WEBVTT - Nicole Lapin 0:00:03.360 --> 0:00:06.960 I'm Sam Edis and I'm Amy Nelson. Welcome to What's 0:00:06.960 --> 0:00:09.559 Her Story? With Sam and Amy. This is a show 0:00:09.640 --> 0:00:15.400 about the world's most remarkable women, their professional and personal journeys. Together, 0:00:15.480 --> 0:00:19.200 we'll hear from gold medalists, best selling authors, and leaders 0:00:19.239 --> 0:00:22.840 of the world's most iconic brands. Listen every Thursday or 0:00:22.920 --> 0:00:27.880 join the conversation anytime on Instagram at What's Her Story Podcast. 0:00:30.440 --> 0:00:33.640 Nicole Labin is a former news anchor turned finance expert 0:00:34.040 --> 0:00:36.720 known for her strade talk. She's the author of four books, 0:00:36.720 --> 0:00:40.320 including her most recent, Miss Independent. She's the current host 0:00:40.320 --> 0:00:43.040 of her Own Money Rehab with Nicole Labin and the 0:00:43.040 --> 0:00:45.600 host of Hatched, a business competition show on the c 0:00:45.920 --> 0:00:50.400 W Network. There are so many things that you've done 0:00:50.440 --> 0:00:54.680 that I've read about that scream independence, from from freezing 0:00:54.680 --> 0:00:58.880 her exit h one to you know, never having gotten married, 0:00:59.080 --> 0:01:03.639 to living in in many many different cities and earning 0:01:03.920 --> 0:01:08.160 your own money. What do you think in your childhood 0:01:08.840 --> 0:01:11.559 lead you down this path all of it? I think 0:01:11.840 --> 0:01:19.400 I grew up in a very traumatic upbringing. I actually 0:01:19.520 --> 0:01:22.640 always tried to hide that part of my story and 0:01:23.080 --> 0:01:25.600 thought it was my biggest weakness. It ended up being 0:01:25.640 --> 0:01:28.720 my greatest superpower, but it was only once I could 0:01:29.200 --> 0:01:31.880 actually be open and honest about it. I grew up 0:01:31.880 --> 0:01:35.920 in an immigrant household, so first generation American UM. My 0:01:36.000 --> 0:01:38.840 father died of a drug overdose when I was eleven. 0:01:39.160 --> 0:01:41.399 My mother, as you read in the beginning part of 0:01:41.440 --> 0:01:43.480 my book, I bailed her out of jail a bunch 0:01:43.520 --> 0:01:46.160 of times when I was in middle school, and so 0:01:46.319 --> 0:01:49.400 I was dealt a pretty shitty hand and I played 0:01:49.400 --> 0:01:52.280 it the best I could. I think I won um 0:01:52.320 --> 0:01:55.840 but I didn't really have another option, and it really 0:01:55.840 --> 0:01:59.280 didn't have any more to lose. So I think everything 0:02:00.080 --> 0:02:03.280 with my childhood and the way I was brought up 0:02:03.280 --> 0:02:07.880 in a chaotic and abusive home, I think led me 0:02:08.320 --> 0:02:11.680 to the only option that was available to me, and 0:02:11.720 --> 0:02:15.799 that was independence. I didn't have any backup plan. I 0:02:15.840 --> 0:02:19.880 didn't have a couch to go home to if something failed. 0:02:20.280 --> 0:02:23.919 I didn't have you know, family money if I lost 0:02:24.000 --> 0:02:27.440 my job. So that was the only path for me 0:02:27.480 --> 0:02:31.200 to take of independence. But so many people in those 0:02:31.200 --> 0:02:35.840 circumstances just just fall away, right They collapse under the 0:02:35.880 --> 0:02:38.240 weight of the stress. Or they don't make it through 0:02:38.320 --> 0:02:40.560 high school, they don't make it to college, they don't 0:02:40.560 --> 0:02:44.400 make it through college, they don't end up having successful careers. 0:02:45.120 --> 0:02:49.560 What was it that made you different? I'm not sure. Actually, 0:02:50.080 --> 0:02:52.959 I think I went the opposite route. You know. I 0:02:53.600 --> 0:02:57.240 used to get a lot of people say, oh, your 0:02:57.280 --> 0:02:59.360 father must have made a call for you or something 0:02:59.400 --> 0:03:02.440 like that. When I UM started at CNN when I 0:03:02.480 --> 0:03:05.680 was twenty one. You know, a lot of my colleagues 0:03:05.880 --> 0:03:10.000 didn't think that that was possible without some sort of connections. 