Lead And Grow Rich: Leadership Starts At Home with Christie Garcia [Podcast 190]

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Have you ever felt the struggle of balancing between your personal and professional life?   Does it feel like in order to find success professionally, responsibilities at home must take second place?  If so, you’re not alone! When too many things are happening in our lives, and we’re being pulled in too many directions, it can become challenging to be authentic, and create the impact you want in the world.  As a leadership coach, speaker, and founder of Mindful Choice, Christie Garcia, is qualified to talk us through this dilemma, and help navigate the topic of leadership at work and home. Christie will discuss the biggest mistakes and hindrances most people encounter with leadership, while also sharing some self-management strategies that help contribute to greater success within teams. In this episode, Christie Garcia creates a candid picture about how you can become not only a great leader at work, but also in your personal life.

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Lead And Grow Rich: Leadership Starts At Home with Christie Garcia [Podcast 190]

We’ve got an amazing guest. Let me ask you a question. Did you ever thought to yourself, “I’m trying to balance between being a spouse, a partner, a husband, a wife, raising kids, and I’m trying to go create something magical. I want to make a big impact. I want to make a big difference.” Have you ever struggled with that? We’ve got an expert that’s uniquely qualified to be able to show you how to navigate leadership. This segment is called Lead and Grow Rich, how to be a better leader and how to be a better leader at home. Her name is Christie Garcia.

Christie is a leadership specialist. She speaks, she facilitates and she’s the Founder of a company called Mindful Choice. She’s got over seventeen years of experience in sales, recruiting and coaching. She’s worked with incredible companies like Airbnb, Oakley, Twitter, and a whole lot more. She left Corporate America and started her coaching business and over the last seven years, she’s worked with all kinds of leaders on accountability, communication, self-awareness, ownership, impact and a whole lot more. Christie, welcome to the show. It’s a pleasure to have you with us.

Thank you so much, Dan. It is a pleasure to be here. I’m very excited to visit with you.

For our audience, we’re calling this segment the Lead and Grow Rich series, how to lead essentially in business, in life and at home. What’s your definition of leadership?

I like the simple definition of it where it’s just owning your own story, owning your own stuff so you can make the biggest impact you’re capable of doing. It’s how you get to show up 100%, be you, which naturally makes you come to life with passion and excitement and people want to follow you.

You can tell the size of the leader by the arrows in their back and the size of their following, it’s usually those two. You’ve had this interesting path. There are lots of stories that people can find if they research you and hear about your story, a lot of different stories as it relates to falling 30 feet, three stories out of a building and that was a critical pivot. Why are you doing what you’re doing? Why are you feeling so compelled that this is your journey to help people and companies with leadership?

To show up 100%, you just have to be you. – Christie Garcia Click To Tweet

There are a couple of things that led me to this place. When I was twenty, I was the epitome of a small-town girl. I had lots of ambitions, but they were only as big as what I knew, which was a pretty small town. I started to venture out and obviously explore the world a little bit. I traveled around and left the country for the first time. Also my grandfather’s both passed and my parents got divorced. From that experience, I realized how much more there was to life and what I wanted to see and do and accomplish. I was on the same path as my parents and grandparents were, where I wasn’t going to venture out much more than what was safe. Through a little bit of self-discovery and awareness of myself, I started this journey that led me to just learning more about me. Who am I? I’m not just this Garcia girl or someone’s cousin or someone’s daughter or someone’s friend or someone’s girlfriend.

For the first time, I became Christie Garcia and I wasn’t really sure who she was. That got me excited and then I started to realize the impact that I could create in the world just being me versus harboring and staying safe through the family network and that sort of thing. That was the unconscious discovery of this work. Then over about ten, fifteen years doing this development and professionally is where it started. I started to be in sales and see how all these amazing people will grow into these leadership roles. They were rewarded as an I, “I win. I get to be the best rep, I get to be promoted, I get to do all of this,” but then all of a sudden they’re thrown into these situations to lead a team that has to be focused on the ‘we.’ I just started to see the gaps. There was no transition. There was nothing that helps someone go from ‘I’ to ‘we’ without a massive two to three-year trial and error period and learn as you go.

