them. I ask them to make sure that these 5 to 7 people are combination of people who love them, people who do not like them at all and just people who are like they’re boss, a direct report like a customer. If they get this feedback around 4 core questions and all of a sudden they’ve got a little bit more comprehensive idea of how they’re doing in the organization. Here’s the thing Dave, unless people are willing to tell them the truth because I can do that feedback exercise and everyone is like, “Oh no Dave’s fantastic.” Most of the time they will.

 

Dave:  One of the problems we have especially in the US is just the idea of getting feedback. You’ll probably get sued from honest feedback. Especially when someone is let go the vast majority of companies are like “I’m really sorry. Wasn’t a strategic fit.” You’re like, “What the hell does that mean? Clearly either I did something wrong or really we had a lay off but even if there’s a layoff like you didn’t lay that guy off, you laid me off.” It’s actually really unkind but if you have HR attorneys they’ll be like you cannot tell the person why you fired them because they’ll turn around and sue you for that. What’s your advice on that situation?

 

Anese: That’s interesting. All the time doing this work, knock on wood, big time wood or labradorite, I’ve never went into that. Here’s the way that I look at that. If somebody is performing badly and its performance related or having a negative impact on other people, you as the leader in the company have a responsibility … I believe it is a huge responsibility to go and to give that person honest feedback saying “Here’s what we’re noticing is happening. We care very much about you. We want you to do well here. We’re willing to put you on a performance program. We’re willing to get you some coaching. We’re willing to do … we’ll get you a buddy like whatever.” I think tis the leader’s responsibility to go and be really honest with that person.

 

If its performance related or it’s the way that they’re showing up in organization it’s not some personal thing like they’re … some of the more traditional things that I see people would get into trouble for like discrimination as a woman or they’re pregnant or on they’re on the trailer. I’m thinking those kinds of things. If it’s really performance related, then in my mind I’ve never seen that backfire. That’s something where you have a responsibility. Where I see it really backfire is people are so doggone polite they don’t want to give that feedback and so they are very careful around it.

 

There’s actually an example like I’ve give in the book with somebody who was awesome. He thought he was doing so great. I got behind closed doors with the leadership team they’re like, “We just don’t think that he’s not going to cut it.” I was like, “You guys I just saw you give him a review that was awesome. What’s the disconnect?” They’re like, “We’re just hoping he’s going to get it.” To me that’s cruel so that is not for the energetic good of all.

 

We talk about giving feedback effectively. We talk about setting people for success. We talk about having really honest conversations in that feedback conversation so that the person if they do end up leaving, they leave feeling good and they were a contribution to the organization whatever where they were and now they can go out and be a better contribution to somebody else somewhere else.

 

Dave:  That is sound advice. We’re up on the end of the show and I feel like there’s a bunch more questions I could ask you for people who like want to navigate the weird labyrinth that is corporate America. I would actually recommend that people read your book because you talk about this a lot. Anyone who shows up in a meeting and gets some of these things, they’ll be able to change at least their contribution and probably the whole meeting. When you are the person who does that reliably what happens is you get raises and promotions like it just works that way.

 

Anese: That’s a bonus.

 

Dave:  I certainly look for people like that. That’s one of the reasons that this is helpful. This isn’t just about leaders. This is about your performance. It is a little bit more about your performance at work but if you take the core methodology it’s about your performance as a leader throughout life not just at work but I think a lot of it does apply to the workplace.

 

Anese: You know it’s funny because the book is called Contagious Culture. I was writing it people keep going “Oh great organizational culture.” Sure, absolutely big applications in organizational culture but I also look at it as the culture in your family, your friends, the culture that we carry in ourselves. I got my own entire internal culture going on right now. Looking at that and always coming back to you as the human being, you as the leader because in my mind everybody is leading. You might not have a leadership position in your company but if you’re not leadIng your life, then who is. Coming back to you as leader and just looking at “How am I showing up? It starts with me. In order for me to impact the world I better show up.” It builds. It’s an inside out approach.

 

Dave:  That makes sense. The other thing I’m going to do just to confuse things I’m going to have my friend and BulletProof radio guest Summer Bock who is a professional fermentationist. I‘m going to have her make a recommendation for Contagious Culture which will confuse everyone.

 

Anese: That’d be great.

 

Dave:  I’m just kidding.

 

Anese: That’d be great.

 

Dave:  Not that kind of culture.

 

Anese: I got a phone call something like that after the book was released. They were like “What is this contagious culture? Does this have to do with the CDC something?”

 

Dave:  Did you really? Oh my goodness! It’s not that kind of culture but it’s a memorable …

 

Anese: It’s not that kind of culture but it does spread.

 

Dave:  It’s a memorable and an appropriate name.

 

Anese: We’re all one big petri dish. Okay, go on. Now I’m going to start kicking out with you. There you go.

 

Dave:  We’re up on the end of the show and last time I ask your top 3 recommendations for people who want to kick more ass at everything they do. Because you just wrote a book on this and you’ve already answered the question and probably remember your answers before, one thing I can do is I can ask you the same one again and do a differential analysis to see if you change your answer but that would be boring.

 

Anese: I promise you I’ve changed my answers.

 

Dave:  Everyone does. Then what I want to know is, what are your top 3 recommendations for people who want to kick more ass as leaders? It better not just be I, E and P because that would be boring.

