A 15-Year Career Retrospective Introspective

What did you desire for yourself in the past? What did you think and believe in the past that have now become your current reality? What do you believe now? What is your dream for the future? These are some of the questions I answer for myself in this career retrospective introspective episode.

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Full Episode Transcript

Hello! Welcome to Episode 46 of Born to Thrive with Jamie Lee.

Another episode, another police siren here in New York City.

Can you hear that? It’s kind of beautiful how well we are taken care of. That’s the thought I have as I hear the police - or the ambulance, I’m not sure - pass by.

It is December. Happy December! It is my birth month and I want to celebrate our struggles.

I want to celebrate all of our frustrations.

I want to celebrate all of our exhaustion, failures, facepalm moments, the moments of despair and just sheer disappointment.

All those moments of self doubt.

All those moments of almost giving up on our dreams, almost giving up on being bolder, braver and better paid because it just felt too hard, it just felt too unlikely, it felt too embarrassing - potentially embarrassing - and just the thought of it was painful.

I want us to celebrate all those moments of pain that we endured to get to where we are today in December 2018.

Because without those moments, we don’t thrive.

It is because of those moments of negative emotion, of almost giving up, of doubting and then overcoming the doubt and the fear and the shame and the guilt that we thrive.

That is why we are born to thrive.

I’ve been mulling on several big questions over the past few days.

A client asked me, “How did you get hired? How did you make your first $60,000-$70,000?”

And Catalyst, which is a leading not-for-profit headquartered here in New York that is all about advancing diversity and inclusion in corporate America for women and minorities, they asked me to come and speak about the unwritten rules of the workplace. That’s a webinar happening next week, December 11th.

And at the same time, I’ve been asking some big questions to myself because tonight I’m gonna be meeting with my Mastermind to talk about our big goals, our Wildly Improbable Goals (WIGs for short) for 2019. Last year we met and set WIGs for 2019 and I shattered through nearly all of them.

So, the net effect here of mulling on these big questions about my past, about my experience in the workplace and also about where I am going in the future, the net effect of all of that is I became retrospective, looking back, but also introspective, looking in.

And so I thought it would be really fun to do this episode and walk you through my career journey and share with you what I see when I look back, retrospectively, and what I see when I look in, introspectively.

What was I thinking and believing then?

And I think that’s really important because when I think about what I was thinking and believing in the past, I see they created the results I have now in my present.

My past thinking created my present results and therefore, in order for me to create new results in the future, I have to have some new thinking.

So I will share with you some of my new thoughts for 2019 and beyond.

But, before we go there, the unwritten rules.

What are the unwritten rules?

Well, when I think about my own career trajectory, there are three things that come to mind.

First is that there are no rules. You gotta throw the rulebook out.

Why? Because everyone’s journey, everyone’s life, everyone’s career trajectory is as unique as their thumbprint. So there is no hard and fast rule about how to do your career.

And so for the person who asked me, “Well, how did you get hired? How did you make money?” I’ll share with you my herstory if you will but I want you to resist the temptation to compare your trajectory to mine because, again, my life is as unique as my thumbprint as your life is as unique as your thumbprint.

And also, when you think about the rules of the workplace or your career rules, I think it’s actually more often the case that the written rules may not apply.

Case in point is yesterday I went to a talk given by another Catalyst researcher, Katherine Giscombe, who is the expert on women of color and their experiences in corporate America.

And she cited this really fascinating research that out of the 15 companies that she studied for her research, 14 out of the 15 said that they have accountability in terms of supporting minority women of color and helping them advance in their companies.

And yet when they asked the actual women of color at these companies, 17%, so that’s more like 1 out of 15 rather than 14 out of 15, I don’t know if the math is correct but when you think about the ratio it’s like the inverse, right?

The majority of the companies that say yes, they have a written standard of upholding diversity and inclusion and having accountability for this and yet most of the people did not actually experience that to be true for them, especially the women of color.

So, yeah. I think the first rule is really that there are no rules.

Having said that, another unwritten rule of the workplace is that you need a future focus.

And this is really interesting because nobody teaches us how to have future focus.

We don’t learn how to have a future focus in school and I think that’s why so many of us struggle with articulating our future potential when it comes to advocating for the value that we bring because it’s hard for us to dream big, to think big, and thereby lead big.

It’s easier for our minds and our brains to think about what we have done in the past and how can we recreate that.

But in leadership and negotiation, it’s about influencing and motivating people to change the status quo and in order to do that, you need to have a big future focus.

You need to tell us how awesome the future is going to be, this alternative future that your leadership and your ask will make possible.

And finally, the third thing I want to say about unwritten rules is that you have to let your desire guide you towards the career of your dreams.

And remember there are no unwritten rules. You gotta throw the rulebook out. Each career trajectory is going to be unique as your thumbprint and so that means you gotta follow that little tug inside your heart.

You gotta follow that little inkling, that slight suggestion, the hint that you get from you, from that little voice inside you.

So, having said that, I will quickly walk you through my resume.

And in the beginning of my career, when I first graduated from Smith College, wow, nearly fifteen years ago, I didn’t know how to navigate the working world.

I am an immigrant. My parents are immigrants and I watched them work 10, 11 hour days at their store, their gift shop in Queens, for 364 days out of the year and so what I learned from watching them is you just work and work and work and work and somehow that’s how you manage to make the rent, manage to put food on the table, and you just work and work and work and work.

But how to network, how to build a personal brand, no, they didn’t do any of that, so I didn’t learn from the example of my parents. I had to teach myself.

I began by just a lot of trial and error. And last night when I attended this talk about how women of color advance in corporate America, they mentioned that trial and error is not one of the strategies that work, and I thought, “Okay, well, that’s interesting to me because, for me, that’s how I grew my career. That’s how I started my career.

I applied to jobs on Craigslist.

And then the first place that offered me a paying job, I took it. And nearly fifteen years ago, it was with this little internet company called Legal Match. I don’t know, I don’t think they are around anymore and I was basically a sales development representative or a glorified telemarketer.