0:03:10.160 --> 0:03:13.360 And it couldn't have been farther from the truth. You know, 0:03:13.400 --> 0:03:16.480 I wasn't born anywhere on the basis. I was probably 0:03:16.480 --> 0:03:20.280 born like in the alleyway, by the trash, I mean, 0:03:20.840 --> 0:03:26.240 And so I think I probably overcompensated the other way. 0:03:26.320 --> 0:03:29.200 Became the valedictorian of my high school and my college. 0:03:29.320 --> 0:03:31.480 And the only reason I say that, because that in 0:03:31.639 --> 0:03:34.120 three fifty will get me a soil Otte these days, 0:03:34.600 --> 0:03:38.400 is that, you know, I really self prescribed, not drugs 0:03:38.480 --> 0:03:42.240 or alcohol to hide UM, but work and then some 0:03:42.280 --> 0:03:45.880 more work, and of course that led me to a 0:03:45.960 --> 0:03:51.160 complete mental, physical, emotional burnout and breakdown from you know, 0:03:51.280 --> 0:03:55.680 constantly self prescribing work since I was in my teens. 0:03:55.720 --> 0:04:00.839 I started on the air, I started at the Chicago Mark, 0:04:00.920 --> 0:04:02.600 which I thought was a mall at the time when 0:04:02.600 --> 0:04:05.400 I was eighteen years old. So I was on the 0:04:05.400 --> 0:04:07.920 air for a really really long time by the time, 0:04:08.200 --> 0:04:11.400 you know, I was in my late twenties and early thirties, 0:04:11.440 --> 0:04:13.680 and it kind of all came to a head. How 0:04:13.720 --> 0:04:15.880 did you get the job at the Mark? Did you 0:04:16.080 --> 0:04:19.560 just send in a resume and like how did it happen? Yeah, well, 0:04:19.600 --> 0:04:22.320 at the time, you sent out a lot of VHS tapes, 0:04:22.440 --> 0:04:25.480 which I just found my VHS tape. Of course it 0:04:25.560 --> 0:04:28.320 was had a red box, unlike you know the black 0:04:28.360 --> 0:04:31.480 boxes with the scribbling on it. I tried to have 0:04:31.560 --> 0:04:34.400 mine stand out and I yeah, I worked at the 0:04:34.440 --> 0:04:39.239 cable Access station and then I just stalked the station 0:04:39.320 --> 0:04:43.640 chief in downtown Chicago who had a station in Milwaukee, 0:04:44.160 --> 0:04:48.200 and I begged for an interview because I said, I 0:04:48.320 --> 0:04:52.280 will do anything. At that point, through Northwestern they had 0:04:52.640 --> 0:04:55.400 a program where I was a reporter in Sioux Fall, 0:04:55.480 --> 0:04:58.840 South Dakota at the CBS station and Lexington, Kentucky at 0:04:58.839 --> 0:05:02.200 the CBS station. So I kind of did an ad 0:05:02.200 --> 0:05:05.159 hoc little education for myself and went to these smaller 0:05:05.200 --> 0:05:08.159 markets and back in the day before YouTube and no 0:05:08.279 --> 0:05:10.440 skipping steps. You had to go to these small markets 0:05:10.440 --> 0:05:12.719 and sort of work your way up. So I was like, okay, 0:05:12.880 --> 0:05:15.360 I know that I need to do that. A lot 0:05:15.400 --> 0:05:18.200 of girls in my broadcast class would go to these 0:05:18.200 --> 0:05:21.400 small markets, marry the police chief or whatever and stay there. 0:05:21.560 --> 0:05:23.960 And I was like, no putting on my blinders, like 0:05:23.960 --> 0:05:25.839 I want to be in and out of these places. 0:05:26.320 --> 0:05:29.240 No offense to these places. I just, you know, had 0:05:30.200 --> 0:05:33.960 probably an unhealthy ambition at the time, and at that 0:05:34.000 --> 0:05:36.520 point I was like, Okay, I'm ready for big market Milwaukee, 0:05:36.600 --> 0:05:39.040 Like this is my big break. I will take the train, 0:05:39.360 --> 0:05:42.600 I'll do anything to get to the CBS station in Milwaukee. 