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Guest:
Jamie Butemeyer is a transformational mastery coach + movement facilitator, and former musical theater artist whose coaching practice exists at the intersection of artistry and entrepreneurship. Based in Aspen, Colorado, Jamie’s client roster includes women CEOs, billionaires, and leaders of all kinds, working one-on-one and in group formats. Her signature program, “Leading Lady,” helps women step out of the background and into the main stage of their lives. Jamie is the head female coach for the Elected Leaders Collective and the co-creator of the Body Alive practice at Aspen Shakti, transforming bodies and lives nationwide. She is also a certified breathwork facilitator.
Her journey includes achievements as a prestigious University of Oklahoma’s theater program graduate and a Miss Teen Oklahoma title. Jamie’s mission as a coach is to help individuals step into their most authentic, empowered selves through emotional mastery and personal transformation.
About the Episode:
In this episode, I sit down with the best human I know, my better half and partner in life and love, Jamie Butemeyer.
We discuss the intersection of authenticity, leadership, emotional intelligence, and success. We delve into Jamie’s background, growing up in Lawton, Oklahoma, and being on stage as a beauty queen from a young age. We talk about childhood patterns and the unconscious programming she picked up as a little one. Jamie shares where her insecurities and limiting beliefs held her back from becoming the Broadway star in NYC she wanted to be but ultimately planted the seeds of her success. Jamie talks about how making big bets on herself paid off and reflects on how embracing emotions, owning her fear, and cultivating emotional mastery skills freed her to become the world-class coach and leader of leaders she is today —all essential skills for leaders like you in high-stakes environments.
We dive into practices like nonviolent communication, somatic awareness, and the power of community to foster healing and connection. Jamie offers unique insights into being a partner to a public servant and what she learned about how you, as a spouse or partner, can contribute to a conscious relationship that safeguards and supercharges the relationship and your service.
This episode is a heartfelt invitation to claim your fullest potential by integrating the full human experience into your leadership. Jamie has been right here with me, helping me find the courage, compassion, and authenticity to be here with you today, and I know in her wisdom that you will find more of these things for yourself.
Key Topics Discussed:
· [00:01:50] Episode Overview
· [00:04:13] Guest Introduction
· [00:06:42] Early life in Oklahoma
· [00:09:09] Miss Oklahoma
· [00:10:53] Young Jamie stood out
· [00:13:52] Personas and masks
· [00:15:37] When is it time to hang it up?
· [00:18:34] Paralyzed by fear
· [00:19:39] Kobe Bryant’s keys to success
· [00:21:21] The efficacy of unconditional lover
· [00:25:46] Lifestyle to support goals
· [00:27:42] Learning from my past
· [00:29:09] Working with fear
· [00:30:53] Knowing what I know now
· [00:31:34] Feel it to free it
· [00:33:40] Make BIG: bet on yourself
· [00:36:51] Are you ready to die?
· [00:39:24] What is a transformational coach?
· [00:42:10] What does one do in coaching?
· [00:43:40] Unconscious emotional suppression
· [00:48:25] Avoidant behaviors
· [00:51:46] Emotional Indulgence
· [00:55:03] Finding Balance
· [00:57:45] Owning your fears
· [00:59:12] Effective confrontation
· [01:00:30] 4 F’s of the nervous system - fight, flight, freeze, faun
· [01:03:00] “Poet Lauriet” Macklemore
· [01:04:25] Victim to empowerment mindset
· [01:05:22] Happening for you, not to you
· [01:06:03] Podcast: Suffering to Strength: Ashley Grimmel on Transmuting Pressure into Power, Resilience, and Health
· [01:07:16] Caroline Myss; archetype work
· [01:08:00] Nonviolent communication framework
· [01:11:15] The fire of love
· [01:14:25] The partner/spouse of public leaders experience
· [01:18:59] Supporting yourself as a partner
· [01:20:56] Approaches to support your partner
· [01:22:50] “The third entity” - Family first
· [01:24:20] Work/life harmony
· [01:25:14] Abundant time use
· [01:27:12] Closing question: Feel your feelings!
· [01:28:40] “The Leader’s Handbook” Newsletter
Key References and Resources Mentioned:
· [00:04:50] Leading Lady
· [00:05:07] Body Alive @ Aspen Shakti
· [00:17:20] World Tour
· [01:06:03] Podcast: Suffering to Strength: Ashley Grimmel on Transmuting Pressure into Power, Resilience, and Health
· [01:07:16] Caroline Myss; Archetypes
· [01:28:40] “The Leader’s Handbook” Newsletter
Where to Find Coach Jamie Butemeyer:
Where to Find Host Skippy Mesirow:
- Receive Support at the Elected Leaders Collective ElectedLeadersCollective.com
- Follow on Instagram www.instagam.com/skippymesirow
- Book a free Clarity Call to see if coaching is right for you
Episode Sponsor:
Helping You Heal Our Politics
The Elected Leaders Collective (ELC) organization is the leading US-based provider of mental well-being training for public servants, conducted by public servants and the world's best mental health and human optimization professionals. With ELC Training, you will learn to rise above and become the political healer you were meant to be, improving your well-being in the process.
Contact the HOP Team:
Do you have an episode idea?
Want to suggest a guest?
Can you provide critical feedback?
We'd love to hear from you!
Contact our team at jesse@healingourpolitics.com
Your input helps us create content that matters.
Creators and Guests
Host
Skippy Mesirow
Skippy Mesirow is a prominent leader, certified Master Coach, and founder of the Elected Leaders Collective (ELC) and ELC Foundation. ELC leads the US in mental health and well-being training for public servants, recognized in The Apolitical Foundation's Mere Mortals report, and named as one of 26 worldwide political well-being "Trailblazer Organizations." A transformational leader in political innovation and wellness, Skippy serves on Gov. Polis’s Natural Medicine Advisory. Skippy’s work has been featured in numerous podcasts and publications, as well as main-stage speaking engagements for organizations NLC, YEO, CML, MT2030, Bridging Divides, and Fulcrum, highlighting his significant contributions to mental health, community, and policy reform. Alongside his professional achievements, Skippy lives in Aspen, CO. with his partner Jamie where he enjoys running ultra-marathons, road biking, motorcycling, international travel, culinary arts, Burning Man, and lifelong learning.
Producer
Aaron Calafato
Aaron’s stories are currently heard by millions around the globe on his award-winning Podcast 7 Minute Stories and on YouTube. Aaron is a co-host of Glassdoor's new podcast (The Lonely Office) and serves as a podcast consultant for some of the fastest-growing companies in the world.
Editor
Jesse Link
Jesse is a strategy, research and partnership consultant and podcast enthusiast. A 2x founder, former Goldman Sachs Vice President and advisor to 25+ businesses, Jesse brings a unique and diverse background to HoP, helping to elevate the range, depth and perspective of HoP's conversations and strategy.
What is The Civic Courage Lab™ Podcast?
This is your training ground for courage.
To survive and thrive in the gladiator sport of public service, you need all six pillars of empowered leadership — mental, emotional, physical, social, financial, and spiritual health.
The Civic Courage Lab™ Podcast brings the world’s leading experts in human development together for the people doing society’s hardest work — public servants, civic innovators, changemakers, and bridge builders. Each conversation explores how to apply these insights directly to your role, helping you strengthen all six pillars of empowered leadership through real stories, practical tools, and wisdom from high-impact leaders who’ve turned their greatest challenges into personal growth and collective success.
Success in the ultra-endurance sport of impact demands courage, curiosity, integrity, and love. Here, you’ll cultivate them all — in community.
From the creators of The COURAGE METHOD™ — the framework that’s helped councils move from combat to collaboration, nonprofits from floundering to funded, policies from ideas to impact, and activists from unknown to unstoppable.
Welcome to COURAGE.
Hello. My name is Skippy Mesereau. Coach, former elected official, and lifetime public servant. Welcome to Healing Our Politics. The show that shows you, the heart centered public servant and political leader, how to heal our politics by starting with the human in the mirror.
Speaker 1:It is my job to sit down or stand up with the best experts public service experience, providing you actionable, practical providing you actionable, practical, tactical tools that you can test out today in your life and with your teams. I will also talk to leaders across the globe with a self care practice, getting to know them at at a deeply human and personal level so that you can learn from their challenges and journey. Warning. This is a post partisan space. Yes.
Speaker 1:I have a bias. You have a bias. We all have a bias. Everybody gets a bias. And I will be stripping out all of the unconscious cues of bias from this space.
Speaker 1:No politics, partisanship, or policy here because well-being belongs to all of us. And we will all be better served if every human in leadership, regardless of party, ideology, race, or geography are happier, healthier, and more connected. This show is about resourcing you, the human doing leadership and trusting you to make up your own damn mind about what to do with it and what's best for your community. So as always, with love, here we go. In this episode, I sit down with the best human I know, my better half, and my partner in life and love, Jamie Boudemeyer.
Speaker 1:We discussed the intersection of authenticity, leadership, emotional intelligence, and success. We delve deeply into Jamie's background growing up in Lawton, Oklahoma. The childhood patterns, the unconscious programming she picked up as a little one that both empowered and held her back later in life. Jamie shares where her insecurities and limiting beliefs held her back from becoming the Broadway star in New York that she wanted to be, but ultimately planted the seeds of her future success. She shares how embracing emotions, owning her fear, and cultivating emotional mastery skills freed her to become the world class coach and leader of leaders that I get to see and experience every day, all essential skills for leaders like you in high stakes environments.