I would call up law offices and try to pitch them on a subscription to this internet service and I got paid $10 an hour with $20 commission for every appointment booked and I was there for just a few months.

But what I realize when I look back on it now is that I was so hungry to get a job that any job was okay for me because I desired so strongly to move out of my mother’s couch in New Jersey. Yeah. And so the driving belief back then was I must, I will get a job, any job will do. You pay me, I will show up and figure it out because I gotta make some money. I gotta make some money and move out.

When I was very young, I dreamt about living in New York City.

I dreamt about living and working in New York City and I was commuting from New Jersey. Not very far, just a quick bus ride, but still it felt like a different world to be in New Jersey, to be in Manhattan was like night and day. Different energy, right? Different culture, different people, different buildings, different experiences and I so desired to find a job in New York City.

And so that’s exactly what I did. I mean, I was not very picky.

So after a few months at this little internet company where I was calling up law offices as a sales rep, I desired for something better. I desired to find a better job, a job that is more fulfilling, a job that perhaps makes use of my education.

I studied Japanese in college and I studied abroad in Tokyo for my junior year abroad and so I applied through a Japanese temp agency and landed a temp receptionist position at an international organization that was going to build a nuclear power plant in North Korea.

That’s right.

You heard me right.

This organization, in 2005 was going to build a nuclear power plant in North Korea. No, that was actually 2004, I stand corrected.

It was organized like the UN as a conglomerate of international diplomats: Japanese, South Korean, American, European, the EU, and I was so excited when landed this temp job as a receptionist. It was like I won the lottery because I am idealistic, if you can’t tell by now, and it really resonated with my dream and desire to contribute to world peace.

So, the long story short here was that during the Clinton administration, former President Jimmy Carter brokered, negotiated a deal in which the international community will build North Korea a sustainable and renewable source of energy in exchange for their promise to stop building nuclear weapons but we all know what happened to that promise. They broke it.

So by the winter of 2005 after the presidential election when Bush was re-elected, the whole organization came to a screeching halt. Everything just stopped. So my dream job became sort of a nightmare job because every day I would go into the office and sit in icy silence.

I got paid $14 an hour, by the way, so I was starting to make a little bit more money and here I was, it was supposed to have been my dream job but no, it turned out it was not my dream job.

I vividly recall commiserating with my college friend. One day We got together for coffee and we were so miserable at our first jobs out of college. They were so disappointing. The pay was so low. Office culture was so...ugh, just frustrating.

And I recall she and I, we kept telling each other, “You know what? It’s only going to get better. It’s only going to get better from here. It’s only going to get better.” I worked at believing it. I really did.

And guess what? It did.

Over time, It did.

After working at this international organization for six months as a temp receptionist getting paid $14 an hour, I saved $2,000. And I felt like I had a lot of money. $2,000.

I moved out of my mother’s couch. I found a little apartment share in Queens and I quit my temp job. I had $2,000, so I had exactly 4 months’ rent, nothing else.

It’s funny. It’s really funny now but also I’m really inspired. I have a lot of respect for my future self for having so much faith and taking such a risk. I mean, I wouldn’t do that now. I have bigger bills to pay but even if I had just four months of whatever, I don’t know if I could…

Anyway, the point being here, I made my dream come true.

I moved out of my mother’s couch. I was now living in New York City. I did have a job. And now I needed to get a new job and my desire, I had a strong desire to just make it work. And because I saw my parents work really hard and make it work in America, I decided I can do it too.

And so, I just hustled, I went back to Craigslist.

Do people even still do that? I don’t know.

I got a restaurant hostess job and I got paid $12 an hour, so I went back in pay, but that’s okay. And I made it work.

But of course this was a temporary solution because I realized, hey, I’m college-educated, I speak all these languages, I can do better.

And so the belief I had back then when I was doing this hostess job was, hey, this is temporary. This is temporary.

And eventually I got hired by a Korean company as a purchasing assistant and I was buying really fancy things like steel copper plates. And I got paid $30,000 annual salary. And I was driven then by my desire to play to my strengths and I taught myself how to type and write business Korean.

I’m ethnically Korean, I was born in South Korea. I came to the United States after having just learned the Korean alphabet, basically. I was in the second grade and, yeah, I had just learned how to speak, read and write and then I left, so my formal education in Korean is extremely limited.

I’m fluent in American English. I can speak conversational Japanese because I studied it in college and because I got this job at this Korean company, I’m like, okay, I know some Korean. This is my mother tongue, technically. I can do this.

I had the belief that I can do this so I taught myself how to type and I remember I went and got these little stickers for my keyboard so that I knew which alphabet corresponded to which letter in the Korean alphabet and I taught myself.

It took time but I did it and now when I look back, I’m like damn. I’m impressive.

And I also taught myself how to do negotiation with business people.

I taught myself how to do international business negotiations because I was taking the orders from the headquarters in South Korea in Korean. I would then translate that into English. Well, you know, most of it was already in English but I would translate the demands and the asks and the requests and I would convey them, I would communicate them with my American vendors with whom I had a really great rapport and so I learned firsthand how important it is to have good personal, interpersonal relationships.

Catalyst also supports this. It really boils down to the interpersonal relationships that have an outsized impact on your career success.

I didn’t have such a great interpersonal relationship with the Korean people back in Korea because they were so far away and there was a culture gap because, mind you, I’m Korean-American, you know? I’m not really a Korean from Korea if that makes sense to you.

If you’re an immigrant or if you’re intercultural, you would know what I mean, right?  

So, I eventually decided that I wanted to move on because I believed that I can earn more money. I was making $30,000. That’s not a lot of money. I also believed that I can enjoy my job more. I believed that I can do it. I was feeling a lot of misery but I also was driven by this belief that I can earn and enjoy my job more.

And so, eventually, I did find a job at an American company as a purchasing agent and I ended up earning $43,000 in annual salary. They first offered me $40,000. I negotiated and I said, “Hey, is there room for more?” and they immediately responded with $3,000 additional dollars, so hey, there’s a salary negotiation tip for you. Just ask them, can you do better? See what happens. And for me that was nearly 10% more in salary.I was super happy about that.