0:05:43.080 --> 0:05:45.840 And once I finally got the interview, I said all 0:05:45.880 --> 0:05:48.000 of this, and the station chief was like, you don't 0:05:48.040 --> 0:05:52.320 get the job, and also you should learn more about geography. Um, 0:05:52.360 --> 0:05:55.279 you can't take the train prey day to Milwaukee, but 0:05:55.360 --> 0:05:58.840 do you know anything about business news? And this was 0:05:58.880 --> 0:06:01.920 my worst nightmare. Um. My boyfriend in high school said 0:06:01.920 --> 0:06:04.120 he wanted to be a hedge fund manager, and I 0:06:04.160 --> 0:06:06.360 thought he wanted to be in gardening, so like I 0:06:06.400 --> 0:06:09.120 was completely clueless. You know, I told you that my 0:06:09.200 --> 0:06:13.039 family just used cash and in nefarious ways too. So 0:06:13.480 --> 0:06:16.680 I didn't want to think about business or money or 0:06:17.000 --> 0:06:18.960 much less talk about it much. Let's talk about it 0:06:19.000 --> 0:06:21.360 to the world. But I needed a job, and so 0:06:21.680 --> 0:06:26.160 I said, absolutely, I know about business news. Of course, 0:06:26.240 --> 0:06:28.919 I know about business news all day, every day and 0:06:28.960 --> 0:06:31.320 twice on Sunday. And I was like, holy sh it, 0:06:31.440 --> 0:06:33.920 I guess I have to figure out business news. And 0:06:34.000 --> 0:06:37.279 so yeah, I realized that money is a language just 0:06:37.360 --> 0:06:40.880 like anything else, and I figured it out and that 0:06:41.000 --> 0:06:44.880 was quite a place to do that. But yeah, I 0:06:44.960 --> 0:06:47.200 just needed a job. And I think a lot of 0:06:47.200 --> 0:06:51.920 times when we have these conversations about entrepreneurialism, you guys know, 0:06:52.279 --> 0:06:54.520 it's like, go out and do what you love, yolo 0:06:54.680 --> 0:06:57.560 fomo whatever you And I'm like, yo, I didn't have 0:06:57.680 --> 0:06:59.480 the luxury to do that. I wanted to be a 0:06:59.520 --> 0:07:01.800 poet when I grew up, like I started as an 0:07:01.800 --> 0:07:03.880 English major. I wanted to sit under a tree and 0:07:04.560 --> 0:07:08.440 um write poetry. And then I needed to pay the bills. 0:07:08.520 --> 0:07:11.800 And so there's no shame in doing things that you 0:07:11.880 --> 0:07:14.400 need to do at the time. And for me, I 0:07:14.440 --> 0:07:16.920 found the shaded part of that ven diagram the things 0:07:16.960 --> 0:07:20.720 that I loved and the opportunity I had, and then 0:07:20.760 --> 0:07:23.840 I found the shaded part because I became a writer, 0:07:24.160 --> 0:07:27.520 just not the kind of expected And now a quick break. 0:07:30.200 --> 0:07:33.440 In your book, you talk about how everyone has some 0:07:33.600 --> 0:07:36.800 degree of money trauma, and we know that you had 0:07:36.840 --> 0:07:40.600 a traumatic childhood. What role did money play in that 0:07:40.760 --> 0:07:44.760 childhood or the scarcity of money? Yeah, I have an 0:07:44.880 --> 0:07:49.360 irrational fear still to this day, and I talk about money. 0:07:49.360 --> 0:07:53.160 I teach others about money of being broke, alone and homeless, 0:07:53.480 --> 0:07:55.960 and it doesn't matter how much is in my bank account. 0:07:56.360 --> 0:08:01.200 And I just constantly still catasted fives and have to 0:08:02.360 --> 0:08:04.560 you know, talk my way out of it. Um. I 0:08:04.600 --> 0:08:08.280 have little discussions with myself a lot that i'm that's 0:08:08.320 --> 0:08:11.960 not going to happen. And it's really helped me to embrace, 0:08:12.400 --> 0:08:17.160 not to get to esoteric or wonky, this stoicism philosophy 0:08:17.160 --> 0:08:20.720 where we suffer more in imagination than in reality. And 0:08:21.000 --> 0:08:23.920 I always try to entertain the worst case scenario. Okay, 0:08:23.920 --> 0:08:25.720 so what if I lose this project or what if 0:08:25.760 --> 0:08:28.920 I lose this job? Am I going to be alone, broken, 0:08:28.920 --> 0:08:32.240 homeless and living in the gutter as I imagine? No, 0:08:32.600 --> 0:08:36.480 I'm not. I have friends, I you know, my chosen family. 