Speaker 1:We dive into practical practices like nonviolent communication, somatic awareness, the power of community to foster healing and connection. And she also offers insights on what it's like to be a partner of a public servant, me, and what that was like for her as I served in office and other roles in the community, what she learned that you can use about how to show up as a spouse and partner to contribute to a conscious relationship that safeguards and supercharges both the partnership and the role and service. This episode is a heartfelt invitation for you to step into your fullest potential by integrating the human experience into your practice of leadership. Jamie has been right here with me, helping me find the courage, compassion, and authenticity to be with you here today and with my clients every day. And I know her wisdom will help you find more of these things for yourself.
Speaker 1:So without further ado, please enjoy this beautiful, connective and lovely conversation. We have a very, very, very special guest with us today. Her name is Jamie Boudemeyer. Jamie is not only a remarkable professional transformational life coach, one of the most sought after in Aspen, Colorado
Speaker 2:Top it.
Speaker 1:The head coach for ELC. Her craft exists at the intersection of artistry and entrepreneurship, something unique and beautiful. Jamie's client roster includes remarkable women CEOs, billionaires, and leaders of all kinds working 1 to 1 and in groups. Her signature program, the leading lady, helps women step out of the background and into the main stage of their lives, and I have seen it work. She is a number of things prior to that.
Speaker 1:Her wins are many, the co creator of the Body Alive practice at Aspen Shakti here in Aspen, which I have seen shift and change bodies and lives all over this country. She is a professional yoga practitioner. She spent time making her way in the musical theater world. Wait. What do you say?
Speaker 1:You say theater?
Speaker 2:Theater.
Speaker 1:Theater world. A graduate of the theater School at at the University of Oklahoma, one of the best in the country,
Speaker 2:a Boomer Center.
Speaker 1:A former miss teen Oklahoma, 3rd runner-up, miss Oklahoma. And in this house, my partner, my better half, my love, we are going to just dive in and see where it goes, and I know that there will be so many bits of wisdom to come out for the audience that they can use in their own lives. And I just wanna thank for being here first and foremost.
Speaker 2:You're welcome. Thank you for having me. And I also just wanna say, I didn't know I was doing this podcast until, like, 20 minutes ago. And today is a day where I I'm usually not on camera, so hence my cool dinosaur hair and hat. I'm a very professional coach.
Speaker 2:I like to spiffy up, but today, you're getting a little more of casual, quirky Jamie.
Speaker 1:I think they're crinkle cut crinkle cut French fries.
Speaker 2:This is the crinkle cut French fry hair look.
Speaker 1:I like them.
Speaker 2:Thanks.
Speaker 1:They're fun. So let's start at the beginning, and just give people a sense of where you are from growing up in Lawton, Oklahoma. Mhmm. To Brad and Linda, by way of Mimi and others.
Speaker 2:Shout out.
Speaker 1:Shout out. But tell us a little bit about your childhood, where you came from, and who you are.
Speaker 2:Okay. So like Skippy said, I was born in a small town called Lawton, Oklahoma. It's the southwest corner of the state of Oklahoma, about 45 minutes from the Texas border, and I grew up in a very traditional, conservative Bible Belt home. I would say there was religious connotations in the house, but not a lot of religious direct implementation in the house. Dogma.
Speaker 2:Dogma. Correct. The culture where I grew up is that you definitely go to church and you definitely only vote one way, and that was just my normal. I am a 5th generation Lawtonian. I'm the 1st in 5 generations to leave, not just the state of Oklahoma, but the town of Lawton.
Speaker 2:And I grew up an only child. My parents said it took them about 6 years to have me, and so I was a blessing. I was a miracle baby, and they adored me. I mean, I had a really beautiful set of parents and upbringing. I was dancing in the studio multiple times a week from the age of 4 to 18 until I left the house for college.
Speaker 2:I tried soccer once, and it didn't go well.
Speaker 1:What's the story?
Speaker 2:I was a goalie in kindergarten, and the other team didn't score. So I was standing there the whole time, and I was like, mom, take me back to the dance studio. This isn't working.
Speaker 1:In the middle of the game. Right? Yeah.
Speaker 2:In the middle of the game. I was like, I just wanna do dance. We can let this sports thing go.
Speaker 1:Just good foreshadowing because you make snap intuitive, but deep decisions still.
Speaker 2:I do. Yes. I do.
Speaker 1:So your mom is also a beauty queen. She's also a artist, a singer, a performer. How much of that is nature versus nurture for you?
Speaker 2:Probably both. Yeah. My mom was miss Lawton. And so every year, we'd go to the miss Lawton pageant, and she would get to walk across the stage, and I would get to walk with her. And after the show, I would always go up on the stage with my little brochure and get the signatures of all the girls.
Speaker 2:I thought they were just so beautiful, so cool. So they were really my first role models. Then when I turned 11, my mom took me to miss Oklahoma, and I said, I wanna do that. That looks really fun. And the pageant lane was my parents' way of getting me on a stage with the limited resources that they did have being in such a small little bubble down in Lawton.
Speaker 2:So that was my first sense of wanting to spend time in studios, practicing my craft, singing, and dancing. And then there then when I got into high school, I had an incredible theater teacher that said, you are really good at this, and you can do this. And she was amazing. I I had I didn't know what I wanted to do for college until really the last part of my junior year. I knew I was performing, but I think I had this story in my mind that that wasn't attainable, that wasn't possible.
Speaker 1:What wasn't attainable or possible?
Speaker 2:A professional artist. This was high school. And my theater teacher at lunch every day for my whole senior year, she would coach me on my monologues and get me ready for college auditions. Ignorance is bliss in this case for me because I had no idea what type of competitive environment that really was. I was fortunate enough to get into the only 2 schools that I auditioned for, which were both state schools, because that's all my parents could afford.
Speaker 2:And then when I got to college and I was one of 10 people in the class that got accepted in this program, everyone else was from all over the country and telling me their woes and trials and tribulations of auditioning for, you know, all the schools.
Speaker 1:If you are, like, looking back now, now that you know how challenging it was Mhmm. And you put yourself in the shoes of the college admissions officer, what do you think they saw in the application or in you that made them accept you into the program?
Speaker 2:I don't know. You'd have to ask them, I guess, but I think if I were to do a little self reflection, at a young age, felt just so in my body. Like, me and the music, I just knew. I know music. I know how to work with it.
Speaker 2:I know how to move to it. I know how to really connect with it. And you see this in me now. I love making playlists for all of my classes and I love it. It doesn't matter what the song or the performance is.
Speaker 2:What matters is how you embody it, how you show up to it, and I think I really just go all in. When I want something in life, even if I'm not the, quote, unquote, best or don't really know what I'm doing, I'm gonna go all in.
Speaker 1:There are a number of people, myself included, who might want to go up on a stage, sing a song, perform, be seen, be funny, be respected, whatever you the story is that comes with it. Mhmm. And yet, as soon as I get on this stage, there's so much self there's so much fear.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:Lack of self confidence, self questioning. What am I doing here? Do I look weird? Am I moving right? What was my line?
Speaker 1:And I just would get so in my head that I wouldn't be able to do the thing that I wanna do. Mhmm. Do do you have any of that going on back then?
Speaker 2:Well, sure. For sure. For sure. And growing up, what my teachers always used to say was fake it till you make it. And now as a coach in the personal development space, I cringe at that saying because my whole life's mission is to help myself and other people become so authentically themselves and operate from their most authentic, worthy, whole selves all the times.
Speaker 2:But back then in the day, again, ignorance, Elizabeth has I didn't know better. So I remember there were a couple of local preliminary pageants to get to the state level when I was a teenager that I just didn't wanna do it. I was a teenager, you know. On on the weekends, I wanted to be going to the football games, not, like, performing and entertaining. And, yeah, I was going to compete in these preliminary pageants to go and pursue, you know, the state titles where I just didn't want to do it.
Speaker 2:And, thankfully, I had parents that kind of pushed me and forced me. I don't know. I go back and forth between there's times where I think parents have to parent their kid, and there's times where they are there to coach their kid. And in this moment, my I think my mom was a little bit of both, and she was like, you are going to do this. We committed to this.
Speaker 2:I paid the the admission fee. We've, you know, done all this time in getting you ready for this, and now you don't want it. And when I think about it, I was scared. Like, there it's such an interesting thing as a performer. And as a human, I at a core deep level, we all just wanna be seen and heard for exactly who and what we are.
Speaker 2:However, we all have developed these different personas or masks, AKA personalities, that really block us from creating that authentic connection that we all deeply, deeply desire. And as a performer, the belief structure that I started taking on as a little kid was, oh, I am only worthy and loved in the world if I'm performing. So there was this ability to, like, you know, quote, unquote, turn it on and, like, become the persona of Jamie on stage, the
Speaker 1:amazing person. Affirmation for that behavior and so that behavior built.
Speaker 2:Exactly. Exactly. And so there there's pros and cons to that fake it till you make it thing. I think sometimes when we have a goal in life, there's moments where we don't wanna do it. We just don't, and that's okay.
Speaker 2:We get fear. We get we get doubt. We we start procrastinating, and all of that really, in my belief, is an ego mechanism. It's trying to protect us from feeling vulnerable or being rejected by the said audience that you're speaking to, maybe a sense of failure. Right?
Speaker 2:It's like maybe when I was those moments where I didn't wanna compete, there was really a deeper fear going on of, well, what if I go out there and I give it my all and I don't win? Right? And at a young age, I really started correlating, and a lot of people do. I think regardless if if they're entertainers or performers or athletes or not, that they start to create this misunderstanding inside their psyche that they can only be loved and accepted if they achieve, if they win, if they perform a certain way.
Speaker 1:So what actually transpired when that happened? Which is to say in this pursuit, in this pageant world, you had a lot of wins. Tell us a little bit about and how that felt, but then, ultimately, at some point, there's a quote, unquote loss. You don't end up miss America. Yeah.
Speaker 1:You don't end up miss Oklahoma, or they're very close. Mhmm. So what actually happens when that maybe worst fear is realized?
Speaker 2:Well, for me, personally, I had 1 year left in the system because you can at that time, after 24 years old, you aged out. You could no longer compete. I was 23, and I had one more year to go. And I think it was a little bit of both for me. I think deep down, I was I was ready to to retire.
Speaker 2:There was a part of me that was ready to move on. However, I also will be fully transparent and be really real and say that there was also a part of me that was so afraid at the time to face the fear of, like, oh my god. I just gave 10 years of my life to this organization, to this dream of becoming miss America, and it's not going to happen. And that if not and at the time, I didn't have the tools to really feel that fee that feeling and really embrace the, quote, unquote, failure.
Speaker 1:I wanna understand what's going on in your head better. And so I think I can relate to this, but I wanna know if the dynamic for you is the same for me, which is when I was roughly that age, a little bit younger, I was in collegiate sports as a skier, and I was competing on the world tour in big mountain skiing. Mhmm. And I had been getting incrementally better. I was never, like, a podium finisher.
Speaker 1:You know? I was a middling athlete in the top area, but I had a specific competition where I skied what was for me a really good run. Stuck all the landings, came out fast, felt good. My score was like a top ten score, And I'm sitting at the bottom feeling proud of myself. And this is at the national championship branch.
Speaker 1:It's like a big thing. And I watched the I think it was Julian Carr, if memory serves, who goes on to be one of the, you know, biggest athletes, film stars, etcetera, comes in over the line where I had linked together all these different airs and cliffs, and it's an icy day and throws this huge backflip off, like, a 100 foot cliff, stops it clean, and skis out. Yeah. And I just remember thinking at that time, I will never do that. I don't have that in me.
Speaker 1:Like, whatever that guy's got, I ain't got it. And that was my last competition.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:Because I felt like if I wasn't gonna win, I didn't wanna do it. Same. Was it the same?
Speaker 2:Exactly. And there's a part of at the time, I thought I was really owning my story of, like, well, I'm
Speaker 1:gonna take control of this.
Speaker 2:Yeah. I'm gonna quit you before you can't reject me. Right? Sure. I think on an ego level, that is is the case, but years to follow after that.
Speaker 2:And even when I moved to New York and started pursuing theater, I wasn't going to auditions. It was real for me. I moved to New York to pursue this performance life, and I wasn't auditioning because I was so terrified. I did not have the resources to embrace failure, to accept, quote, unquote, defeat and rejection, and it's really, really painful. So I also you know, to kinda loop back to your question around people that desire to be seen maybe in a stage way, I think the the irony in everything in what we do as coaches is the things that we're avoiding, rejection, disappointment, failure.
Speaker 2:When you learn to embrace and accept those parts of the human experience, you get really free. I heard something amazing today. I think it goes really well with this. I was on a mastermind call with my bestest coach friends in the world. We call ourselves the Wu Tang, even though none of us know the Wu Tang.
Speaker 2:Skippy does. And, Natalie, she is an incredible coach that coaches athletes. She was telling us this amazing story on a podcast that she heard about Kobe Bryant that I feel like not a lot of pop culture really knows about and is a big part of Kobe Bryant's success. In the background, Kobe had parents at the games on the sidelines that would say things to him. You know, Kobe, whether you win or lose, we love you.
Speaker 2:And I think my parents did say that to me. I don't remember it. Right? And I just wanna say my parents are lovely humans. They weren't like these tiger parents.
Speaker 2:They were like, if you lose, don't come home tonight. It was not that at all. But to have parents or teams or whoever it is say to children and adults, like, win or lose, no matter how you perform today, you are so loved and accepted. Right? And then at that moment, like, Kobe's like, well, game on.
Speaker 2:Like, I can just play and be present and enjoy the process. I'm not having to play to prove or play to win or play to, you know, not disappoint people. I can play knowing that I have this unconditional love and acceptance underneath me really supporting me. I think that's just so incredible. And if more people had that within themselves and surrounded themselves with community members and family and friends that really said, embodying our fullest potential in our human experience, and especially as leaders.
Speaker 2:I think for leaders, especially to learn how to, quote, unquote, take the mask off and let themselves be seen vulnerably and authentically, which as we know in the political space is really, really challenging, I think we would we would we would heal our politics.
Speaker 1:Being there through thick and thin, of having assurance that those people have your back and you have theirs, that you'll be held to account into a high standard, but that you will also be supported when you fall short. And so I think whether you are running a department in a city, or you're part of a school board, or you're a peace officer, the recognition is that you don't have to wait for someone else to do that. That you can start doing that behavior, and that that behavior will be contagious because others want to be seen and held in that way, but you also can't fake it. And in fact, if you do, and you get caught, like you say, I'm here for whatever, and then you don't do that, you will cause more harm than you're doing good because now everyone else on the team will not trust you even further. So it has to be from a truly authentic place for it to work.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. But I wanna go back to this being too afraid to audition for fear of failure. Mhmm. Because I imagine that there are a number of listeners out there who really want to apply for, a new position.
Speaker 2:Or run for an elected
Speaker 1:office. In office or take the next step in their career or publicly advocate for a new policy and are like you or in my words, you tell me if this is wrong, but we're sort of paralyzed in action by fear.
Speaker 2:Totally.
Speaker 1:So could you share what that felt like for you at the time and how it presented? Are you like doing the work and sketching out your schedule? I'm going to hear to hear to hear and then just ghosting them not showing up. Are you not even putting the application in? Like, what are you physically doing?
Speaker 2:All of the above. All of the above. And this was something I observed happening unconsciously and unconsciously with a lot of aspiring performers and actors moving to the city to make it. And so first off, you you know, coming out of college, I had no money. So first things first, I gotta get a job to pay the bills.
Speaker 2:And the job, I also have to maneuver those hour. It has to be a flexible enough job, so I am making time to actually go to the auditions to try to get work in the actual field and industry that I wanna get work in. And I would go to the auditions, but I wasn't really there. I would get so psyched out and people are singing. People are putting on their makeup in the mirror.
Speaker 2:People are, you know, doing these crazy dance moves. And if you are not confident in who you are and really okay with who you are, I mean, for me personally, some people I think become a tiger and they go into that fight, like, I'm gonna prove you energy or they shrink into, like, a turtle. And I definitely shrunk into a turtle shell. And from the time you got to the venue to audition until you audition, it could be anywhere from an hour to 6 hours. And then they might get to the end of the day, and the the producers and directors are tired, so they're like, come back tomorrow.
Speaker 2:You were in a room all day fighting your psyche and your emotions and your nervous system for hours and hours and hours. You missed a whole day of working to pay your bills. It was a tough, tough cycle, and I was just tired at that point. I think after putting my my body and being in a similar type of environment for years with pageants when it was actually time for me to pursue the performance thing. I was I was really tired and broke.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And I wonder just knowing you and how you're wired
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And how challenged you can be by densely packed, highly human environments.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I wonder how much of your aversion to the interview process or rehearsal process Audition. Audition audition process was not the audition in the room itself was but was all of the lead up and the room you had to be in and the environment you were subjugated to and required to be in energetically just before you did the important act.
Speaker 2:Exactly. And that is such a metaphor for life. Everything leading up to the actual moment that you were on stage, everything happening behind the scenes, everything that you were doing in your life that is not the actual, quote, unquote, performance or the leadership position, all of that really, really matters. I didn't have the nervous system regulation tools that I have now. I did not have any sort of mindset mental mastery, you know, ways that I could really keep myself present and in my body in the in those spaces of waiting for hours and hours and hours.
Speaker 2:I would just would psych myself out, And it really it really hurts to know that you are a gifted and talented performer or that you are a gifted and talented leader, but you just can't get out of your own way. And at the time, I could not get out of my own way.
Speaker 1:And I asked you to close your eyes for a second.
Speaker 2:Oh.
Speaker 1:And I want you to bring into your energetic space, like, the most empowered, the most aligned, the most the most knowledgeable version of professional badass woman warrior coach Jamie. And I want you to just feel her in your presence. And then as you tap into her, I want you to imagine she's floating up above your physical form, looking down at you sitting in this room, and then she lifts her gaze, and out in the distance, she sees 10 ish years ago, Jamie, kind of small in her turtle shell, just perseverating over if she's going to go to an interview or not. And you kinda fly over there, because obviously this version of you can fly, and hop down into that little studio or one bedroom in New York, and sit down on the floor, crisscross applesauce in front of younger, insecure, we'll call her Jamie, and you have a microphone to share with her all the things that she could do differently to show up in the room the way she wants? What would you share with her?
Speaker 2:I would just say, sweetheart, it's really okay that you're feeling like a turtle right now. It is so okay that you're scared. It is so okay that you're feeling defeated, that you're feeling like a failure, that you you feel like you wasted years of your life, and now you're not doing it. And I just it's really okay that in this moment, this is where you're at. And I love you, and I'm here for you.
Speaker 2:And regardless of whatever you choose, I will always be here for you.
Speaker 1:So you're offering her permission to accept her reality?
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:And then if she does that, if she just accepts her reality and she says, okay. I get that this is okay for me to feel this way, is that sufficient to set her up to now be successful, or are there additional things that you would have her do or different ways you would have her show up or prepare or decompress, all the above?
Speaker 2:I would I would just put in her house. I'd just say, you know, well, what do you wanna do? How what do you wanna do right now? And I'll and I'll support you in whatever that is. Probably at that time, she was probably like, I just don't wanna do it right now.
Speaker 1:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:And I think, you know, in the healing that I've done between then and now, a lot of the healing has been around rewriting the story inside of my body and being that I quit. And, actually, you know, I did. I did quit. I quit that dream, but the meaning that I made that moment mean, like, for years of, like, I failed. I'm a quitter.
Speaker 2:That wasn't helping. And so creating a new narrative around what that meant and just being at peace and accepting what happened that okay. I did quit, but I don't have to make that mean anything about me. Because when we lay as we know now in the coaching world, like, what if we label ourselves a quitter, a failure, it our our we get hooked in that story and narrative, and then we won't go pursue other things because we're afraid to repeat the same experience from the past.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Once you identify with the label, then you will unconsciously project that outcome, which you claim to not want into the future. Mhmm. And in doing so, you will have repeatable evidence
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:Of that, which will deepen the belief over time, and it becomes a self fulfilling prophecy. And so what I'm hearing you say is that the first step to shifting that energy is acceptance. Mhmm.
Speaker 2:Well,
Speaker 1:I guess the first step is awareness. This is going on for me. Mhmm. Then there's acceptance of it.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:From that place, the energy is freed up to do something differently with it. Mhmm. So then let's move to that Mhmm. Which is let's assume you didn't want to give up, but you wanted to continue. You wanted to get a role on Broadway.
Speaker 1:What what actions would you take differently knowing what you know now? Well, I
Speaker 2:would have hired a coach if I could have afforded it back then. Definitely. I think I really isolated myself in that experience, and science is showing more and more and more that so much healing and personal development happens when we surround ourselves with like minded people. I think I would have found a support system back in the day. And, you know, knowing what I know about the nervous system now, I would I would have really learned to feel the feeling I was avoiding feeling.
Speaker 2:Because a lot of the times, again, going to the the stage metaphor, we don't quote unquote put ourselves out there or get on stage to, you know, be let ourselves be seen or share a message with a community or whoever you're speaking with because we're afraid to feel something. So we think if we avoid it, we don't have to feel it, but that is not a long term strategy to really living a big life. The the people that I know and see and, blessed to to be able to coach in this life, when they become free of the feeling of the thing that they're avoiding, they go do it because they've created safety inside their body to feel that sense of disappointment. I was on a call again with a friend today who is doing amazing work in her business, and she has some really elite people in her world. And she said she's like, I just I'm feeling like I gotta show up.
Speaker 2:I feel like I'm gonna let them down, that I'm not gonna be able to hold amazing space for them in the way that I want to. And so she'd processed in her own way. You know? Like, okay. Let me just feel that part inside of me right now that doesn't feel good enough.
Speaker 2:Let me feel that fear of, like, okay. What if I let these people down? And it's counterintuitive because a lot of us weren't taught to feel anything other than joy and ecstasy and happiness and all these higher emotions on the emotional rating scale. Right? But, ironically, when you embrace disappointment, when you embrace not enoughness, when you embrace failure, when you embrace rejection, that is the ultimate freedom because you're not manipulating life, like I like to say, to be different than what it is.
Speaker 2:So you don't feel a feeling.
Speaker 1:So I get curious. The Jamie that I met and got to know early on impressed the hell out of me by her. Yes. Yes. But very specifically in your confidence and willingness to invest in yourself, and take what I would have personally considered very outsized financial risks to do it.
Speaker 1:For instance, when you were first taking your master certification and coaching program, you invested, I think in the 2nd year, somewhere, approximately 80% of your income upfront. So 80% of what I will make this year, mind you, this isn't coming out of savings. Like there's nothing in that. Yeah. I'm just throwing it on a credit card and that's going to work.
Speaker 1:And that, those were decisions that like, really, I was like, wow, like that's amazing. And I wouldn't have done. So how did you shift from too scared to go to an audition to 80% of my income on a credit card won't be an issue?
Speaker 2:Yeah. There's a lot in there, my love. There's a lot of steps. I think probably after that chapter of my life closed of closing down the I'm gonna pursue performing in Broadway chapter and I was in the space of exploration of like, okay. Well, then what what is next?
Speaker 2:I think, oh, I think I know. I know I made a commitment to myself at that time, and I didn't know how or when, but I just knew that I was never going to take myself out of the game of a big dream that I have again. Like because that felt really terrible doing that the first time. And I didn't know how I was going to not do that again, but I just I think I just made an internal vow to myself at that time of, like, I am not going to let my mind really and my lack of emotional intelligence to take me out of the game of life. And I wasn't looking for coaching.
Speaker 2:It was it I was not looking for coaching. I knew I had the ability to perform in front of people. I knew I had the ability to hold space for people, and I knew I loved the healing arts. And so that's when I started the yoga journey. It's a skill that I have that I can do in my sleep now.
Speaker 2:I've I just it's just so in me. I love it.
Speaker 1:And Did you when you first started, did you have any of that same performance anxiety? Do you can you recall?
Speaker 2:I don't think I did because it was I, you know, I moved to Aspen. I moved to Aspen, Colorado. I didn't know a soul. And I had this just I have nothing to lose mentality. I don't know anybody.
Speaker 2:I'm the new girl in town. I'm gonna get my yoga certification, and I'm gonna start teaching classes. And my skills and gifts of performing really translated there. However, in a more intimate, you know, environment, like a yoga class versus, you know, a big stage with lights, people really see you. So I couldn't come into I mean, I could have, but it would have been inauthentic to come into a small intimate yoga studio and ask for the Colorado and be like, here I am.
Speaker 2:Welcome to class. Right? It's just super gimmicking. Like, I I really had to the and that's the beauty of the healing arts and and yoga and spiritual psychology and all of these, you know, modalities of really learning to understand who the f you are. You're really required to to die.
Speaker 2:You're really required to shed a lot of skins because people can feel that in a room. And I still say that to this day. No matter what, I don't care if you're the most if you have, like, the craziest sequence of a yoga class or if you have the most accolades, you know, if I'm, like, going to some sort of event and there's speakers there and the speakers have all the accolades, like, all that really doesn't matter. What matters is the energy that you bring into a room and how you hold a room. And that is a skill that the political space could really benefit from.
Speaker 2:There's a lot of words in the political space. There's a lot of talking, talking, talking, and there's not a lot of embodiment. Mhmm. That really is the way of consciousness expanding in today's world is really how do you how do you make people feel when you walk into a room? Before you open your mouth, how do you feel?
Speaker 2:So, yeah, when I when I went from, you know, big stage energy to a small yoga room, it required a different part of me to show up in the space. Mhmm. And it was a part that I really liked and a part that I didn't know existed because up until my yoga journey for years, you know, remember, I was this little girl who was buying into the misunderstanding that she had to perform a certain way in order to be loved. And then I was in these yoga rooms with students. They just want Jamie.
Speaker 2:They didn't want me to perform.
Speaker 1:Although it doesn't hurt when you sing in Shavasana.
Speaker 2:Yes. I still am asked to sing in Shavasana a lot. I love it. Yeah. Thanks, honey.
Speaker 2:And I love that. I love that now I'm in this place where all of me in in coaching has done that for me. It's really allowed all parts of me to be seen, and I get and I love that I have the ability to kinda titrate between the different archetypes of Jamie. You know, when I'm holding a client in a 1 on 1 intimate space versus when I'm leading a retreat and, yeah, the performer comes on, and I love that that's still there. I know with all this personal development work and healing journey I've been on, now the performer, she's she's real.
Speaker 2:She's she's not faking it till she makes it anymore. Yeah.
Speaker 1:So now you're here and you're a coach
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:What does it mean to you to be a coach? Mhmm.
Speaker 2:My job as a coach is to embody the presence of unconditional love.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. A
Speaker 2:lot of us, if not all of us, didn't really get that presence of unconditional love. So I'm not there to be my client's parents, but in a way, I really am. Even before my mouth opens in a call, I I close my eyes. I say a prayer, and I just say, let me be the presence of love for this person, however that shows up. So in a way, I kinda am, like, being the parent that they didn't get.
Speaker 2:I'm not, you know, treating them like a child, but I'm really trying to embody the presence of unconditional love. That is my job as a coach. Just being in the presence of love, whether someone realizes it or not or whether they're they have this language that you and I are speaking right now or not, it's felt. Mhmm. And when you feel love, unconditional love, you feel safe.
Speaker 1:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:And when you feel safe, your nervous system relax, your parasympathetic goes on, and you start to receive better guidance and insights from your own inner wisdom.
Speaker 1:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:So to wrap that up, my job as a coach is to be the presence of unconditional love so my clients can have access to their own innate, unique, individual wisdom.
Speaker 1:So I'm hearing that you are creating an energetic container that allows the client to release from the fight or flight place that they inhabit more than they want, which presents as anxiety, stress, overwhelm, fear, indecision, and allows them to tap into a more base essence, unpatterned version of themselves. And then from within that container, you are leading them through various tools, awarenesses, practices, conversations.
Speaker 2:So they can do that for themselves without me there.
Speaker 1:What would some of those things that you would do in a container look like?
Speaker 2:Mhmm. So many things. So a lot of us get lost in our stories. You know? There was a coach once that said I can't remember his name right now, so I can't give credit where credit is due, but he would coach people live in front of big audiences.
Speaker 2:And the person he was coaching would just go on and on and on and on and on about the problem that they're having. And he would so massively, like, interrupt them and say, I don't need your context right now. I just need your content. So one of the ways that helps, I think, all of us really heal and uplevel is having somebody lovingly call us out when we are stuck in our patterns that are holding us back. And a pattern that a lot of us have is we loop.
Speaker 2:We loop, we loop, we loop on problems Yeah. Versus being able to stop ourselves in our track and really go to the root of where that looping is coming from.
Speaker 1:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:So I think one way of really supporting someone is, a, helping them identify what current pattern or belief system or way of being do they perceive as holding them back from getting the thing that they want. And then that pattern gets projected into the space in a coaching container all the time. And so to be the coach that says, hey. You're doing it again. You see?
Speaker 2:Mhmm. You're doing that thing. That doubt, there it is again. And not to make that wrong, but just to help someone call it out and be like, oh, there there's my thing again. That's where I'm getting hooked in my own story and my own suffering again.
Speaker 2:That's really, really powerful for people. Another big area of coaching that I really thrive in and feel really, really is helpful, and I feel confident in serving people is emotional mastery in, as we like to say, expanding their capacity to hold for all the feelings. Like I was saying earlier, there's there's you know, our emotions have a frequency. Every single emotion has a different frequency. And a lot of the times, we only wanna feel the higher vibrational frequency emotions because they feel good, and they're awesome.
Speaker 2:Gratitude, love, joy, ecstasy, happiness, all of that is great. However, there's a a beautiful library of so many other emotions, and a lot of humans are afraid to feel maybe some of those, quote, unquote, lower emotions because they're afraid they're gonna get sucked in it or it's not gonna feel good. And really what I'm learning about emotions as a coach is that they are wisdom. They have so much amazing wisdom that they're trying to get us as the human to see. Yeah.
Speaker 2:And so when we learn how to be with an emotion, not indulge in it and also not avoid it, but really hold that emotion inside of ourselves in a beautiful way, we can hold it. We can accept it, and we can extract the lessons from it and move on more masterfully.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. I can relate to the suppression of emotions. I was one of those people that got trained that happiness was the only acceptable emotion. Yeah. Received affirmation for embodying happiness
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:And received consequence for not. Mhmm. And so I learned, I think, as others may be listening too. And I I didn't know this consciously at the time, but alcohol was a really great emotional suppressant.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:It is a reliable way to not feel feelings. Yeah. And it can feel in the moment, like, what a relief. I had such a stressful day. I'm all over the place, and let me just have a couple bourbons, and all of a sudden, like, my head isn't going a 100 miles an hour.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. And It's
Speaker 2:very effective.
Speaker 1:Well
Speaker 2:Until it's not?
Speaker 1:Yes and no. Right? It it is effective in shutting down the hamster wheel that's spinning too fast in my head. I'll use myself in this. However, it is not effective at all in changing the condition of the hamster, or the wheel, or the thoughts.
Speaker 1:And so the next morning, it's right back on. Nothing's been resolved. And when I you don't resolve something over time, the core condition compounds.
Speaker 2:Yeah. I say a lot in my practice, if avoiding feelings worked, I would totally teach you and coach you how to do that, but it doesn't.
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Speaker 1:I do that. Maybe it's just a little, like, I wonder if I'm avoiding something even if it's not conscious, or what would it be like to try cessation of that behavior for a week just to see if anything else comes up or I notice? Just to add to their emotional portfolio potentially.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Avoiding can be really sneaky. It can be really obvious sometimes, but it can also be really, really subtle. A few of my clients that maybe avoid having a challenging conversation with a partner, because as children, they were taught to not rock the boat at all. There's avoiding conversations not to feel a certain emotion comes up a lot for people.
Speaker 2:You know, speaking to the leaders as well. Sometimes, I think people in leadership put themselves in leadership positions as a safety mechanism, I can relate to that in some ways. I think I am a natural born leader. I think it's my path to be a leader, and I've also been noticing lately some of the shadow sides of being a leader where sometimes you, you know, put yourself so separate from the audience because you really don't want them to see, you know, a crunchier, more, quote, unquote, vulnerable part of your human experience. Right?
Speaker 2:It's like the leader can also wear a mask as well of, like, let me be here so I can keep my distance.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. I have an excuse to not share because if I do, I'm gonna disrupt the team.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Exactly. That can show up a lot. Avoidance also shows up as you've made this incredible plan for the a new product or launch in some part of your business. You know, you're about to execute on something, but you, you know, procrastinate.
Speaker 2:You shut down the computer, and you don't really, really go for it. You don't fully commit. There's, yeah, tons of ways that we subtly and not so subtly avoid feeling something.
Speaker 1:Got it. So a few things. I'm just recapping that people may be doing to avoid feeling emotions Mhmm. Alcohol or other drugs, not having hard conversations, creating separation through role or position, simply the act of just not feeling. Like, if you just notice, hey.
Speaker 1:I really don't feel that much.
Speaker 2:Or a lot of the time, I'll help clients in the beginning. Like, you and I, we talk we do a lot of 90 day goal setting for our clients, really breaking down goals into bite sized tangible 90 day plans. And I'll have a client. They're so excited. They're making moves towards their 90 day goal, but then they get almost lost in taking action, but they're taking action not on the things that they need to be doing.
Speaker 2:They're like it's like busy work. Busy work can also show up as avoidance. Like, you're staying busy, but are the are the things that you're actually doing moving the needle towards the goal?
Speaker 1:Busy work and then procrastination. Yeah. Okay. So that if you're experiencing any of those things
Speaker 2:Uh-huh.
Speaker 1:You're, like, noticing, oh, I do that. Then maybe it means something, maybe it doesn't. But the opportunity is to go explore and see what it would look like to do something different for a week. See what comes up. Be observationally aware and acute and open to what you learn.
Speaker 1:Now that's one side of the emotional bell curve.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:The other side, this is kinda more my domain, the avoidant side. Yeah. The other side is the indulgent side Yeah. Which is more your domain.
Speaker 2:Correct.
Speaker 1:So can you describe what emotional indulgence is, what it might look like, and why you would want to pull yourself out of it, and then how?
Speaker 2:I have to be careful to not get consumed or overindulgent in the emotion. I think indulgers of the world, I'll just speak for myself, is like, if I just let myself, like, feel this feeling so deeply, so indulgently, if I really just let myself go there, then maybe a, I'll, like, get a release on the other side of it, or, b, I'll, like, take myself such a down such a, you know, deep, dark place that I have an excuse to, like, hide a little bit. It's like, you know, an excuse to not to not show up to my life in the way that I want to because I'm I'm not feeling good.
Speaker 1:It could become an all encompassing reality rather than feeling about reality that can inhibit normal flow of life. So the example that I was thinking about, we like to travel together.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:And so say we are somewhere brand new that we've never been, and we are in a challenged area of the city that's very densely packed, doesn't have law enforcement, etc.
Speaker 2:A lot
Speaker 1:of crime. And the reality is there is crime. The reality is we want to see this community. We want to get to know people. We want to move through it.
Speaker 1:We also want to be safe. So both of us show up. We take a look at this village. Both of us have a hit of fear. Right?
Speaker 1:That's the emotion. It's the early warning system. It's doing what it's supposed to do. The overly avoidant person, me in this case, are like, it's fine. It's just a feeling.
Speaker 1:It's stupid. We've done this a 100 times. It's fine. Let's just go. No planning.
Speaker 1:Walk. And you end up getting robbed. The potential downside in this real world example is you get robbed because you didn't take the you didn't take the information from the thing seriously. Now on the overindulgent side, you feel that fear and you just this is it. This is a 100% gonna happen.
Speaker 1:The world is super dangerous. We shouldn't be here and you never even go in and you miss the conversation. You miss the opportunity to explore it safely. You miss connecting with people. You go back to the Holiday Inn.
Speaker 1:Right? But there's a healthy middle. Yeah. Where you honor the fear, where you learn the lesson, take responsible action. You are on your p's and q's, but you're not so fearful that you are projecting that onto people, and you have deep, real authentic conversations.
Speaker 1:You get to know the place and you stay safe.
Speaker 2:Exactly. So to break that down in that moment, if that were happening, to be able to be present to life in that moment and also honor and accept the reality of what you're feeling and not gaslighting the fear Mhmm. Or or overindulging in the fear. Mhmm. It would probably look like us taking a moment to, like, feel the fear for a second and just name it.
Speaker 2:Like, okay. There's some fear here, and that's okay. This is a new environment. Things look or feel a little sketchy. Like, it's really okay that there's some fear here.
Speaker 2:Like, we would just embrace and accept the fear. If that, like and a lot of the time, fear, it shows up somatically in the body as, like, a tightening in your throat, a pit in your stomach, like, a constriction around your heart. For me, a lot when I fear, it it always comes to the heart. It doesn't really come to the belly much for me. And so it would just be around, like, really just taking a beat, maybe even closing the eyes, breathing, feeling the sensation of fear for, you know, a good window of, like, 30 to 90 seconds.
Speaker 2:And after we, like, give presence to that fear, it starts to subside because all of our emotions, whatever it is, fear or anything else, it's just wanting to be met by us. So when we meet it, like a little kid asking for help, the cortisol goes down, the fight or flight starts to to go away, and we can move into a place of rest and relaxation. We're coregulating with ourselves, and we're coregulating with each other because we're telling each other as a couple or, you know, as a team if this shows up in the professional space, like, hey. What you're feeling is okay. You're safe.
Speaker 2:I'm here with you. It's all good.
Speaker 1:And then when you're out of that immediate autonomic response and you have a workable higher cognition brain back, then you can ask the question of, like, okay. Well, what actions can I take
Speaker 2:Not from the fear, but from a grounded place?
Speaker 1:That's right. Yeah. To improve my chances of both seeing this place that I wanna see And
Speaker 2:being safe.
Speaker 1:And being safe. And so that would look like, like I always say, you know, a handful of small things can reduce your chance of crime in this scenario by 99%. Yeah. Right? First thing is
Speaker 2:Walk with confidence. Walk
Speaker 1:with purpose.
Speaker 2:We always talk about.
Speaker 1:And a smile. Because you want people to know you're friendly, but you don't wanna be a mark. You don't wanna be clear, and you want it to be obvious you have somewhere to go. You know what you're doing and where you are.
Speaker 2:And nervous system regulation hack, making eye contact with people, you start to coregulate. It's just a signal of safety of, like, hey. I see you.
Speaker 1:Yep. I'm here. I'm doing something. I'm friendly.
Speaker 2:So make eye contact my leaders with your, you know, constituents and with the the yelling citizen at you.
Speaker 1:And you wanna know where you're going so that you don't get lost in a in a Eddie where you now are backed in and you don't have any place to go. Yep. You would want to walk with or have access to a local so that you have the ability to communicate if you don't speak the language.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:And you probably would want to have something both for defense and as a gift. Mhmm. Right? So that you can extend to someone. So with some very small examples in this situation, you can mitigate your downside risk by a huge amount and proceed into the world.
Speaker 1:Right?
Speaker 2:Yes. And to make this even more practical for for people and I'm just even thinking, like, knowing what I know now, if and when I was in that audition room and fear was coming up, the fear of not being good enough, the fear of being rejected, whatever it is, in that moment, I would embrace it. I would be like, okay. Like, there's a chance, honey, that you're not gonna get this role.
Speaker 1:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:There's a chance that they're not gonna like you, and that is okay because I'm here with you now. You're safe with me. And at the end of the day, of course, on the ego level, we want other people to see us. We want people to see our magic, see our gifts, but if we can't see it for ourselves, we're not gonna be able to really let people see it as well. So same with leaders.
Speaker 2:Like, before going into a council meeting or before really speaking, you know, your truth in a within a com in a in a crucial conversation with a coworker, like, taking that moment and whatever however that fear is presenting for you, if it is fear, maybe it's anger, maybe it's sadness, maybe it's disappointment. You know, like, just taking a moment to be like, okay. I'm I'm feeling this. I'm gonna let myself feel this. And you'll feel it in your body pass after a while.
Speaker 2:Like, there will be kind of a a lightning that happens. And once that does, then, like Skippy is saying, you can then ask the question, like, okay. Now that the fear is gone, how can I what is the most aligned choice for me to make from this place? Not from my fear, but from a sense of centeredness.
Speaker 1:So I'd like to jump to the next topic, which is very interrelated because most of the things that not all, but most of the things that raise our fear quotient in leadership actually have to do with conflict. Mhmm.
Speaker 2:I
Speaker 1:don't wanna share something because I'm gonna get, you know, screamed at by a colleague. I don't wanna share something because I'm gonna look stupid in public when it doesn't succeed. I don't wanna share something because I'm gonna get threats from citizens or I'm going to get flamed on the Internet. And so the reaction can either be to scream and shout and fight, which almost never gets you the result you're looking for.
Speaker 2:Tiger.
Speaker 1:Or to just not say, I mean, cut down question why you're there. Are you spending your time as you should? Are you effective? Are you any good at this? Yeah.
Speaker 1:And so you talk a lot about nonviolent communication, conscious communication, the the idea of a carefrontation rather than a confrontation. I want you to talk a bit about how somebody can prepare intentionally for a confrontation or carefrontation. What are some of the the steps of preparation, and what are some of the best practices that they can use to have a better than not shot of improving the discourse and coming to a workable conversation and outcome?
Speaker 2:I think first and foremost, becoming aware of what your unconscious patterning is. Like, what is your unconscious response that you go to when conflict arise? Do you go into that fight kinda tiger mode? Do you go more into freeze, deer in the headlights? Do you go into fawning where you will over pacify and placate to the other person's needs, or do you just flee the the scenario altogether?
Speaker 2:I think
Speaker 1:Many people will use more than 1 in different scenarios.
Speaker 2:Right? But, usually, we have out of those are the 4 f's of the nervous system, fight, flight, freeze, or fawn. We usually have one that we go to, and they are all strategies that our biology uses to try to keep us safe. If I fight with this person, I can get on top of them before they get on top of me. If I flee the situation, I don't have to face the conflict.
Speaker 2:I'll be safe. If I freeze, if I don't move, if they don't see me, I'll be safe. If I fawn to them, if I placate and over people, please, or overly compliment them, then I'll be safe. Right? So I think knowing which one is your kinda go to one is is first and foremost where to go, and then heal it at the root.
Speaker 2:We think the external needs to be different before we get our needs met. It's really, really innocent, and we all do it. It's called outsourcing. But when you really learn to go to the root and ask yourself, Where do where in my life did I potentially pick up this nervous system response? Who taught me that this is the way to get safety?
Speaker 2:Did I have parents that modeled like, did they fight a lot? And so I just naturally do it because that's all I was shown. Or maybe you were a child that you had parents fight a lot and so you would go hide and your thing is to flee. That's your nervous system response. Right?
Speaker 2:Whatever your colleagues or whoever this person that you're conflict in, whatever they're bringing up inside of you, that is an invitation for you to get the healing and transformation that you need. It's not about them. It really is not about them, and we always think it is. And that is why, in my opinion, politics is in such a, pardon my French, shit show that it's in because people are just you, you, you, you, you, you. Blame, blame, blame, blame, blame.
Speaker 2:But we need to take this finger that we're pointing at other people and, like, point it inside and be like, okay. Interesting. This is bringing up something inside of me. Let me heal this at the root, figure out what's going on, and then I can approach this situation with this person from a conscious place and not from my unconscious conditioned wounded child self. There's a lot of kids running the show right now.
Speaker 1:In a talk that I do at conferences, I will quote the great poet laureate Macklemore from one of his songs, City Down Sleep, which I think the lyric is, if you wanna see change, put your ones as in your finger, your ones in the air, and turn your ones around because change starts right there.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And it's a recognition that taking radical personal responsibility for everything is the most empowered thing.
Speaker 2:Not the sexiest thing, but, damn, it you get your your power back the minute you take responsibility of how you are participating in the dynamic with someone. Even if someone is coming at you and you did nothing, you still are participating in some way, shape, or form. You attracted this person in, not to punish yourself, but this person is coming into your world. If you wanna take the conscious route like we're taking here, they have come here, and whatever they are eliciting inside of you, whatever they are triggering inside of you, that is an invitation for you to heal the trigger at the root.
Speaker 1:Right. And when you say you've attracted them in for that, the way I hear that with maybe a little bit more of a clinical mind is Mhmm. I have a choice.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:I have a choice how I respond to you in this interview. I have a choice how I feel about this piece of art behind us. I have a choice how I respond to an angry public comment, or to a colleague that I don't like. I have a choice. And I can either choose to be a victim to that, and make it about them to blame them, and go home.
Speaker 1:And how that's gonna show up for me is I'm gonna ruminate, I'm gonna be pissed off, I'm gonna be turning over my head, it's gonna affect my sleep, it's gonna make me short with you. It's going to harm me. Or I can choose to take the empowered position, which is to say, man, I might not like this. I don't agree with this. I don't think this should even happen, but what can I learn from it?
Speaker 1:What can this show me of what I can shift or change, how I can level or how I can evolve? And even if I don't get the outcome that I want the next time, I will know I've done my level best, and I will sleep better, I will love better, and I will lead better.
Speaker 2:That's right. And I just wanna name here that there are people that are victims to terrible things that happen in the world. The word victim right now in our culture, it's held with a lot of negative connotation. And what we're talking about here is not being a victim to the situation at hand. We have power in that choice.
Speaker 2:And the minute we choose to consciously participate in our evolution and use everything that's happening in service for our growth and really not looking at life as this is happening to me versus this is happening for me. I mean, you can just feel it even just saying that. When you're wearing the lens, like, this is happening to me right now. You it's, like, so defeating. But when you put on the glasses okay.
Speaker 2:This kinda sucks right now. This is uncomfortable. But, man, this is happening for me right now. What might that be?
Speaker 1:I recorded another podcast recently with Ashley Gremel, which may or may not have been out yet, but she talked about how she's been raped twice. There's no part of that experience that was her fault, or her doing or her choice or that should have ever happened, she said, like, from the moment that I could say, this is what happened, this is where we are, and share that with others, it was so empowering to herself and others Yeah. That it normalized it. And she said, you know, while she would never wish it on anyone or even on herself, she's learned a lot, and she's grown and become a better person because of that.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Not everyone's gonna be ready for that perspective, and that's really okay. Everyone's at a different place in their journey.
Speaker 1:But my point is that to accept something is not to agree with it. Yeah. To accept something is not to think that it should have happened. It's just to recognize that the only thing you have to work with is what is. And so when we say the word victim, victim is not, like, the act.
Speaker 1:It's your orientation to it.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. Mhmm. Yeah. And I'm a big student of Caroline Miss, who is an incredible she's been in the personal development game before personal development was a thing. And she talks about that there's 4 primary archetypes or characteristics inside every single human no matter what their experience is.
Speaker 2:And one of those core archetypes is that there is a victim. There's a there's an inner victim inside all of us.
Speaker 1:Yeah. That part that's in all of us. Okay. So you've kind of cleared whatever is going on inside. You've recognized what the source of your trigger is.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:And so now you are energetically ready to have a carefrontation.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:What are some of the best practices? Like, what do I say? How do I prepare?
Speaker 2:Nonviolent Communication is an incredible resource. They have a free PDF on their website if you wanna check them out, and the framework essentially is coming into a conversation with someone that you're in conflict with. You're always using ownership language. Because the minute you go, you made me feel this way, you did this, you didn't do that, the other person is gonna put their guard up and go into defense mode automatically. But when you say, hey.
Speaker 2:I felt this way when this went down. This is how this made me feel. When you really just share your authentic experience and you share, you know, I've I felt really frustrated by what you said. I feel really sad that this is how our dynamic is right now. Whatever the feeling is, really expressing it through ownership language is really, really important and really, really powerful because then you're modeling to other people for them to do the same as well.
Speaker 1:The
Speaker 2:it's it's so unconscious in our culture. Like, you made me feel this way. Nobody can make you feel a certain way. They can elicit an emotion that's inside of you, but that's you. You they can't make you feel any way without your consent.
Speaker 2:So really taking ownership language and then making a loving request, you know, next time when this happens and asking permission. Would you be willing to do this next time this happens? And that way, you start enrolling the other person in coming up with a solution so they feel a part of it versus you are coming at them demanding something of them because nobody likes to be told what to do.
Speaker 1:So and to that end, how do you initiate the conversation?
Speaker 2:I usually when I have to have a hard conversation with you or with a friend, I feel really uncomfortable and vulnerable, and I just name that. And you see that good public speakers, if they're feeling nervous, they just name it. They're like, oh, I'm feeling some nerves right now. And I'll say that. I'll say, I don't have a very eloquent way of saying this right now, and I feel really uncomfortable, and I feel really cringey around this right now, but I know it's important for me to talk to you about this for the sake of our relationship.
Speaker 2:And so I'll just open with that a lot of the time.
Speaker 1:But you'll also ask me if I'm available.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Because if you're not available, there's it doesn't matter what how amazingly I talk to you. If you're shut down or if you're not in a space to really hear it, it's not gonna work.
Speaker 1:So I just wanna just highlight that, which is if you wanna have a conversation with someone, the first step is to open and ask for the conversation, but be willing to hear a no. Yeah. As if you simply if you use ownership language, but you accost somebody in the hallway and start telling them your ownership language
Speaker 2:I feel this way. They're gonna be like, I don't care who you feel.
Speaker 1:I mean, this person's crazy. I'm not here for this. And
Speaker 2:overall So set the scene. Like, set the environment. Make it a make it a date. Like, be conscious about it. Like, hey.
Speaker 2:I got something I wanna run by you. It'll take 20 minutes, or it's it's like this might be a longer conversation. Do you have some time later today or tomorrow or whenever?
Speaker 1:Yeah. So opening, asking permission
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:Preparing so you know what you want to say and you know going in, how you've been feeling.
Speaker 2:That's where you and I are different. I'm really a on the on the fly kinda girl. Yes. Prepare, but also, like, speak from your heart. Just be vulnerable.
Speaker 2:Be in your heart when you're talking to someone. And I wanna I wanna differentiate that a lot of the time when I say be in your loving or be in your heart with someone, a lot of people think that that means be ooey gooey, be mushy, be soft, but also love can come really direct and fiery. Sometimes if someone crosses a boundary with me that does not feel good and they've crossed it multiple times, like, I'm gonna be loving, but I'm gonna be direct. I'll be like, hey. I asked this, and you didn't do it again.
Speaker 1:When you say in the heart, you mean authentic, true, clear. Yeah. Yes. The reason I'm I'm saying preparation is because if you're even having if you're even listening to this, you're in some form of fear Mhmm. About the conversation.
Speaker 1:And the first thing that goes is our memory. And so we have spent all this time thinking about it, but if we don't do preparation for many, not for all, you're gonna consciously ask for this conversation. You're gonna sit down, and you're gonna go blank.
Speaker 2:And don't be afraid to use your notes. Like, be an authentic person in that moment. Be like, you know what? Like, this is this is important to me. This our relationship matters.
Speaker 2:I've written down some thoughts, and it might look silly and but I don't care. What's more important to me is that I really speak what
Speaker 1:You can own
Speaker 2:it. What I want. Own it. Yeah. Don't hide and be like, I have to be perfectly rehearsed and blah blah blah.
Speaker 1:Whether that system for you is, like, my brain is just great at this, like Jamie, or you have more need for aids like me, you are wanting to think about ahead of time and prepare to be able to accurately from the heart correctly share how you've been feeling, the behaviors that you've noticed that have led for that, and what your desired changes are. And and I'm reflecting what I heard from you. You're also open and willing to truly listen, to change your perspective, and to hear those things from the other person, and to seek some form of mutual resolution through the open exchange of those ideas.
Speaker 2:It's the best you can do. It's really the best you can do.
Speaker 1:And, also, to detach from the outcome. Like, be really invested in in the conversation, but recognize that you alone cannot solve this. Mhmm. And it may or may not go as you planned or well at all, and that's okay. All you can do is show up the best you can.
Speaker 2:Let's talk about that for a second. We we say it a lot in our work, being highly involved in whatever it is that you're involved in, but lowly attached to the outcome. It's really an incredible way to live, highly engaged with whatever's coming, but lowly attached to the results. And I really think you can actually authentically be unattached if you are holding a presence of unconditional love and safety inside yourself. Because if you don't lose you, then you're good.
Speaker 2:You're free. Like, I'm gonna love myself. I'm gonna be okay regardless of what goes down in this conversation. That allows that just gives your whole being permission to be really highly involved and unattached to what happens.
Speaker 1:Okay. So I want to shift into the experience of being a partner of a public servant. We When we started dating, I was on city council, I was in elected office, and you've been along with me in this journey into coaching and supporting others in the public space, but also still being involved through state boards, commissions, non profit boards, and I think it would be beneficial for the listener to start to have some sense of what this might actually be like for their spouse, significant other, boyfriend, girlfriend, or otherwise. Mhmm. Can you speak a little bit to what it's like to be the partner of a public servant?
Speaker 2:Well, I don't have a ton of experience in it since we've had 2 years together in that space. I think that's enough to have some insight.
Speaker 1:You lived through a campaign.
Speaker 2:Yeah. I did. And I get really invested. You know? I would tune in to watch the stream of the council meetings to watch you and also to, like, see where you guys were on the agenda to know if you'd be home in time for dinner or not.
Speaker 1:Generally not.
Speaker 2:Generally not. And I think I think for any couples, if either of you are in places of leadership or just one of you are, I think it's really important to simultaneously learn how to be there for your partner, really support them while also maintaining your autonomy. I think learning the skill of holding both of those roles, like I am my own autonomous individual, but I'm also here for you, I think is really healthy. Because I think if you're too much on one side or the other, if you're like totally separate from the process, it feels just inauthentic. It feels like there's a side of you that I'm not, like, really embracing.
Speaker 2:And then if I'm too much in the campaign or too much in what you're doing, I think and this is this kinda happens all unfortunately, a lot for women. They lose their own sense of identity. And enmesh. They enmesh. And we ain't here to enmesh.