Over time, I decided that I was going to start building out communication programs and transition that ‘I to we’ quickly. How do you get up and running in six months versus two, three years, sometimes six years? Sometimes people never figure out how to do that truly successfully. Over the last five years, I started using more of the ego management tools and that is the work that just inspires me and put me in a place where this is exactly what I’m supposed to be doing. How to self-manage our brain, how to control our emotions in order to get the most impact, in order to find that level of peace and balance within us that allows us to be better people. Not just better at business, but a better leader in our life, in our family, in our communities, which ultimately makes us better people and leaders in our business as well. It’s a whole picture that just led me here and I don’t think I’m supposed to be anywhere else, especially at this moment.

There are so many ways I can take this. If you’re joining us for the first time, thanks for making us part of your day. We’re going to definitely get into some strategy. We’re going to get into some tactics. We got some special bonuses that Christie’s going to share with you as well. If you want to join in on the conversation, you can hit us up on Twitter, @Dan_Kuschell, and join tens of thousands of others there and a whole lot more now. Christie, I know we’re going to cover some of the biggest myths and misunderstandings around leadership. If you could think back for you, how did the role of your mom and dad going through divorce impact your view of leadership may be at home and then also taking it into the business world?

 

As a kid, you don’t look at things like leadership as black and white as adults do. We all went into survival mode, to be honest. I grew up thinking my family had this perfect little story. We went on our family vacations and my dad owned his business and my mom worked hard and I had three siblings. There were four kids total and we all got along great and had this blissful life, at least I thought. My parents were good at helping us have this safe harbored viewpoint of what life was throwing at us. We were very naïve to real life struggles, which I think is a blessing and a curse at the same time. My parents got divorced when I was a junior in high school and my older sister had already left for college. By the time this all went down, it threw all of our very stable family traditions out the window.

You can tell the size of the leader by the arrows in their back. – Host Click To Tweet

All of a sudden, we’re these young adults in the world trying to figure out who we are now because we’re no longer a unit. That’s when I figured out that we have to find this fulfillment within ourselves. My parents worked both very hard and like most families, they get lost in their kids, their jobs, life’s crazy. Instead of staying grounded and rooted within each other, it got veered off into different directions. Through my life, I became very intentional about what I wanted to overcome. Through their struggles, being able to make sure I built relationships that were more intentional. Probably to a fault, to be honest, I was probably too much of a giver when I was younger. Where now as an adult, as a business owner, as an ambitious woman in the world, I see the struggles that both my parents went through, how to show up 100% in all avenues of life when life is stressful.

That has become a big focus for me on helping individuals figure out how do you want it to be happy as you? There’s a level of selfishness that has to come with leadership and then how to be selfless to make sure that even when you’re stressed out, you’re aware and empathetic to what’s happening around you. We don’t put up these boundaries and walls that can create resentment and all the things that end up happening, whether it’s at home or at work, we do it every single day. That’s where that ego management came into play. Get off our own survival island and remember we’re all on the same team.

As you’re reading this right now, do you find yourself on survival island? Do you find yourself at a place where you’re questioning who am I? Who are you now? Do you find yourself struggling to tap into true fulfillment? Do you find yourself maybe like Christie described, where you feel like you’re a giver and you’re not necessarily getting it all back? We’re going to dive deeper into some of the ego management strategies, some tactics, we’re going to give you some walk away value.

 

Christie, I can’t help but wonder, I had gone through a divorce because quite frankly, I don’t know that I had the leadership piece right for about a decade or so. I was building up these big companies and although on the outside people looking are like, “You have this amazing business,” at home, it was quite dysfunctional frankly. There’s a psychology I have now which is, “If you can’t lead at home, it will impact your business. It may be a slow burn, it may take a while but it ultimately will be a leak in the boat that will get bigger and bigger as time goes on and it does have a major impact.” It’s better to get these things front stage at home and backstage in your business working together in harmony.

Before we get into some of the strategies and some of the tactics that I know you can share and talk more about ego management. I’m curious for you personally on this journey, what has been your lowest point in business or the biggest mistake or conflict that you faced as a leader that helps set the course of where you’re going at now and in the future and what did you learn from them?