And at this American company where I was working as a purchasing agent, we had a new CEO and the new CEO was very charismatic and he wanted to rally the people. He wanted to really connect with the people.

And so he had every one of us fill out a quick survey and I think he took these from coaches because I realize he asked a coaching question. It said, “What do you really want out of life? What do you really want? What really drives you?”

And I wrote down...I thought really hard about this. How do I answer this question? What do I really want? And I wrote down, “I really desire to grow. I really desire growth as a person, as a professional. Personal development. I really want growth.”

And later on, I found out he gave a town hall address and he was like, “Oh, thank you so much for taking that survey, and I found out” - this is what the CEO said - “I found out, to my relief, that nearly all of you said that your family is the most important thing.”

For me, it wasn’t family. I was a single woman living in an apartment share in Queens at that time. For me it was growth. It still is!

And it’s no wonder now, when I look back, I realize, now I make the connection how I ended up where I am today.

I eventually did make $60,000+ when I got a job as a hedge fund analyst and again, it was through Craigslist. Somebody at my old company when I was a purchasing agent, told me that she posted her resume on Craigslist. I don’t know if people still do this. I wouldn’t advise it, in fact.

But I did it and I got a call from this hedge fund that was seeking a qualitative analyst and basically, that’s just a fancy way of saying that they wanted someone to read like two dozen newspapers, research reports, and organize information, just consume a ton of data and digest it and that’s exactly what I did.

And I was making $50,000 annual salary, which I later found out was half of the going market rate but I did earn close to $20,000 in bonus, so that’s how I made my first $70,000. And at that time I had a lot of desire to make money. I still do. I love my desire to make money. My parents taught it to me and I’m really appreciative of that.

But I also was driven by my desire to learn and to work hard and to take a risk. My life partner at that time, I’ll just say my ex-husband at that time, told me not to do this. He told me not to take this risk. He told me not to go for this job.

But I knew that it was worth taking a risk because I can earn more, I can learn more and I can really grow. So now I work as a negotiation and leadership coach, public speaker and I absolutely love what I do and I want to continue to grow personally, professionally, I want to grow my income. I want to become bolder. I want to become braver. I want to become better paid, just as I want to help my clients do the same.

I had a blast from the past this weekend.

As I was mulling over these talking points this weekend, I went to brunch in Manhattan and just, completely coincidentally, my coworker from 12 years ago when I first worked for this Korean company, she came and sat right next to me at this restaurant. Completely out of the blue. Completely at random.

And I found out she is still there. She still works there but she’s been now promoted to senior manager. And it’s really fun to think about, how come she had that trajectory and I have had my own trajectory? And I think it’s because of what we think and believe are so different.

So, what about you? What are you thinking and believing now?

What are you thinking and believing today?

And this is something really important. This is something for you to be really mindful of because what you think and believe, what you desire now will create your future.

What do you want in the future? What do you want your 2019 to be?

How awesome will it be?

Here are some things I believe today:

I believe that the work I do changes lives.

It’s not just about a bigger income. It’s not just about a bigger paycheck. It’s about changing your mindset and when you change your mindset, you change your perspective, you change how you see your world, your world changes.

I believe that I can create my future, not my circumstances.

I believe that all of my failures up to now - and I’ve had many failures, I’ve made tons of mistakes - are as worthy as my achievements. Because my losses are more instructive than my wins.

I believe that my business will grow as I grow as a person, as a professional.

And you know what? I grow.

Like a big, hairy beast.

I just had my seven-month-old nephew come visit me today, earlier today, and every time I see him, he acts differently. He’s now crawling, he’s making funny faces, but it’s just mind-boggling how quickly he is growing. He’s growing like a big, hairy beast and you know what?

So am I.

As a business owner, as an entrepreneur, as a coach, as a person.

Every day I am growing.

I believe that the words I use create my world.

And the best words are the ones that crack me up. And when I was preparing for this, I chuckled, I was like, oh, this is really good! I like this. That’s how I know that I’m using the best words, because they make me laugh.

I believe that every day I am living into the impossible.

What is impossible today will become possible later.

I am quoting my own coach, Brooke Castillo, and when I think about my own life, when I think about the fact that I am an immigrant, I’m from a culture where women don’t have rights. My grandmother, she wiped down the floor with a wet rag and I live a life completely unimaginable to her.

And, by the way, I’m not saying that women in South Korea don’t have rights, I’m saying I come from a past, I come from a different past where the opportunities that I have today to work from home, to talk to people all over the world, to coach scientists and entrepreneurs and executives and engineers and people literally all over the world. I mean, I just coached somebody in Switzerland.

I live a life that was impossible, that was unimaginable for people just a few generations ago.

So, every day the impossible is becoming a possibility. I am living into the impossible every day.

And I believe that my dreams are in the process of coming true, except only always. Except only always.

So it is up to me to dream big and to desire big. What do you desire for your future?

What does that little voice, what does that little inkling say?

Don’t pay so much attention to what society says, what schoolbooks say, what rulebooks say, what parents say, what teachers say, what your bosses say. But listen to that little voice inside of you.

What does it say? What do you desire? What is your dream?

I believe I always get what I want. There’s nothing I truly want that I can’t have.

And I believe that 2018 was a miraculous year. It really was.

It’s incredible that I am now working for myself. My business is growing. My coaching practice is growing. My mastermind is launching. I am speaking at these leadership events and, wow. It’s something that I would have thought - I did think - was impossible in the past, but not only is it possible, it is my reality.

I believe 2019 is going to be even more awesome.

What do you believe? What do you think? What is your trajectory? What is your desire? Who are you becoming?

I will talk to you soon. Have a good one.

The People-Pleasing Trap

How differently would you show up to ask for help, work, or money if you didn't have the need to please people? 

My bet is that you'd be bolder, braver, and as a result, better paid. 

I have a lot of experience with the people-pleasing trap, because I'm a recovering people-pleaser. 

In this episode, I explain how this fear of displeasing others holds us back from asking, receiving, and thriving. 