0:08:36.600 --> 0:08:39.520 That's never gonna happen to me. So still, you know, 0:08:39.760 --> 0:08:43.480 I have financial demons that haunt me, but we all have, 0:08:44.240 --> 0:08:48.480 I think, to some extent, micro or mackerel financial traumas. 0:08:48.559 --> 0:08:51.520 Whether you know our family. I mean, if you look 0:08:51.520 --> 0:08:53.080 at me and you're like, girl, I did not have 0:08:53.120 --> 0:08:55.440 to bail my mama out of jail with the cash 0:08:55.520 --> 0:08:58.040 under the stink next to the maxipads like you did. 0:08:58.480 --> 0:09:03.040 But you know, maybe my parents hoarded or clipped coupons 0:09:03.160 --> 0:09:07.960 or spent frivolously, and that affects how you look at money. 0:09:08.000 --> 0:09:11.959 And then macro traumas like the dot com bubble or 0:09:12.000 --> 0:09:15.800 the Great Recession, the housing crash, or the pandemic. I mean, 0:09:15.880 --> 0:09:19.640 this all affects how we look at money, and so 0:09:20.000 --> 0:09:23.600 it's really important to realize that just because it's been 0:09:23.640 --> 0:09:26.040 a certain way doesn't mean it's the way it needs 0:09:26.080 --> 0:09:30.720 to be. And oftentimes I get questions about, you know, 0:09:30.880 --> 0:09:34.960 raising financially responsible kids, and I don't have kids yet, 0:09:35.000 --> 0:09:39.680 but I would say that just by being a kid, Uh, 0:09:39.720 --> 0:09:44.000 it is so important to lead by example. So I mean, 0:09:44.080 --> 0:09:46.600 you could try to find all the little kid financial 0:09:46.600 --> 0:09:49.120 books that you want, but if you're a financial mess. 0:09:49.200 --> 0:09:51.840 That's not help book because your kids are watching everything 0:09:51.920 --> 0:09:56.520 you're doing. How do you define financial independence? For me, 0:09:57.080 --> 0:10:01.080 financial independence is having the ultimate a few money to 0:10:01.760 --> 0:10:04.560 leave a crappy job or leave a crappy relationship. And 0:10:04.600 --> 0:10:08.160 I think far too often women in particular stay in 0:10:08.520 --> 0:10:13.040 terrible relationships. I've received a lot of notes of women 0:10:13.120 --> 0:10:17.640 staying in abusive relationships because they're scared of taking care 0:10:17.640 --> 0:10:22.560 of themselves financially. And for me, that is having the 0:10:22.640 --> 0:10:28.440 ultimate financial independence is having that choice and having that freedom. 0:10:28.480 --> 0:10:31.280 Along those lines, you've had a lot of high profile 0:10:31.360 --> 0:10:36.760 relationships with men who are very, very successful. You went 0:10:36.800 --> 0:10:38.960 with people who were as ambitious as you were. Is 0:10:39.000 --> 0:10:42.720 that fair to say? Well, I have a very colorful 0:10:42.840 --> 0:10:45.599 dating history, not all of it is on the internet, 0:10:45.800 --> 0:10:50.080 so um. You know, for me, I was always attracted 0:10:50.320 --> 0:10:55.760 to uh, someone who was ambitious and could relate to 0:10:56.760 --> 0:10:59.240 you know, some of that drive that I had for 0:10:59.360 --> 0:11:04.840 better or and you know, for me, regardless of a relationship, 0:11:04.960 --> 0:11:07.520 it's always important to have your own back, and it's 0:11:07.520 --> 0:11:11.160 always important to take control of those conversations that you mentioned, 0:11:11.200 --> 0:11:12.840 like what if he leaves me? What if he asked 0:11:12.880 --> 0:11:16.600 for a prenup, Like fuck that, you know you suggest 0:11:16.679 --> 0:11:19.360 a prenup. So I'm even talking to my fiance now 0:11:19.440 --> 0:11:23.600 about prenups and I'm like, great, I made my own money, 0:11:23.720 --> 0:11:27.120 I have my own stuff, Like cool, let's talk about 0:11:27.120 --> 0:11:30.680 a prenup. And so, I don't know where in the 0:11:30.800 --> 0:11:35.880 zeitgeist we've somehow relinquished control of these conversations. I think 0:11:36.200 --> 0:11:39.200 you can reframe them and take them back, and I 0:11:39.240 --> 0:11:42.880 think we should. Unfortunately, a lot of women want to 0:11:42.880 --> 0:11:45.360 get their financial lives together or have to get their 0:11:45.360 --> 0:11:48.319 financial lives together when they get divorced or when their 0:11:48.400 --> 0:11:52.880 husband dies. And during some of my previous book to Wars, 0:11:52.960 --> 0:11:55.320 when we were out, I r l not just you 0:11:55.520 --> 0:11:57.959 r l um. You know, I'd have young women or 0:11:58.000 --> 0:12:00.760 I'd have their moms. Unfortunately, tell me like, yeah, she 0:12:00.840 --> 0:12:03.160 went to x Y z ivy league school, but I 0:12:03.200 --> 0:12:05.040 just want her to marry a rich guy. I'm like, 0:12:05.720 --> 0:12:08.880 are you gidding me? This is still a thing. And 0:12:08.920 --> 0:12:11.320 if we, you know, try to hide behind this boss 0:12:11.320 --> 0:12:13.720 whitch definitely, I wrote the book boss Bitch, and so 0:12:14.280 --> 0:12:19.199 I you know, this rhetoric unfortunately is not actually becoming 0:12:19.880 --> 0:12:22.240 reality in the way that we'd hope it to be. 0:12:22.679 --> 0:12:27.199 And so I think that having a proactive financial literacy 0:12:27.240 --> 0:12:30.160 discussion is really hard to have. Um I've tried to 0:12:30.200 --> 0:12:32.920 do it, of course, but it's just like having a 0:12:32.960 --> 0:12:37.400 proactive healthy eating plan is hard. It's you know, once 0:12:37.440 --> 0:12:40.280 you unfortunately get a diagnosis, then you have to be 0:12:40.440 --> 0:12:43.439 reactive and you have no other choice but to do it. 0:12:43.800 --> 0:12:46.760 So I see a lot of women who have gotten 0:12:46.800 --> 0:12:49.600 divorced and either are screwed in one of two ways. 0:12:49.640 --> 0:12:52.840 Either there they don't have any money, or they don't 0:12:52.840 --> 0:12:55.679 have any credit because all of the bills were in 0:12:55.760 --> 0:12:59.200 there somebody else's name. So in a lot of senses, 0:12:59.520 --> 0:13:02.679 you know, not having a prenup and not protecting yourself 0:13:02.800 --> 0:13:05.440 can screw you in ways that you don't expect, like 0:13:05.720 --> 0:13:08.600 by the way debt gets shared in a marriage, as 0:13:08.600 --> 0:13:12.200 you guys know. And I think that having control, whether 0:13:12.280 --> 0:13:16.199 it's with an estate plan, any sort of advanced directives, 0:13:16.240 --> 0:13:19.959 power of attorney, prenups is better than having the state 0:13:20.080 --> 0:13:22.920 decide what your affairs are going to be. Like do 0:13:22.960 --> 0:13:25.400 you feel like men get different financial advice when they're 0:13:25.480 --> 0:13:27.920 young men when their boys or young men are like yeah, 0:13:28.000 --> 0:13:33.160 And I quote a study in Misindependent that shows young 0:13:33.280 --> 0:13:38.000 boys associate these power words with money, so these ambitious 0:13:38.000 --> 0:13:42.080 type words, and young girls associate scarcity words with money. 0:13:42.120 --> 0:13:46.640 So obviously finances isn't something only a guy can do. 0:13:46.720 --> 0:13:51.600 There's not any magical, you know, special sauce that men 0:13:51.720 --> 0:13:54.480 can only figure out. But they talk about it way more, 0:13:54.640 --> 0:13:56.920 and they talk about it more confidently. I mean, I'll 0:13:56.960 --> 0:14:00.720 tell you living with an entrepreneur, you know, whether he 0:14:00.760 --> 0:14:06.040 knows something or not, he for sure says it really confidently. Um, 0:14:06.160 --> 0:14:09.640 And so I think that's something that we're missing. I 0:14:09.640 --> 0:14:12.680 don't necessarily think there's a knowledge gap. I think there's 0:14:12.679 --> 0:14:15.600 an action gap. You know. I don't think knowledge is power. 0:14:15.679 --> 0:14:18.040 We have so much knowledge out there. I mean there's 0:14:18.120 --> 0:14:20.600 all the books, forget about the ones that I've written, 0:14:20.600 --> 0:14:23.280 and all the others, and all the podcasts and all 0:14:23.320 --> 0:14:27.960 the articles. I mean, knowledge isn't ultimate financial power. Action 0:14:28.120 --> 0:14:29.800 is power. And you're never as young as you are 0:14:29.840 --> 0:14:33.600 today because you know, you hear these stories or excuses 0:14:33.720 --> 0:14:36.960 like I don't have enough money to start, I'm too old, 0:14:37.000 --> 0:14:40.000 all these things, or just stories that we're telling ourselves. 0:14:40.280 --> 0:14:41.880 And so yeah, I was just drinking out of my 0:14:41.920 --> 0:14:44.760 coffee tup um. One of my slogans from Miss Independent 0:14:44.920 --> 0:14:47.760 was I'm glad I didn't invest earlier, said no one ever, 0:14:48.200 --> 0:14:50.320 No one in the history of the world has ever 0:14:50.360 --> 0:14:52.640 said that. It's like you never regret a workout, like 0:14:52.800 --> 0:14:55.280 getting my ass on a treadmill is very hard, but 0:14:55.400 --> 0:14:59.680 afterwards I'm stoked. Same thing with investing. What kind of 0:14:59.760 --> 0:15:04.000 narro relative did you have going into you know, you 0:15:04.080 --> 0:15:07.480 talk about in your twenties it was all ambition. At 0:15:07.480 --> 0:15:10.320 what point did that change for you and you decided, Okay, 0:15:10.360 --> 0:15:14.080 I want a fuller life, not just my career. Well, 0:15:14.120 --> 0:15:18.520 I had no choice when I ended up in the 0:15:18.600 --> 0:15:21.640 psychiatric ward of n y U in the middle of 0:15:21.640 --> 0:15:25.480 the night with my shrink and my assistant um canceling 0:15:25.520 --> 0:15:31.080 my entire schedule because I was depressed and suicidal and 0:15:31.200 --> 0:15:34.240 had all of these issues that I never dealt with 0:15:34.440 --> 0:15:38.720 and I couldn't outrun them anymore. And it was only 0:15:38.800 --> 0:15:43.720 then that I realized self care is either the biggest 0:15:43.760 --> 0:15:46.600 asset or liability in your career. It can take you 0:15:46.720 --> 0:15:49.000 to rock bottom like it did for me, or it 0:15:49.040 --> 0:15:51.680 can bring you more success than you imagine. So it 0:15:51.800 --> 0:15:54.880 was only then where I realized, you know, I set 0:15:54.920 --> 0:15:58.960 this little goal post for myself. I'll be happy when 0:15:59.000 --> 0:16:01.720 I get to the network, or I'll be happy when 0:16:01.720 --> 0:16:03.240 I get to New York. Or I'll be happy when 0:16:03.280 --> 0:16:06.160 I get one book. I'll be happy, but really when 0:16:06.200 --> 0:16:08.760 it hits the New York Times bestseller list. Okay, but 0:16:08.800 --> 0:16:11.080 then I'll be happy only when I have two books. 0:16:11.080 --> 0:16:14.640 And you know, there's always something there there And for me, 0:16:14.840 --> 0:16:17.800 I never got my brain to the other side of 0:16:17.840 --> 0:16:23.080 happiness with that construction, and so it kicked mass and 0:16:23.280 --> 0:16:27.280 at that point I had no choice but to create 0:16:27.320 --> 0:16:30.040 a fuller life for myself. So what did you do 0:16:30.200 --> 0:16:32.160 when you left the hospital? What did you do? I 0:16:32.240 --> 0:16:36.280 went on a crazy journey. Like you know, we started 0:16:36.320 --> 0:16:41.600 this show joking that I was Tracy Flick of podcasting. 0:16:41.640 --> 0:16:44.040 I felt like I was Tracy Flick or Valedictorian of 0:16:44.080 --> 0:16:46.920 the psych word because I was taking notes. I was like, 0:16:47.360 --> 0:16:49.240 I want to learn. I want to figure out how 0:16:49.320 --> 0:16:53.000 to hack this, because we don't learn this stuff in school. 