If you can’t lead at home, it will impact your business. – Host Click To Tweet

There are two things. The first one is something that comes up in every workshop I lead, how and why I believe in this work so much. Before I was coaching, I was just training and developing myself and I started to learn about my own ego and my own stuff. At the end of the day we all have it, whether we want to call them daddy issues, mommy issues, or just our own siblings who create these boundaries and personalities that come out of us that react to life and the insecurities that feed us to show up.  One of the things that I realized with my last boss, I worked with him for the last six years of my medical career. We were good friends, but there were times that we would just go head to head and battle. The more I learned about ego, it was our own ego showing up. There was an insecurity or fear or value being stepped on them, neither of us was aware of. We are almost always fighting the same conversation, the same outcome, but our words were slightly different in that it became a confrontation. It was almost like we were competing with each other, but he was my boss and I was his employee.

There was always this weird dance that we did and then I started to learn more about these coaching tactics and self-development. As I did, I started to see how I can apply these to our relationship. I was able to change the way I communicated with him and then he naturally responded differently. That’s when I realized that we can’t change other people, but if we change our own approach, we can change the way the world functions around us. That I found very inspiring. A lot of people say, “That’s manipulative.” It’s really not actually. It’s learning how to manage our own self in order to get better results for everyone.

When we show up 100% at, I called the 33% of our strengths and weaknesses. If we use our strengths at a full 33%, that actually has us show up 100% in all categories so people can relate to us, they can be inspired by us, they can be motivated. Where when we overuse our strengths, it holds us back and it starts to push us into the defense, into that ego manic place where now we have to defend ourselves or we have to take control or we have to show that we’re better than someone else. We’re not being in that authentic real place that says, “I know what I’m doing. I’m confident. I’ve got this.” It becomes a fake confidence. I learned that about myself and as I started to explore that more, even through business, now I’m at a place talking about a low point in business.

 

Over the last two years, I probably have been at my low point as far as learning my latest and greatest next move. Each one pushes you into a growth spurt. The last two years I’ve been in a growth place in business. It’s like, “What is my next move?” I’ve been playing it safe and going virtual has been a scary tactic for me. I can’t wrap my head around technology, so for me I just avoid it and that has been a lot of learning for me as the leader of my business, leader as an individual in life, and how I procrastinate when I don’t want to do something or I don’t know how to do something. It’s in that self-awareness of when to take the bull by the horns and just grab on and run with it and not be scared of the unknown. That is a big downfall that I have when I get to a place of unsure.

I’m usually sure about everything. When I get to that place of like, “What’s next?” I’ve been trying to build this business out and finally, I feel like it’s just hiring the right people. Don’t try to take it on yourself and get to that next point as quickly as possible versus waiting. I wish I would have listened to my own advice years ago and I would not be still looking for the right team and the right people where now it’s like, “Get the loan out. Just do it. Make business happen.”

We can't change other people, but if we change our own approach, we can really change the way the world functions around us. – Christie Garcia Click To Tweet

There are so many layers of this as you’re sharing your story, Christie. Thinking back to when you have dealt with a confrontation with a colleague in your office or your boss if you’re on a boss-employee relationship or doing that dance with somebody and how do you navigate. I know we’re going to start to dive into a few more tactics. I can’t help but ask a couple of things as it relates to you just being completely vulnerable and sharing where you’re at and bumping up against that next level for you overall. There’s this whole idea that jumps in my head, which is, “Irritated oysters create pearls.”

What would you say to the person who says, “Christie, I like what you have to say, but Steve Jobs built the number one company in the world by basically being an irritated oyster with every oyster he ever ran across, but that conflict created amazing results.” That great coach, some coaches in the NFL are known to be very friction-oriented and they get great results out of their team, at least for the short term. What would you say to somebody who holds on to that old way of looking at leadership as this your framework of I need to be the irritated oyster to help create great pearls and others?

I get that question probably weekly from those frustrated clients that aren’t ready to make the change themselves. What I always say, there are different types of leadership. We know that the old school powerhouse leadership can work. We wouldn’t have all this success that we see in the world if it didn’t, but we also know that there’s a lot of backlashes right now and there’s a point where that old school leadership model doesn’t work. The reality is yes, you can accomplish many things on your own. You can accomplish many things being a dictator, but does it fulfill you or does it fill you up? Does it leave you happy at the end and do you truly feel like you have made a difference the end of your days? One of the biggest things I used to hear when I was in medical sales, I’d walked through the hospitals and I’d see all these people by themselves in their rooms and I get curious.