You'll learn: 
- Why and how the life-long training to please others started 
- Why our brains confuse other people's displeasure as a threat
- Why it's impossible to please others with who we are, what we say, or what we do 
- Three ways we can get triggered to sabotage our outcomes 
- Three ways we can work ourselves out of the people-pleasing trap 
- Five of my recurring stressful thoughts around pleasing people 
- How I turn these thoughts around to instill a new mindset of growth, appreciation, and confidence 

Come check out www.jamieleecoach.com for details on Small Group Mastermind, private coaching, and speaking services.

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Full Episode Transcript

Hello! Welcome to Episode 41 of Born to Thrive with Jamie Lee. I am your host and coach, Jamie Lee.

I find it really auspicious that I’m recording Episode 41 on November 1. I like that number and it reminds me to renew and refresh my commitment to delivering and creating exponential value to those who come in contact with this podcast, with my workshops, with my coaching.

And I also have been thinking about numbers a lot because there is now exactly two months or eight weeks remaining to 2018. I am going on vacation at the end of the year and I realized there’s only about 40-something days before I leave and having that very concrete deadline, the numbers are motivating me to create things of value, to deliver more value, to be focused so that I can become bolder, braver, and help people become better leaders.

How about you?

What is helping you become bolder, braver, and better leaders or better paid? Those things can be synonymous, I think.

As we are nearing the end of 2018, soon we will be talking about 2019 goals and what do we want to achieve in 2019, so I think this is a really exciting time for us to be working hard towards our goal while also thinking about what else is possible in the future.

So, with that in mind, I have created a small group mastermind to support those who want to set powerful intentions and wild and improbable goals for 2019. People who want to surprise themselves with what they achieve in 2019. And if you are thinking about being supported in this way while also being held accountable to take concrete action and to start the year in high gear with high momentum, please reach out. I’d be happy to talk to you about what that is going to be like and how you might benefit.

You can also come to my website: jamieleecoach.com. I’m also continuing to book 2019 speaking engagements and private coaching clients, so it is all happening. It is all happening.

We are born to thrive. I believe that. And I believe that negotiation skills are leadership skills that can help you thrive.

The thing that holds us back from doing what we’re born to do is so often fear. And today, I want to talk about a very specific type of fear: the fear of displeasing people. The fear of losing the approval of people, especially those in a position of authority.

Think about going to ask for help, asking for work, asking for money, and if you have the fear that your ask might upset the person who has the authority to say yes or no, how likely are you to go for it? It just takes more courage. It takes more thought-work, I think.

And yesterday, I was exchanging emails with a client. I let him know that the homework assignments that I give this person, it’s not intended for him to please me. It’s not about me, coach Jamie. It’s about serving the needs of the client and the client was shocked. He was like, “Woah, how did you know that I have this need? I’m really curious how you were able to get out of this mindset, this pitfall of needing to please others because I see that it’s holding me back.”

And I wish there was a shortcut.

I wish there was a quick “fix-it”.

But there isn't. There isn’t. I don’t believe there is.

I believe I’m gonna be working through this myself for the rest of my life. But I’d be honored to tell you how I think about this need to please others, how I experience the pitfall of needing to please people, and how I am working through it so that I can still ask for help, ask for work, ask for money, and still show up bold, show up brave, and get better paid.

So, I want to say, first of all, that the need to please others, when I reflect on my life, it started from the very first day of my life. The first day, my parents met me and they said, “Oh, you’re such a good girl!”

I was trained from a very young age. I was fortunate to be trained from a very young age to please my parents, to be good, to listen, to behave, to make mom and dad proud.

I was very fortunate because my parents trained me for a really good reason. They trained me to seek their approval, to please them for a very good reason.

They trained me this way to keep me alive.

When I was one, when I was two, when I just started to gain my bodily functions and be able to walk and talk, that’s when I was most vulnerable to hurt myself.

Don’t play with knives, you’ll hurt yourself. Be good. Don’t go into the woods with strangers. Those are the kinds of things my parents told me and they told them to me so that I would survive. I would continue to live and continue to grow. That was their number one objective.

So, they trained me to please them for a really good reason. This is not bad parenting. However, in my very young, impressionable brain, I interpreted these lessons in this way: that pleasing others, especially those in a position of authority is essential to my survival and safety because without my parents I cannot survive as a baby, as a toddler, right?

And this served me really well when I was a very small, very young person. The problem is that I have now outgrown the situations where making that mistake of playing with knives or going into the woods with strangers would cost me my life, would potentially cost me my life.

I have outgrown those situations but my brain didn’t outgrow the groove that was created when this lesson was repeated over and over to me for my own good. And so, what happened was that my brain - the not-so-evolved part of my brain - is associating the risk of displeasing others with the risk of my own survival.

And when my brain thinks that my very own survival is at risk, this triggers this primal fear or the amygdala hijack and, as discussed in previous episodes of this podcast, what can happen is that it can trigger either the freeze, flight or the fight response.

And when those responses are triggered, that’s when I end up sabotaging my own outcomes.

So, let me give you some examples.

Freezing because I’m afraid of upsetting people. I encounter this when I’m networking with very successful people and this not-so-evolved part of my brain is frozen with the fear of not being good enough or displeasing these new people who are more successful and therefore in a higher position of authority. At least that’s how my brain is interpreting, right?

And so what happens is that I freeze up. I kind of get really awkward, I get weird, I say the wrong things and then I go home and I’m like, “Ugh, why did I say that? Ugh, that so awful!” And I didn’t get to make the ask that I wanted to ask.

Number two is flight. Basically, when I avoid speaking up, avoid asking out of fear of making people around me unhappy. It’s something that I’ve had a lot of experience with and I know some of my clients experience as well when they have this irrational fear that if they make their ask, they’re going to make people upset.

Now, this is rooted in the misconception that I can cause people unhappiness. It’s simply not true. Now, I know that when you hear this, you’re like, “What?! Of course it’s true! My parents told me that I made them upset and unhappy over and over again.” I mean, I’ve heard it, too. Believe me, I’ve heard it too.

Most people have the misconception that somehow you can cause other people’s unhappiness or that you can displease other people. But I’m here to say that is a myth. That is simply not true. Why is that? It’s because people are displeased not because of what you are or what you do. People become displeased because of the thought they have about what you do or what you say.

I think about how when I was dating this person, this particular person, I did not tell my mother that I was dating the person because I was afraid of displeasing my mother. So, even though I was, in fact, dating this person, my mother did not have the concept that I was dating the person and so she was not displeased particularly about this topic, right?

And then when I did tell her, it wasn’t until she had the thought that this would not be a good match for me that she was displeased.

It wasn’t because I was dating this person. I mean, I had been dating this person throughout the time that she didn’t know, right? It was only when she had the thought that this wasn’t a good match for me that she was displeased.

So, the point I’m trying to make here is that when we avoid making the ask out of fear of displeasing people, we are genuinely confused about the cause of people’s displeasure. The cause of people’s displeasure is not what you do or say. It’s what they think about what you’ve done or said and that’s something that you cannot control. That’s on them. You cannot change how people think.

So, in other words, when you avoid making an ambitious ask out of fear of displeasing people, you are essentially giving up your power because you’re saying, “I’m giving you all the power to make me feel safe in my brain.”

It’s funny, right?

Okay, so the third response is fight. And I’ve done this. I’ve talked about in this podcast how early in my career, I bungled my salary negotiation and then I felt resentful at my employer because of the thoughts that I was thinking and then I got adversarial with my manager instead of taking a collaborative, problem-solving approach and that adversarial approach, when I just went into the office and I said, “I demand a reimbursement,” it completely backfired.

And I took this adversarial approach because I was reacting from the fear of making people upset. I reacted by doing the very opposite thing that my brain wanted me to do.

So, watch out for these pitfalls. The pitfall being that you either freeze, you flight or you avoid, or you pick up a fight when the best thing is to approach this conversation in a calm and collaborative way.

So, now let’s talk about how to get out of this pitfall. Like I said at the beginning of the podcast, I do not believe there is a quick fix to this.

We’ve been trained from day one, from the very get-go to please our parents and to associate the pleasing of people in authority with our own survival. And so this is something that is deeply rooted. There’s a deep groove in our brains associated with this thought pattern. When I please people I am safe. When I please people, I will be able to survive and be okay, right?

It’s just that this thought pattern no longer serves us. In order for you to brave uncomfortable and difficult asks, you have to be willing to risk them thinking whatever they think when you make that ask. You have to be willing to risk rejection. You have to be willing to risk no in order to get to yes.

So, how do we get out of this? There are three parts.

Number one: Just notice. Raise your self-awareness around your own need to please people.

Number two: Deliberately decide that you are going to create a new mindset - a brave mindset that will help you make the ask.

Number three: Practice this new mindset with intention, focus, and diligence as if you’re learning a new language. Practice like you’re learning Japanese.

So, number one, notice. Just raise your self-awareness around your need to please others.

I notice that I get weird. I get awkward. I get needy. I get nervous. I get anxious. And I also notice that when I’m triggered by my need to please people, I am constantly checking email.

Do you hear me on that? Can you relate to that?

And I realize this because, for me, when I get an email from somebody, there’s like this dopamine hit in my brain and I’m addicted to that. And so I keep checking my email over and over again and I keep wondering, why? Why am I doing that?

It’s because I want to hear from people who want to work with me or from clients or opportunities and I associate those emails with approval and that I have pleased people and that I am okay.

And I also notice that when I am triggered by my need to please others, I often feel resentful because I want them to give me something that I can’t give myself. And so I’ve created this manual in my head that they should respond to my email. They should acknowledge me. I need this person to say thank you. I need this person to write me back immediately. I want this person to do x, y, and z so that I can feel happy, so that I can feel acknowledged, so that I can feel safe.

And so, number one: raise your self-awareness. Just notice when you get triggered like I do with the email checking and the neediness and the resentment.

And then write it down on paper. It’s so easy to overlook this part and I think it is possibly the most important part of raising your self-awareness. Just, when you notice that this is happening, write down the stressful thought or the problem that you think you have.

I did this the other day and it was so interesting what I wrote down because I realized it was all coming from this need to pleasing, this need to get approval.

I wrote down, “I’m scared of looking bad.”

I wrote down, “I’m scared of getting fat.”

“I’m scared of being disliked by people I don’t actually know or like all that much.”

“I’m scared of disappointing people.” (In other words, displeasing them.)

“I’m scared I won’t be able to produce good work, so I can be liked and respected and comfortable with myself.”

I wrote them down. And I realized that every time I think I have a problem, it’s almost always a variation on one of these stressful thoughts. I’m scared of looking bad. I’m scared of disappointing people. I’m scared I’m not good enough, basically.

So, number one: raise your self-awareness. Just notice when you are triggered and be compassionate. Be kind to yourself. This is a lifelong training that we’re trying to undo here.

So, number two: Now that you’ve raised your self-awareness, you want to deliberately decide on a new mindset. In other words, deliberately decide the new thoughts, the new beliefs that you want to have.

Belief is simply a thought that you have over and over and over again.

If you were free of your need to please others, if you were free from the fear of disappointing other people, what thoughts would you have?

Perhaps you would think:

I am good enough just as I am.

I am lovable just as I am.

I am safe as I am. I am worthy as I am.

I am powerful.

I create value.

And if those thoughts are not yet quite 100% believable and easy for you to say, “Yep! That’s me. I’m completely free of the need to please other people,” then you can also explore some thoughts to bridge the gap.

And I start with:

I am here.

I am simply here.

I am okay.

Except for my need, except for the stressful thoughts that I have in my head, I am always okay.

I am human.

Here’s another strategy: Once you have written down your stressful thoughts or the problems you think you have, you can also think about, okay, what is one reason to be grateful to have this problem?

This is a tip that I took away from an article written by James Altucher who is a writer and entrepreneur. He wrote this phenomenal article in 2011 about how all the successful people in life and in business are grateful. That’s the number one commonality they all have. They’re always grateful and that gratitude is the ultimate miracle.

And he talked about how you can develop a gratitude muscle and one of the things that he suggested you do is write down the problems you have and then think of one reason why you’re grateful for this. It’s kind of bonkers but it twists your brain and it makes you see your so-called problem, your perceived problem from a new perspective.

And so I did this too. I wrote, “I’m scared of looking bad.” And I realized I can be grateful for this because I get to be seen by people. How awesome is that? And I get to allow people to judge me, judge my Asian face, my open bite or whatever shortcomings that people project onto me. It’s a great opportunity for people to have their own thoughts. It’s a great opportunity for me to simply be and be seen, so I’m grateful for that because, at the end of the day, people will judge. It’s fine. That’s up to them. I am not in control of that and it’s the way things are and so I get to allow things to be the way they are. It’s great.

Number two: “I’m scared of getting fat.” It’s this irrational fear that gets triggered every Fall because in Fall things become more delicious and I want to have more sugar. And I am grateful for this because, hey, this means I have a body. I have two arms, I have two legs, I have two healthy lungs. I have a body, I have muscles, I have fat, I have organs, I have a brain. I have everything that I was born with and I still have them all...well, except for my baby teeth.

That’s pretty cool.

Number three was “I’m scared of not being liked by people I don’t actually know or like all that much.” And I can be grateful for this because this shows me my own neediness for approval, right? I was talking about how you need to raise your self-awareness and so this problem, ironically, is helping me because it raised my own self-awareness. And it helped me realize I still have this attachment to a random concept, to the misconception that somehow I can cause other people’s feelings. And just noticing it is half the battle, so I’m grateful for this.

Number four: “I’m scared of disappointing people.” I’m grateful for this because...GOOD! I get to disappoint people! What a privilege. The more I get to disappoint, the more I get to learn about how to serve. The more I get to learn about how to become better. The more disappointment I create, the more and deeper my learning is.

So, I’m grateful for that.

Number five: “I’m scared I won’t be able to produce good work so I can be liked and respected and be comfortable with myself.” And I’m grateful for this because I get to ask myself why do I want to be so liked and respected and comfortable? And when I ask myself that, I realize, hey, I tell people that the key to mastery, negotiation mastery, is losing the need to be liked, to be respected, and to be comfortable.

And so then this helps me realize, wow, I still have a way to go before I fully walk the talk that I give. This gives me a ripe opportunity to learn, to grow, to stretch myself, and to see how hard it really is to walk the talk that I give. This gives me a deeper sense of appreciation.

So, this helps me, ironically, listing my own problems, my own stressful thoughts and then being grateful, finding ways to be grateful for these, help me instill a new mindset of growth, learning and appreciation.

So, number three is to practice with intention the new thoughts and some of my new thoughts are:

I walk the talk that I give.

I have a body.

I am here.

It’s a privilege to disappoint people.

Yes lives in the land of no.

And I am okay no matter what.

What I want to say about this is I think it really helps to be future focused.

I talked about my goals for 2018. I talked about how I’m starting to think about new goals for 2019 and it’s really motivating to think about how I want to feel at the end of 2018. How do I want to feel on December 31st, 2018 while I’m on vacation, when I look back on the progress I’ve made, when I look back on the brave asks that I made over the next coming two months?

And I realized I want to feel proud. I want to feel accomplished. And all of my clients tell me this as well. They want to feel proud. They want to feel accomplished.

So if you are feeling proud, who have you become? What are you thinking? What have you done?

Think about how you can please your future self. Make that a priority rather than pleasing other people which is an impossible task, right? I mean, think about how your parents have these mile-high expectations, if they do and it’s an impossible task because at the end of the day, it’s not what you do or say that pleases them, it’s what they think. It’s what’s in their mind which is out of their control.

So, instead of setting yourself up for failure and disappointment by trying to please other people, what if you tried to please your future self? What would be possible then?

My bet is that you will become bolder, braver, and better paid.

I look forward to speaking with you again next week and I wish you a marvelous week.

Bye!

How to Avoid the Trap of Impostor Syndrome

One of the most insidious traps in negotiation is the impostor syndrome. If you’ve ever struggled with feeling like you are good enough, or if you’ve sabotaged your outcomes because of imposter syndrome, you won’t want to miss this episode. I walk you through the root of behavior that generates our results and concrete steps you can take to shift your mindset, from a place of lack to one of abundance, confidence, and power.

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Full Episode Transcript

Hello! Welcome to Episode 36 of Born to Thrive with Jamie Lee. I’m your host and coach, Jamie Lee.

It feels really auspicious to be recording and publishing the 36th episode of this podcast while I am still 36.

My birthday is on December 31st, so I have the whole year to be 36. I’m really looking forward to turning 37, actually.

But, in any case, I just want to say thank you so much for listening, for subscribing to this podcast. If you have any questions for me that you would like me to address, please, feel free to reach out. I read every email. I respond to every email. jamie@jamieleecoach.com

I want to just reiterate that I believe that we are all born to thrive.

I believe that abundance is our birthright.

I believe that it is our nature to be in peace, to be in cooperation with other people, and that’s why negotiation skills help us lead, influence, and thrive, because through negotiation we can collaborate, unlock more value, and contribute in a bigger way.

When I say thrive, you may think, “Oh, does it mean just act happy?”

This is something that one of my clients actually said to me the other day when I was explaining to her some of the concepts that I will explain to you today.

She was like, “Oh, I get it! You just act happy!”

I’m, like, “No! No no no! You’re not getting it! No. It’s not about acting happy, it’s about getting to the root of our behavior so that we can generate bigger, better results in our lives.”

And I want to explain to you where I’m coming from.

I define leadership as creating solutions in the best interest of everyone. I define negotiation as a conversation with the intention of reaching agreement where everyone has the right to say no. Our basic autonomy. Our fundamental free will, in other words.

And in the conversation where you’re negotiating, you want to understand so that you can align your interests with theirs and ultimately you want to influence other people’s behavior.

But before you can influence other people’s behavior, you have to first be able to influence your own behavior, right? I mean, you can’t do with other people what you can’t do for yourself. That’s why you can’t love other people before you can love yourself.

And today I want to talk to you about some self-sabotage behavior when it comes to negotiation due to Impostor Syndrome.

It’s something that I have experience with. I was coaching an analog astronaut earlier this week. Did you know there are people on Earth who recreate the experience of being in outer space for the benefit of furthering science and exploration in outer space? I didn’t know, and they’re called analog astronauts.

So, anyway, I was having a coaching session with this analog astronaut and she’s like, “Yeah, you know what? I think we’re talking about Impostor Syndrome here.” And I’m like, “Yeah, I think so, too!”

So, Impostor Syndrome. What is the behavior that is associated with Impostor Syndrome? I will speak from my own personal experience. I know that when I was in the grips of feeling like an impostor, like a hack, like a fraud, I would try to please everyone and anyone by never saying no, not setting boundaries, saying yes to all the distractions because I would rather be distracted than feel the discomfort of feeling like an impostor.

And I also have heard from my clients that they see this in their own behavior. Let me give you one example from an entrepreneur client: He says that he oversells himself. You know what I mean? You are kind of acting out of desperation, neediness, and you try to pitch somebody even though they’re not all that interested and in your overselling you kind of create this unintended consequence of looking like you really need the job, not that the client really needs you.

And this can have an adverse impact on the perceived value of whatever it is that you’re offering to your potential or current client, so my client was self-aware enough to realize that yeah, this behavior is not serving him.

I have another client who explained to me she sees this self-sabotage behavior when she feels like she’s not good enough - in other words, when she’s in the grips of feeling like an impostor. She blows herself up like a blowfish. And we both agree this is a great analogy where you blow yourself up to be something you are not. So, it’s kind of like trying to be a fake to be accepted and it’s painful, it’s awkward, it feels uncomfortable, and in the long run it doesn’t serve you because you’re kind of selling people on a false bill of goods.

So, now that we’ve identified some behavior that’s associated with Impostor Syndrome that can sabotage your outcomes, I want to talk to you about the root of this behavior. The root of all behavior really comes down to your mindset.

What are you thinking and believing?

Because what you think and believe will generate the emotion that generates action that generates the results that you get.

And for me, I know that the thought associated with Impostor Syndrome is: I am not good enough. I haven’t done enough. And I’ve worked on this mindset for years now, and I still do. It’s a life-long process.

You might have thoughts like: I’m a hack. I don’t deserve it. I’ll never have enough money because I’m not good enough. That’s another one that I can relate to.

Here’s a very insidious thought that can have a really adverse impact on your negotiation outcome: I need other people’s approval to prove my worth. I need money to prove my worth. In other words, I need external circumstances - the things that are outside of me - to make me feel that I am enough.

What happens, what do you feel, when you have these kinds of thoughts?

For me, the biggest emotion that’s associated with feeling like an impostor, like I’m not good enough or I need other people’s approval to feel that I’m good enough is resentment. Feeling this anger and frustration. Resentful.

Mostly at myself.

There’s a lot of self-loathing associated with that.

And this comes from comparing other people’s shiny outsides to my shabby inside.

Just a few years ago, I remember so vividly how I would go to my life partner’s work functions and I would see the happy, well put together professionals having beers, hanging out, laughing and they seemed very relaxed. And I would see their shiny outsides. They’re very young, they seem content and I would compare their shiny outsides to my shabby inside where I was hating on myself and I would just feel worse.

Does that sound like something that you do as well? I’ve been there! Done that!

And what happens in this cycle of self-loathing is that you project your resentment onto other people. Especially other people who are in a position of authority. For example, your boss, your parents, your teachers. Because when we’re thinking that we need other people’s approval, we need other people to give us money, praise, promotion, raise, whatever, to make us feel good, what we’re doing is we give them the power to make us feel something.

And they can’t do that.

Nobody has the power to make you feel something.

I know this is contrary to a very popular and pervasive myth that people make you feel something but they don’t. The only person who has the power to make you feel that you are enough, make you feel that you are worthy, make you feel that you are valuable, is yourself.

Because the only person who has the power to choose your thoughts is you.

No one has the power to choose your thoughts for you.

What we do is we often fall back on default patterns of thinking. Patterns of thinking that we were taught to have when we were young. Patterns of thinking that we inherited from our parents. Patterns of thinking that we see other people like our friends have and then we adopt them because we feel like, okay, if they feel and think that way then it’s okay for me to feel and think that way.

That’s default thinking and so many of us fall into that trap. And when we do this, we feel powerless because we feel like we need other people to make us feel something and help us feel it by giving us something that we feel would make us feel better.

I want to quote master coach instructor Rich Litvin who says, “You can never have enough of what you don’t need.”

We don’t need external validation. We don’t need money. We don’t need other people’s approval to make us feel that we are worthy. We can do that for ourselves.

And I want to talk to you a little bit more about how to do that but before we get there, I want to talk a bit more about the trap of Impostor Syndrome when we give other people power to make us feel something that we’re choosing not to feel because we’re not choosing the thoughts for ourselves.

There are three types of traps. Basically, you freeze, or you take flight - you run away, you avoid - or you put up a fight. And I’m talking in the context of conversation, negotiation with other people who have the ability to help you or to cooperate or to say yes or no.

When we are in the traps of feeling powerless and resentful at people because we feel that we are not good enough and we need them to give us something to make us feel good, we feel powerless and we feel trapped. And from that place of feeling trapped and powerless, the amygdala is triggered, basically our lizard brain, and we either freeze, fight or flight.

Is that something that you can relate to? Because that is something that I’ve definitely done. I’ve frozen in conversations with my bosses because I was just in this mental spiral of oh my God, I don’t know what to say, I’m not good enough, he doesn’t like me, he doesn’t think I’m good enough and oh, this isn’t gonna go well. So, I’m just in this mental spiral and I don’t know what to do so I get frozen.