 

Anese: Here’s the thing. You ask this question of everybody. There’s so many good things that come out of these 3 questions for people. I’m just going to add on to them because you ask me this last time and I remember I couldn’t get to 3. I don’t know if you remember but I was combining 3 into each answer.

 

Dave:  You’re like 3 answers each with 17 subparts. I remember that.

 

Anese: You say it was okay because it was hacking and I was naming and I was doing it. I would say … as a leader one is to find the gift in everything. This is different. Aside from being present all things we’ve talked about taking accountability for your life all that stuff I’m just going to add some more. One is find the gift in every single thing. Something happens in the company. You have to fire somebody. You get stuck at the airport. A big meeting gets cancelled whatever get present to it and find the gift. There is a gift in it. There’s always some kind of a gift. There’s something that we can learn. There’s something that we learn about ourselves. There’s something.

 

If you can find the gift and really look at how can this help you move into being an even more impactful leader, that’s awesome and that will change you from having the mindset of like “Oh my gosh! I can’t believe thing just happened. This sucks and dah, dah, dah.” Even though you might feel that way for a while to turning that thing into something really productive. Find the gift and be really grateful for it.

 

Dave:  What was the gift at the airport? Can you just tell me about that.

 

Anese: The gift was I got to run a really fun little experiment in Contagious Culture. Travel is a great place to look at that anyway. Sitting on a plane … I sat there Dave and I watched the people behind me just throw a huge fit. The whole back of the plane was just like eh. Then you go the people around me and the woman next to me and she was amazing. We were looking at “What are we going to do? We’re stuck here for the night.” I was sitting there and I actually got my Christmas shopping done. I got the rest of my Christmas shopping done online because we were on the tarmac for 2 hours.

 

Looking at how people react you get off the plane. You get a choice. There’s a choice in every single moment about how do I want to show up at this, how do I react to this. For me the gift was and that’s new friends. I got to explore the airport although I’d be fine not to do that again. I got to really, really have a visceral experience of being completely exhausted because I didn’t sleep that night. Completely exhausted surrounded by crappy food. I did have some of my BulletProof stuff on me so that got me … that was great.

 

Dave:  You have a stick of butter you’re going to make it.

 

Anese: Stick of butter in one of your bars. I think to me personally the biggest gift of that night was noticing how many times I wanted to go to snarky and be frustrated about it and then catch myself and go, “No, no, no I have a choice here. We really have a lovely evening.” I made it as lovely as it could possibly be and I got home and it’s all good. It didn’t ruin my life. That’s one thing.

 

Another thing would be as leader to create a tribe of people around you that really inspire you and that ask you to be even bigger and better than you are but also hold space for you to completely suck. Your tribe I think that’s still so important. Then another one I would say would be to building rituals. Building rituals into your life every stop. I got rituals in the morning. I’ve got rituals in the afternoon with my kids. Just to build some kind of ritual that makes you feel really good and it isn’t a big should but that actually gives you energy, gives you a better container to show up in a way that you want to show up. Those would be 3 things.

 

Dave:  Awesome!

 

Anese: I’m not going to cheat and give you 20 more.

 

Dave:  Anese thanks for being on BulletProof radio. People can find you at iep.io or if they could spell it anesecavanaugh.com.

 

Anese: They can do Contagious Culture.

 

Dave:  There’s a contagiousculture.com?

 

Anese: They can get there too that way. contagiousculture.com is really easy to get to as well.

 

Dave:  There you go. It’s easier to remember. All of them are going to lead to your work and your book is a worthwhile read. I really think so which is why I invite you back on the show.

 

Anese: Thank you.

 

Dave:  Thanks for being here.

 

Anese: Thank you for having me on again. Thank you for reading it. Did you read the acknowledgements?

 

Dave:  I did not read the acknowledgements. Should I have?

 

Anese: Oh my gosh Dave, how did not read the acknowledgements? Really quick the acknowledgement section the original draft was 4000 words.

 

Dave:  That’s a lot of gratitude right there.

 

Anese: I know. I sent it to the editor and they said that you cannot have a 4000 words acknowledgement You can’t have that. I had to cut it down with 1000 which was honestly almost the hardest thing to do in that entire book. That was painful for me to be cutting stuff out but you’re in there and you should see it.

 

Dave:  I will now that I know.

 

Anese: Your coffee was the co-author of the book. I can’t believe you didn’t look at that.

 

Dave:  Wow I’m amazed. Thank you Anese.

 

Anese: You’re welcome.

 

Dave:  Totally did. I tend to skip that because I’m like I’m just going to read the book.

 

Anese: That’s so bad. You got to read the back.

 

Dave:  I will read it.

 

Anese: Thank you.

 

Dave:  Thank you.

 

Anese: Thanks for having me on again. Thanks.

 

Dave:  Bye.

 

Anese: Bye.

 

Dave:  If you like today’s show you know what to do. Head on out there to iep.io and check out Anese’s work because its good stuff. You could also head on over to bulletproofexec.com/youtube and just click subscribe or follow and I will give you lots of good stuff on YouTube that you’re not going to get just on the podcast. It’s worth having in both ways. If you were watching today, you would be seeing my incredibly cool rock star sunglasses. I look only a little bit like Tron today and you would have seen my cool lavender ball. Have an awesome day. Bye!

You may also like

Dave Asprey

Start hacking your way to better than standard performance and results.

Receive weekly biohacking tips and tech by becoming a Dave Asprey insider.

By sharing your email, you agree to our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy