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"A LOT with Audra" is the podcast for women juggling big dreams and full lives. Each episode, host, Audra Dinell, Midwestern wife, mom and neurodivergent multi-six figure entrepreneur encourages women to embrace their many roles holistically by living a values-based life with confidence and joy. Through candid discussions, practical strategies and inspiring stories, this podcast is your guide to designing and achieving success without losing yourself in the process.
Ep84
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Summit Recap Kickoff
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[00:00:00]
Audra Dinell: [00:01:00] Hey, happy Monday of back to school week. I am recording this the Friday before you're hearing it, and I have come from two whole days at the Global Leadership Summit. It's one of my favorite events every single year, and it feels like such a sacrifice to take two days out of the last full week of summer and spend it at a conference and figure out logistics with the kids.
And of course, they tag along to set up the booth the day before because The Thread has a booth at the Global Leadership Summit in Wichita, Kansas, and it is always worth it. I leave with fresh perspectives, deep conversations, and just feeling so filled up. So today, I'm gonna give you a little recap of some of my favorite learnings that I've [00:02:00] just taken in from the Global Leadership Summit, and the first one comes from David Ashcraft.
Embracing Tension
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Audra Dinell: He is the president and CEO of the Global Leadership Network, and he kicked off this year's summit talking about tension. Now, normally when we hear the word tension, we think about hard, sticky, like it just gives us a feeling of wanting to get out of it.
But he really suggested that we reframe tension in a different way so that we can embrace it. When he talked about tension, he talked about the desire that we all have for something more, but we also have things that are really truly needed of us in our real lives. So instead of running away from this tension that exists, whether it be in between contentment and ambition or working or, [00:03:00] and staying home with your family or, you know, more time for yourself versus more time to hone your craft, the thought was to embrace the tension because that's what fuels us.
So for me, I've thought about this over the years as we've gotten deeper into our values work in the Thread community, and especially since we have begun to work with Suzy Welch's Values Bridge as a tool. I've thought about values tension or goals tension. So really just thinking about that word tension and reframing it for myself, and if you're like me, reframing and moving away from like wanting to escape that tension and like just fully embracing it and living into it and knowing that that tension is just a part of growth.
So if you're a person who values growth, which I'm assuming you are if you listen to this [00:04:00] podcast, tension is going to be a part of our lives. Accepting it, embracing it. Okay.
Navigating the Fog
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Audra Dinell: The second takeaway I had was from Jim Collins. Now, I was gifted his brand new book, What to Make of a Life, by one of our Thred alum for my 40th birthday this year. And I have not dug into it completely, but as soon as I got it, I just thought, "Oh my gosh, that is so, so fitting for turning 40, What to Make of a Life."
So Jim Collins had a talk that was based on that body of work.
And one of the things he talked about in his session was this experience of fog. So he talked about we all experience foggy moments in our life. And a fog could be times where we feel lost, or we feel stuck, or we feel f- confused, or we feel uncertain. So we all experience times of uncertainty. And the [00:05:00] first thing is to just recognize that that is the human experience.
There is no human on this earth who is going to go through life clear 100% of the time. However, if you have ever been in a fog, I've certainly been in fogs. I've certainly walked through seasons of uncertainty. If you've ever been in a fog, we tend to add an additional layer where we are sort of like shaming ourselves or, guilting ourselves for being in a fog instead of accepting it as part of the human experience.
So I loved that he just, like, normalized fog because we look out there, right, on social media or other people in our world that we can compare ourselves to, and we tend to think, "Oh, my gosh. They have it all together. They know what they're doing. They never seem uncertain. They seem so confident." But no, it is part of the human experience to deal with uncertainty [00:06:00] at times.
And Jim Collins calls this the fog. He talks about navigating the fog. And my favorite way that he talked about, which we've talked about on this podcast, is just looking down at your feet and deciding which is the next right step to take. I think so often, you know, we want the big plan, but when we're in foggy seasons, we just have to look down and take a next step.
We have to take whatever action feels most aligned from that place and just have that faith that it will all connect on the other side. He talked about when you're in a fog, be very careful to avoid making big irreversible decisions, right? Because sometimes when we're in that uncertain place, we just wanna be like, "Okay, I'm moving to Europe," or, "Okay, [00:07:00] I'm quitting my job," or, "I'm leaving this relationship," or, "I'm turning the corner in some really big, bold way.
But instead, release that need to do the big, bold thing and just look down at your feet and think, "What is a small step I could take right now?" Maybe it's reaching out to a friend. Maybe it's getting a hobby. Maybe it's getting off social media. Maybe it's choosing to double down on my morning routine and spending more time pouring into myself.
Little steps. Look down at your feet. Figure out what's next.
Freedom and Self Renewal
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Audra Dinell: The third thing I'm really taking away from this year's Global Leadership Summit is also from Jim Collins' book, and that is reframing what freedom means to me. So I am a person who values agency. That's one of my top values, [00:08:00] and when I think about agency, I definitely think of time freedom and choice freedom, and I loved this concept where he switched the definition of freedom from being the ability to do anything we want whenever we want, no limits, to freedom being the ability to choose our responsibilities.
And the reason he made that shift was he did these studies over at least a decade, and one of the studies was on Ben Franklin. And he talked about researching all the biographies that have been written on Ben Franklin, and in all of the biographies that have ever been written on Ben Franklin, his life starting at 60 and beyond made up 53% of what was covered in the biographies.[00:09:00]
And so his whole point to this was that we as leaders are responsible for our self-renewal. We as leaders are responsible for stroking our inner fire. It is not too late. This felt very second act. Thank you, Ben Franklin It is not too late to make impact. And in fact, some of the greatest people that we know have spent the later years of their life, their second and even third acts, doing work that was for them and lit them up.
And because they were living in their skills and strengths and aptitudes, and they were so on fire for their work, the impact they made was so great. I also just, like, wanted to double-click on his point that as leaders, it is our job to self-renew. It is our job to get [00:10:00] excited about life and about work.
And of course, there are gonna be seasons where we're not feeling that way. But instead of looking outside our circle of control of like, "Why am I not feeling this way? What is going on?" Reminding ourselves that it's our responsibility. It's our responsibility to be pumped about life. So I think that all tied back to When it is our responsibility to self-renew and when we let go of those time limitations that society or somehow got into our heads.
we can look at freedom differently, and that's the freedom to choose our responsibilities. Because when freedom is anything and everything and just anything we want, our fire can start to die Okay. There was so much more from the Global Leadership Summit, but I am literally, like, [00:11:00] an hour post it right now, and will be digesting more of what I learned over time.
But those were three of the lessons that I just walked away feeling so renewed by.
Bonus Ted Lasso Lesson
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Audra Dinell: And then I wanna give just a little bonus lesson. My husband and I last night had a kid-free night, and we watched the first episode of Season 4 of Ted Lasso. So no major spoiler alerts, but perhaps turn this off if you don't want any clues on what the first episode of Season 4 is going to be about.
In this episode, Ted is presented with a choice, and the choice boiled down to do I stay safe and small and comfortable and here where I am Or [00:12:00] do I take a leap, a big, bold leap? And do I ask a question that makes me nervous And is it worth it to pivot again for something that lights my heart on fire?
And that episode just felt so, so good to me in this season of life and business. I won't spoil it and tell you what he does, but I'm sure you can guess But sometimes it takes us really taking a good look at what's working in our life, what's good in our life, but then also measuring it up against what could be, what might be great, and making that leap.
Wrap Up and Next Week
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Audra Dinell: So thank you for listening. I hope you have a wonderful last week with your kids if you still have kids at home like I do. I know I'm gonna be [00:13:00] enjoying the next three days just trying to be present and focus on my little guys before school starts on Thursday. If you are local to the Wichita area or follow the thread, you have likely seen some evolutions in the news, and I wanted to let you know that next week the team will be on, and we will be talking all about the layers we peeled back over the last 18 months to kind of get where we are, and a little bit more about where we're going.
So stay tuned for that.