I’ve avoided conversations because I didn’t feel I was good enough. I’ve done that a lot.

I’ve taken up fight, like go in there and make demands and try to manipulate people into giving me something that I feel would make me feel good. And that has never worked out. All of those attempts have backfired on me and I’ve talked about them a few times on this podcast.

So, how do we get ourselves out of this trap?

I want to offer you a simple process. But first, you gotta take a pause. If you’re feeling like an impostor, if you’re feeling like you’re not good enough, if you’re feeling like you’re a hack, take a pause - a strategic pause - to first, feel your feelings.

The traps that I mentioned where you freeze or your fight or you flight, the cause of this trap is that we’re trying to do away with feeling the discomfort and the pain, and the frustration, and the anxiety and do it away by either running away, or picking up a fight, or freezing.

And emotions like resentment, frustration, anger, they’re all just vibrations in the body. You will live if you allow yourself to feel the feelings. You will be okay when you acknowledge what you feel instead of reacting first by doing things like freezing, running away, or fighting.

And if you want to know more about this process of accessing your felt resources so that you can feel your feelings, ground yourself, please check out Episode 31, interview with expert and somatic coach Jay Fields, who talked about this in detail.

So, first you gotta pause. Second, you gotta feel the feelings. And number three, you want to write down your thoughts, your stressful thoughts. Write it on paper. And write them in short, simple sentences.

I have a journaling process that I’ll share with you.

When I’m feeling kind of anxious, resentful, frustrated, stuck, afraid, I do a thought download in my journal and it’s a very simple prompt. I just fill out the blank in this sentence: I’m afraid that __________.  I’m afraid that I’m not good enough. I’m afraid that this will fail. I’m afraid that people will be disappointed.

Just write as many as you can think of. And once you get the hang of writing your thoughts down in this way, just allowing your brain to empty itself out, what happens is that you get to realize, oh, these are just thoughts! And they’re outside of me. These are just sentences in my head that are causing me to react in a way that doesn’t serve me in the long term.

You could also do other sentence prompts like:

I want _______________.  

I need ________________.

I should _______________.

I want people to like me. I need people’s approval. I need to make more money. I should be doing more.

These are all sentences that are associated with Impostor Syndrome, at least for me. And once you have done your thought download, once you have written down your thoughts on paper, the fourth step here is to distinguish, differentiate between what is fact versus bad fiction.

What is fact? What is true? What is observable, measurable, repeatable, provable in the court of law versus what’s just a story?

It’s very likely that the thought I’m not good enough is just a story, an opinion that you have. An opinion that you’ve been repeating in your mind so much that it feels like it is true. But can you absolutely know that this is true? Can you prove in the court of law that this is true? If so, how? If not….hmmm. That’s interesting, isn’t it?

What are the facts of your circumstances?

And circumstances, I want to emphasize, are neutral. And when I do this work with my clients, something really surprising happens. Here’s how. So, I ask my clients to just list the facts of their situation and it’s something like this: I have an interview tomorrow or I have a client. The interviewee or the interviewing company or the client, they asked for something. They asked for x and the truth of the matter is I have experience in x, in digital marketing or software development or whatever. I have done this in the past and I can do more.

So, when you list just the facts, we realize that the stories we have about ourselves, about our ability, they’re just stories. They’re not necessarily true. And often they are bad fiction.

And once we have written down the facts of the situation, of your circumstance, here’s another question. How do you want to feel about the facts? Because you have the power to choose your story. You have the power to choose a perspective that serves you.

And often my clients tell me they want to feel accomplished. They want to feel confident. They want to feel proud. They want to feel okay.

And so now that we have identified how we want to feel, as opposed to how we feel through default thinking and Impostor Syndrome, now we can generate some new thinking, a new mindset, a new perspective.

And here are some new perspectives that I want to offer you:

I have something the other side wants. Because, let’s face it, otherwise they wouldn’t even bother initiating a conversation with you, right? And in fact, negotiation expert Chris Voss says that if you are in a conversation with somebody it means that you have leverage. If you are in a hostage situation and the hostage takers are still talking with you, it means that you have leverage. You have something they want.

That’s an extreme example, but for most cases, in work situations, you have something that people want. You have value to offer. You have experience, you have skills, you have strengths that people benefit from.

Another thought is: I have something to add. I can create more value. I can add more value.

Another thought is: I’m doing a good job. Who’s to say that you’re not doing a good enough job? If it’s just a story in your mind, you can also tell a new story that you are doing a good enough job. And in fact when I walk my clients through this process, this is the point when they tell me, “Oh, you know what? Actually, come to think of it, my supervisor just sent me this praise. Come to think of it, this hiring manager said ‘She is awesome,’ and they meant me when they said ‘she’.”

And here’s one more thought: I am enough. No matter what.

This is a thought that I’ve been practicing intentionally for the last year and I have to say, it has really generated some amazing results in my life. And one of my clients just this morning wrote me an email to tell me that in the process of working with me for about a year, she’s been changing jobs and the most recent offer that she got was 33% higher than the offer she had at the same time last year, and she said she really attributed that result to the thought work that she’s been doing that she is worthy, that she is enough and that she can believe in her own value.

So, what about you?

What are some thoughts you have in your mind that are creating Impostor Syndrome, that are creating sub-optimal results, that are creating resentment and feelings of powerlessness. If you are experiencing this, I invite you to do a thought download. I invite you to separate fact from bad fiction. And I invite you to think about, “How do I want to feel about the facts and what are the thoughts that will help me work through this so that I can have an abundance mindset? I can feel that I am enough and I can feel that I can create more value in the world.”

Because this is how you will thrive.

I believe in it.

The question is, will you?

I want to wrap this up with an invitation to another webinar that I will be doing in partnership with the United Women in Business. It’s going to be held on October 17th and if you come over to my site, jamieleecoach.com, you can register for free. There’s no obligation. I also have some free resources for people who are preparing for salary negotiation. So come check me out. Please subscribe and please leave me a review if you can.

Thank you, and I wish you an abundant week.