0:16:53.080 --> 0:16:54.560 I mean, if I were in charge of the world, 0:16:54.720 --> 0:16:57.680 we would not only learn about financial literacy growing up, 0:16:57.720 --> 0:17:02.480 but also what I learned dialectical behavioral therapy for instance, 0:17:02.520 --> 0:17:04.919 that really helped me and changed my life in an 0:17:04.920 --> 0:17:10.879 outpatient program, basic interpersonal skills, interpersonal effectiveness, stress management, to 0:17:10.960 --> 0:17:14.000 stress tolerance, all of these things that are really important 0:17:14.040 --> 0:17:17.960 in all aspects of business. So I went to see 0:17:17.960 --> 0:17:21.160 every healer in the history of the world. Amy, I 0:17:21.200 --> 0:17:26.320 went to see you know, Balinese uh medicine men, to 0:17:26.680 --> 0:17:32.040 like Indian chiefs, to psychis, to mirror ball, to god 0:17:32.119 --> 0:17:34.440 knows where. And I felt really fortunate at that point 0:17:34.480 --> 0:17:37.200 to be able to afford a lot of this because 0:17:37.200 --> 0:17:40.840 it was really expensive. And so I took notes along 0:17:40.840 --> 0:17:43.520 the way, and I didn't necessarily expect it to turn 0:17:43.560 --> 0:17:48.400 into a book, but um, I felt compelled to be like, Okay, everybody, 0:17:48.440 --> 0:17:51.320 this is the cheek code if you don't have the 0:17:51.320 --> 0:17:55.439 money to do all of these therapies. Here's the cliff 0:17:55.520 --> 0:17:58.560 notes version of that. So I really, um yeah, I 0:17:58.600 --> 0:18:04.359 took a year in half probably and just soaked all 0:18:04.440 --> 0:18:07.440 of the woo woo stuff that I could possibly soak 0:18:07.560 --> 0:18:12.080 up and tried to turn it into an action plan. 0:18:12.200 --> 0:18:15.960 You know, my brain works in like steps and metrics 0:18:16.040 --> 0:18:19.080 and measuring too, metrics and all of these types of things, 0:18:19.119 --> 0:18:21.959 and so um, so yeah, I went on a journey 0:18:21.960 --> 0:18:24.920 to figure out how to do that. What was that moment, Like, 0:18:24.960 --> 0:18:27.960 I think so many people, especially now, are suffering from 0:18:28.000 --> 0:18:32.240 mental health issues. What was the precipitating moment for you 0:18:32.800 --> 0:18:35.920 that said, Okay, like enough is enough. I'm I'm going 0:18:35.960 --> 0:18:40.399 into psychiatric word. This isn't just normal stress. I thought 0:18:40.400 --> 0:18:43.800 a lot about this question, and I have a line 0:18:44.000 --> 0:18:47.560 in Becoming Superwoman where I talk about this. Um that's 0:18:47.600 --> 0:18:50.399 one of my favorite lines in the book. It says 0:18:50.520 --> 0:18:55.639 that my breakdown wasn't a spontaneous combustion precipitated by a 0:18:55.680 --> 0:18:59.640 single event, but a lifetime of smoldering emperors that finally 0:18:59.680 --> 0:19:03.520 caught fire and incinerated everything in its path. And I 0:19:03.560 --> 0:19:06.960 think it really was that I was just finishing up 0:19:07.000 --> 0:19:10.439 my second book tour, and when I went out to 0:19:10.480 --> 0:19:12.600 do my third, I had a team that was like, 0:19:13.119 --> 0:19:16.400 are you okay, because like the second one created all 0:19:16.480 --> 0:19:19.000 this stuff, And I was like, it wasn't the book, 0:19:19.040 --> 0:19:23.640 it wasn't this one thing. It was this whole lifetime 0:19:24.040 --> 0:19:28.560 of self hate and self neglect. And I had a 0:19:28.600 --> 0:19:32.359 lot of still imposter syndrome now about talking about how 0:19:32.400 --> 0:19:36.280 to you know, indulge in self care, because I was like, 0:19:36.320 --> 0:19:39.000 I'm no expert in this. I'm more of an expert 0:19:39.400 --> 0:19:43.920 in self harm or self hatred than self care and 0:19:44.080 --> 0:19:48.400 self love. And that's what made me hopefully a good 0:19:48.400 --> 0:19:50.439 person to talk about it, because I know what it 0:19:50.520 --> 0:19:53.520 was like, you know, I know what um that darkness 0:19:53.600 --> 0:19:55.200 was like. I know what it's like to have many 0:19:55.320 --> 0:19:57.960 rounds in the ring with darkness. And I also know 0:19:58.000 --> 0:20:00.040 what it's like to be broke and live on a 0:20:00.119 --> 0:20:03.120 brown rice and beans diet because it felt fancier than roman. 