Coming from a big family, I just can’t even imagine someone dying in the hospital by themselves and there are a lot of people that do. I would go into these rooms and I would just sit and visit during the break and learn a little bit about them. Why are they here on their own? What got them here? The most consistent pieces of advice that I would get is they were alone because they put all their eggs in their work basket. They wanted to provide for their families. They wanted to be successful and make sure that they did their career well. That’s awesome, but what happened was when they came to retirement years, either they had worked so many hours that their body was literally dying on the inside. Now they’re all sitting in the hospitals fighting cancer off or they have lost everybody that they actually loved the most and worked so hard for because it was always, “Once I have more time, I’ll do this. Once I have more of this, I’ll do that.” Unfortunately, we’re only guaranteed time now so these people ended up alone and by themselves. That is something that breaks my heart when I think of old school leadership.

 

They’re not living fulfilled lives. They’ve got no one that stands behind them and says, “I will follow you anywhere.” They’re just chasing the paycheck or the success stick as well and that ends. What do you get to say on your 90th birthday at the end of your days of how success looks? Were you a great leader? Each of us are the only ones who can wake up every day and every night and say, “I did it well or I was a jerk.” It doesn’t matter what that answer is to me. It doesn’t matter what that answer is to you. You’re the only one who has to die on that dying bed and say, “I have no regrets and I was a good person,” or you’re the guy that’s dying on that dying bed and wishing that you did things over or you had more time and you can do all this stuff differently. You don’t get a second chance. Be nice and be a great leader now.

You’re touching a lot of different chords. I won’t take a lot of time because this is your platform now. As a dad and as a husband and also having gone through a divorce, doing self-reflection, I realized that I wasn’t getting it right. I was on the verge of being one of those dads that were going to end up on a table, which actually I did. For four days, I had a heart surgery, I had to sign a disclaimer that said I had one in X chance of dying. It freaked me out at the risk of being one of those dads. “What was your dad like?” “He was great, but he was never home because he always worked.” It was something that motivated me to do things differently, to disrupt my world, to shift it, and to transform it. The old adage, “If you want to break through, be willing to break something and break old habits to get the new thing.” There’s just so much wisdom in what you just shared, Christie, that it really touches in.

I can’t help but reflect on this whole hospital story, having gone through that. At the time I had 175 employees, we were doing some big revenue. On the outside, it’s a very successful business but at home, I wasn’t fulfilled. I wasn’t healthy. I was 65 pounds heavier. I had my son who had just been born, I had a daughter that was two, my marriage was in upheaval at the time and it really shook things up. By the way, I share that with our audience right now so you don’t have to go through that same pain and struggle. I would encourage you to find a coach like Christie to work with. Find someone that can help give you the guidance and the platform. Christie, I want to dive into some of the strategies. You’ve worked with Airbnb, you’ve worked with Oakley, you’ve worked with Twitter, you work with solo entrepreneurs, you work with entrepreneurs, the highly creative visionary types, and a wide range. What do you see is the biggest mistake or misunderstanding that most people have around this idea of leadership?

Unfortunately we're only guaranteed time today. – Christie Garcia Click To Tweet

One of the things that frustrate me the most is when I hear people say, “That person’s just not cut out for leadership.” They got into this role but they’re just not supposed to be, that they’re bad at their job or they’re not a good person. I just cringe at that because those are all belief systems that we create judgment around others. I believe that every single person has the ability to be a leader, it’s just what they’ve been exposed to. Who’s taught them how to lead? If you’ve only had a leader who was a dictator, who only gave you that tough love, who never showed empathy, then you’re going to have a leader that doesn’t show empathy and only gives tough love. Being able to help people recognize their impact. One thing I love the most is the first debrief session that I do with one-on-one clients. We have an overview of perception, how you see yourself showing up versus how the world around you sees you showing up and it shows the self-awareness gaps.

Most of us believe we’re doing either better or worse than our actual impact is. It all goes back to confidence. Are we overconfident, trying to overcompensate for something that insecure us or do we under compensate and have no confidence and we just try to go out in the world and get the approval and the permission? It’s an interesting thing for me. The biggest thing is most people use their own insecurities and fears to judge leadership versus to see that as an opportunity to step up. If you have a terrible boss, then you could actually step up and help your boss be better just through ego management. Otherwise what happens is the boss has an ego. Now the employee has an ego, now you have a battle in the relationship where as long as one person can manage their ego, you can actually manage both egos in that situation. I think that’s the real power of leadership is when you can take full ownership and it doesn’t matter if you’re the boss or you’re the employee or you’re the janitor. I don’t care what your role is. You can show up and change people’s impact by just being aware of your own.

It’s not the title and it’s not the tenure. It’s how you show up. What do you see is the biggest insecurity in how people show up as a leader?

 

The platform that I use, there are three reactors. There’s the complying reactor, the protecting reactor and the controlling reactor. The controller, their biggest reaction is to control. If they’re uncomfortable, if they’re feeling insecurity, if they’re not going to be the best and win, then they’re going to charge harder. They’re going to be that freight train that just runs people over, get on the bus or get off. They’ll always get to the finish line, usually first but they may not have any passengers on their bus.  It doesn’t mean they’re not successful and it doesn’t even mean they don’t have a team. They’re just usually the lone ranger that’s always at the top. The sad thing with that personality type though is that a lot of times they tend to have that extrovert switch. In the show light, they’re an extrovert but the insecurity comes back when they’re actually home and the introvert comes out and they think that they’ve got all these relationships and connections. They’re pretty shallow and just task-oriented and based around the project.   I was that person. That’s what led me to this work and my fall that you mentioned earlier was getting to realize that I was one of those chargers that had a lot of friends, had a lot of people in my life, but they weren’t deep meaningful relationships. They were just these empty lost relationships. That’s the control.

The protectors’ downfall and how they show up is they’re so distant, they’ve got so many boundaries and so many barriers that they’ve put in place and that have gotten them to where they’re at. It’s one of their gifts is to create these boundaries, but they get so unemotional and unrelatable that it’s hard for people to see them as someone they can follow our trust because there’s just so much distance there. That can come out as a very loud arrogance or very quiet passive arrogance.  One of the most common things I hear from most people because most of us have a protector as our second subtype, and that is, “I’m not that confident or I’m not that arrogant at meetings.” Sometimes it’s just the energy we put it off. The passive quiet protector could just be the guy that’s got the arms crossed and there’s an energy saying, “You guys are going to screw this up and I don’t want to have anything to do with it so go for it.” That energy speaks really loudly. Then there’s the louder, more confident controlling protector who tends to be more the guy that’s going to fight you to the end to say, “My way’s the right way, get on board or get off,” and they’ll be that confrontational person on the team. Those are the two that are the most common and the loudest.

Your complier response is usually the one that just goes along to get along. They’ll say yes, they’ll do everything just to make sure they’re liked at the end of their days, even though they don’t necessarily identify with that consciously and subconsciously. Everything they do is to make sure they don’t rock the boat and just keep everybody happy. Go along to get along. Unfortunately, with that is there’s a point where they have to shut off. You can only fill up your jar so much and take before the explosion happens. The lid pops and now all of a sudden you’ve got this backlash, this very passive-aggressive approach to make sure everyone knows how upset you are.

People will appreciate and respect you more when you just speak the truth. – Host Click To Tweet

We’ve got a protector, we’ve got a controller and we’ve got compliers. How big of a role do you think is being a people pleaser? I’m sharing this just reflecting on myself, some of the struggles I’ve had over the years in all things in business, relationships and partnerships has been around this idea of being a people pleaser. I’ve worked hard at it the last decade. How big of a role do you see being a people pleaser playing in this?

For compliers, the people-pleasing component, it’s important. With these reactors, these are all our strengths and our weaknesses. This is where I say if we use the complying at a 33%, you’re actually using that pleaser in you as a strength. Part of pleasing is to know that, “I’ve got to make sure that everybody’s happy in order to get a nice momentum from the entire team,” in that alignment component, but there’s a point where if you’re too people-pleasing, it almost puts you into a victim mindset. You take and take and it becomes someone else’s fault that you’re unhappy or someone else’s fault that you didn’t get what you needed or someone else’s fault that you have fifteen things on your plate.