Speaker 2:We're here to be 2 individual, autonomous, whole individual beings that when we engage in our individual mission or our shared mission, it's this experience of both of us supporting one another and and raising the bar together. So I shared with you before, I think if you do run again, that I'll probably be a little more involved in the campaign because I think how you do anything is how you do everything. And then I think it's really empowering and important and to be really transparent with people that you're asking for a vote for them to see who you really are behind the the leadership role. And I think who you do life with, because I think that's the the most telling thing
Speaker 1:about you. Best indicator of your decision making?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:But what was it like? What was it like to have people come up and ask about me or Mhmm. To have somebody complain about a policy to you or to read a nasty op ed in the paper or to have me, you know, not come home from meetings until 11 at night, multiple days a week.
Speaker 2:At first, I think I got into a lot of inner, like, inside defense where I felt like I had to defend you. And I also think you are who you spend the most time with. So naturally people would put me and you as if our belief structures are identical, and we have a lot of common and same beliefs and values. That's why we're in partnership together. But I think if people don't like you, they they start to not like me too.
Speaker 2:That's kind of a hard pill to swallow because I am a people pleaser. I'm a recovering one. And but there but then there becomes a point where it's like, you're my man. Like, I got you. I'm gonna support you.
Speaker 2:And I and regardless if if you're my man or not, I really believe in your heart and your integrity, and I I would vote for you even if you weren't my partner. Right? So, yeah, it can be challenging to know what's mine, what's yours, what's not, any of those things.
Speaker 1:If we were to do it again, if we were gonna run again
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:What would you do to support yourself Mhmm. To better support your autonomy, but also to better support your emotional self to deal with the brunt of those incoming attacks?
Speaker 2:Mhmm. I think you have a pretty healthy approach to the haters and the attacks, which is to not really give it much energy. We listen to it. We acknowledge it. People have something to say.
Speaker 2:But at the end of the day, we all trigger each other. We're all triggering each other all the time. It's what you do with it that, really is supportive. So I probably, honestly, I would probably use it as a vehicle for me to just even go deeper into my own inner work. And every time I get triggered and just, like, really practice what I preach a lot, like, really, really do my own inner work around it.
Speaker 2:And, also, there comes a part in the personal development journey when telling someone to just kinda f off is, like, really appropriate. Like, that's great. I I hear you. You're allowed to have an opinion, but you're not allowed to
Speaker 1:You can draw a boundary.
Speaker 2:Yeah. You're not allowed to be mean to me. Yeah. GTFO.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yeah. Or just to call them out into the awareness of that behavior. I've experienced several times where people were acting in that way that was hurting, say, a member of my campaign staff.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And I reached out to let them know and came to find out that they had no idea that's how that were impacting and that they were apologetic and shared their story. And so sometimes it's about just lovingly holding up a mirror Mhmm. To somebody so they can do that.
Speaker 2:I'd probably do that a little bit more. I think my tendency is to shrink and to hide from conflict. I don't wanna go to the counter of that and fight with conflict, but I think finding a happy medium of of of being in the game with it and not not being afraid of being, an active participant in a campaign.
Speaker 1:So the last piece that I wanna touch on here is you are an incredibly masterful partner in supporting me Nice. When I'm having a tough day Yeah. When I'm bringing something home from the office, so to speak. Mhmm. And I wonder if you could share some of the things that you do to show up in that way.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. Read the room. Read the room. If if you a lot of the time, I have, you know, a list of things that I need from you or I need to run by you or I need your help with after being away from each other for a workday. And I gotta check-in again, like, is this person available to hear what I'm saying right now?
Speaker 2:And if you're not, I'm not going to start something that's going to end in you being hangry. Right. Most of the time we're most of the time we're just hangry. Most of the time you and I just need food and all of our problems get solved. So reading the room, waiting for the moment to to, engage.
Speaker 2:But if it's pressing, like, I don't wanna just fawn and be like, oh, he's in a bad mood. I'll just, you know, not do this. I'll be like, I'll acknowledge. I'll just be like, hey. I'm noticing you're, like, tired right now.
Speaker 2:I'm noticing you're frustrated. I'm noticing you're you got some energy going on, and I'm here for you, and I love you. And I still need you to show up to our life right now as well. There's some time pressing issues that I gotta get handled right here and now. It's important for all partnerships, whether one is in a leadership position or not, is to to call each other forward.
Speaker 2:And, it's all an art, my love. It's all an art of, like, being able to feel where you're at, gauge what I think you can or cannot handle, and also honor my needs and honor what I need and what our partnership needs. And and treating our partnership like a third entity, I think, is really powerful too. It's like there's you, there's me, but then there's our relationship. It's like, what does the relationship need right now?
Speaker 2:And we will, need right now?
Speaker 1:And we will we will get into those moments. I mean, when we were, say, traveling in Indonesia, and I was having the time of my life, and we realized, oh, shit. Jamie
Speaker 2:is not.
Speaker 1:She's completely overwhelmed by this and shutting down in a panic state. Completely overwhelmed by this and shutting down in a panic state. There's a moment of, in my head, wanting to be selfish, wanting my trip, wanting to go where I wanna go. There's the part of me that wants to be generous and benevolent that's, like, we'll give Jamie what she wants, and then there's the 3rd part of me that realizes, oh, you're having an argument in a competition between 2 people for who gets their needs met. Actually, this isn't about either of those.
Speaker 1:There's no winner or loser. This is about family first.
Speaker 2:Family first.
Speaker 1:What's best for the unit? Let's do that. And I think in high stress situations, coming back to that is really beautiful, and ultimately it is what happens within the home that I think is the greatest grounding and anchor for any potentiality of any public servant, and getting what's right between the walls of the house first, is arguably the best thing you can do to set yourself up for success.
Speaker 2:Yeah. And a lot of challenges we hear of where people's leadership journey isn't going well. It's because of the toll that it's taking on the family, and they and family takes a back seat.
Speaker 1:Yes. It goes in both directions.
Speaker 2:Right. So what would what would happen if you really did put family first and gave as much weight to that as much as your leadership position and vice versa, they really start to feed and serve one another versus going into this black or white thinking of like, I can only if I do leadership, then that's gonna mean my family life comes at a cost. Or if I put my family first, I can't show up in my leadership position. There is a world where both can coexist beautifully and they can start to feed each other, which is really where you want a cohesive life. You know, this whole work life balance thing, I really don't like it.
Speaker 2:I really like the idea of work life harmony where all of them are weaving and working together. I think that's a really powerful reframe because we want leaders to feel resourced at home, and we want the family to feel resourced too. It's all it's all working together.
Speaker 1:Yeah. It reminds me that while time is our most valuable nonrenewable resource, it is a scarce resource. The way we spend it is not scarce. We can choose to use our time in ways that amplify the experience and the agency of each moment or subtract from that. And so we don't have to choose family or work.
Speaker 1:We can act in ways where we're getting more out of each moment with each of those and that they're reinforcing and amplifying each other, and each are better for the opposing one.
Speaker 2:That's part of our secret sauce as well that I'm sure we'll coach and train people with in the future. I think we have a shared mission, and being partners that are choosing to do life personally and professionally together. It could be really easy to not want to do professional things because it might hurt the relationship. But I think you and I are working and finding a really beautiful way of having them feed each other.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Mhmm. I think that's as beautiful as anywhere to start to wrap up. I am so grateful for you. My life would be immeasurably different and worse without you.
Speaker 1:This podcast wouldn't exist without you and not just the one that you're on, but having you as a support system in my life really makes all of this possible. And I'm just so grateful to you for that.
Speaker 2:I love you. Thank you. I love
Speaker 1:you. Thank you for hanging in there.
Speaker 2:The Josh Groban song just came on. You raise me up so I can stand on mountains.
Speaker 1:He's gonna go clean herby for us on the mission.
Speaker 2:Raise me
Speaker 1:up. So before we go, the last question that I always ask each guest, which is our listeners are not passive observers. They are the people in the arena. They're the ones that are making the change.
Speaker 2:Bless you.
Speaker 1:And if you could leave them with just one thing, one quote, one saying, one perspective, one practice, one thing and one thing alone that they could apply to be the greatest vector to heal our politics starting now, what would you leave them with?
Speaker 2:Expanding your emotional range and feeling your feelings is not a luxury. It really is a necessity for you to integrate and embody and really lead from your most whole authentic worthy self.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. And where can people find you if they need a coach, if they need a leading lady container to get into, if they just wanna follow you on the socials, anything you wanna share?
Speaker 2:Jamie Butemeyer is my Instagram handle and website, jamiebutemeyer.com. Jamiebutemeyer.com. Jamie, b as in boy, u t e, m as in Mary, e y e r. And I have a 6 month signature program. It's called the Leading Lady, and I have an incredible just community of heart centered mission driven folks in my world.
Speaker 2:And community really is a missing ingredient in a lot of people's success journeys. And so finding groups, finding communities that you feel deeply held and seen by, it is a game changer.
Speaker 1:Well, thank you so much, my love. I hope you have a beautiful evening. I think we have a dinner ahead of us. Bye for now. Thank you so much for joining us today.
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