0:20:03.840 --> 0:20:06.680 What do you hope that your life looks like when 0:20:06.720 --> 0:20:08.520 you're in your seventies? What do you hope your career 0:20:08.520 --> 0:20:12.040 looks like? I love that, um. Sometimes I talk to 0:20:12.080 --> 0:20:14.720 my old lady self. UM. I have a lot of 0:20:15.200 --> 0:20:18.960 uh dialogues with myself, my younger self, my older self. 0:20:19.240 --> 0:20:21.920 I think my younger self would finally be proud of me. 0:20:22.280 --> 0:20:24.720 I kind of lost my way a little bit, um 0:20:24.800 --> 0:20:28.119 and and focused on some of the things that you know, 0:20:28.200 --> 0:20:31.320 perhaps she wouldn't have loved. And I think my old 0:20:31.440 --> 0:20:36.000 lady self, UM, I would I love for her to 0:20:36.480 --> 0:20:41.639 have the um, the financial freedom and you know, the 0:20:41.680 --> 0:20:48.159 ability to not only pursue projects she loves. But I 0:20:48.240 --> 0:20:51.200 have no regrets. On her death bed, I think about 0:20:51.359 --> 0:20:54.080 my death bed a lot. You know, the the word 0:20:54.359 --> 0:20:59.359 that Chris Pan does the my Intent bracelets where you 0:20:59.359 --> 0:21:02.560 put like the word on the circle. I've often put 0:21:02.640 --> 0:21:05.560 time when then I tattooed that, so then I stopped 0:21:05.560 --> 0:21:08.720 putting that. But then deathbed because they think about, you 0:21:08.760 --> 0:21:12.160 know what, am I going to regret not being brave 0:21:12.280 --> 0:21:15.359 enough to do? So what was the moment when you 0:21:15.600 --> 0:21:18.480 felt like, Okay, I'm healed, I'm ready for the next 0:21:18.560 --> 0:21:22.040 chapter of my life. I don't think you're every necessarily healed. 0:21:22.160 --> 0:21:26.639 I actually wrote an epilogue to my last book where 0:21:26.680 --> 0:21:28.680 I felt like I was on the verge of another 0:21:29.880 --> 0:21:32.880 breakdown right in the precipice of the launch of the book, 0:21:32.920 --> 0:21:36.679 and I actually delayed it six months, which my former 0:21:36.680 --> 0:21:40.440 self would have never imagined doing. And I said, you know, 0:21:40.840 --> 0:21:43.520 balance can be used as a noun and a verb, 0:21:43.680 --> 0:21:46.480 and often in this discussion we use it as a noun, 0:21:46.640 --> 0:21:50.520 like I found balance. It's there, I'm good. And I 0:21:50.560 --> 0:21:53.680 think for me, it's been helpful to use it as 0:21:53.720 --> 0:21:56.840 a verb because it's something that's constantly in motion. It's 0:21:56.840 --> 0:22:00.920 something you constantly have to work on and cultivate. So 0:22:01.080 --> 0:22:06.040 I think that for me, remembering that balance and chaos coexists. 0:22:06.119 --> 0:22:09.320 They have to coexist because sometimes again in a habit 0:22:09.440 --> 0:22:12.399 even still where I'll get back to that balance or 0:22:12.440 --> 0:22:17.080 self care stuff like after this, and um, you know, 0:22:17.240 --> 0:22:21.240 I think that there's never an after this for me 0:22:21.840 --> 0:22:24.720 realizing that you have to be in both. In fact, 0:22:24.880 --> 0:22:28.440 both have to coexist to have the other. And so 0:22:28.600 --> 0:22:31.639 it's a lifelong journey. I think I'm always going to 0:22:31.720 --> 0:22:35.440 be a reader of my um my third book, which 0:22:35.520 --> 0:22:38.120 is crazy because I'm the writer, but also I think 0:22:38.160 --> 0:22:42.560 a lifelong reader. And now a quick break. 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I drove by myself, and I didn't 0:23:26.400 --> 0:23:28.080 know that I would end up back in l A. 0:23:28.640 --> 0:23:30.840