It’s one of those confident things to say, “Where are the boundaries?” Using that 33% from the protector that knows where to say no, knows where to put boundaries up to say, “I can’t take that on now. That doesn’t feel good with my integrity. I need to stand by my value and say no to this topic.” It’s just being able to speak up and speak your truth in those moments versus just going along to get along. As a pleaser, one of the hardest things for teams to do is if you have a controller and a complier on the same team, you start talking different languages.

The complier doesn’t want to hurt the controller’s feeling, the controller doesn’t even know how not to hurt the complier’s feeling. The controller is just direct and honest and the complier is saying, “I guess we’ll go that way.” At the end of the day, if the complier could just speak up, recognize you’re not going to hurt that controller’s feeling so speak your truth, they want to hear it. They actually thrive in truth. Being able to meet those direct people in your life will give you more strength and more confidence. Face that confrontation versus avoiding it is probably the biggest thing I work with my compliers. It’s how to face the conflict and the struggles immediately versus letting them go too long to where now you’re going to have that explosion effect.

I’ve got three and a half pages of notes and these last couple of chunks here address the issue right here, right now, speak your truth. There’s a great Dan Sullivan quote which is, “The first progress starts by telling the truth.” People will appreciate you and they will respect you more when you just speak the truth. You’ve got to be willing to open up. What I’d love for you to share, you’ve got all this experience, you work with companies like Twitter and Airbnb and hundreds of other business owners as well and very active out in the leadership community, brilliant at what you do. If you had to narrow down your experiences, what are one to three of the biggest breakthroughs either you’ve experienced yourself and/or you’ve helped your clients implement and install in what they’re doing around leadership and the impact of that? What would those be?

 

I would say the first one for me, I’ve been on this personal and professional. I was a single gal until last July and anyone in a relationship know how challenging that is. I had it all figured out in the professional life and now I’ve got this man of my dreams that came in and showed me how to be the real we in life, not just in my business. I’ve been on my own journey there is how to build balance and practice a lot of what I’m preaching on the relationship side, not just the business side. It’s being able to stay mindful in the relationship, how to make sure when I get into my intense mindset, recognizing that that ego is very standoffish, very direct and very short.

My emotion goes out the window when I’m stressed and he’s been a partner that reminds me that he’s there. He’s like, “Where did you go? I’m home right now.” Just being able to have that in my life has really helped me stay more present in those moments, catching myself in the middle of the chaos. That’s when we lose our best self and our leadership goes out the window, is when the stress and the pressure go up. If you’re a person that has a lot of stress and pressure in your life, I guarantee that there’s relationship suffering probably in the business place and at home. Just stop long enough to ask yourself, “What can I do to make sure that I’m showing up in these relationships 100%? What can I do to make sure that the people I love and I say are my number one priority, are actually feeling that?”

That’s a big one that I hear all the time from clients is, “My family is my number one priority,” but then if you ask, “How much time have you invested in them this week?” It’s like deer in headlights, “I don’t know.” Consciously create this time. I think that’s my biggest takeaway personally and professionally, is we control our own time. If we learn how to stop being busy and start being productive, there’s a difference there. Busy makes us feel valued. That feeds our ego to say, “I’m busy, I’m important, I have things I need to do, and people are counting on me.” That’s really a false reality. Being productive is where success comes from, where results come from and where efficiency comes from.

Making sure you’re managing your time to where you’re productive actually buys you more time to spend it in areas that really matter. Don’t do the little tasks that aren’t going to matter in five days or five years, like do the things that matter most. That is a big one for everybody that I work with. The other big takeaway is the leadership academy that I run, there’s a great model that’s built into that that helps people in those moments of denial of their ego. I’m in denial sometimes when I’m facilitating these and I get reminded of my ego every day through my clients. The more we talk about this stuff, the more we realized, “That’s present in my life too,” so being able to work in this leadership academy setting which has anywhere from ten to 30 people in them at all times and being able to hear where the ego’s showing up, how it’s showing up and that denial component is the biggest changing factor that comes into play when people can actually stand up and say, “I never realized that I had so much ownership in that conflict.”

When people can actually stop and recognize what is their part, whether it’s 1% or 99%, what is your part in every situation in your life, good or bad? You play a role in it, so you might as well own it. The more you can own it, the stronger that impact can be. Those are probably the two. I don’t know if those were super clear on the question you’re asking, but I feel like those are the ones that stand out the most.

Denial is one of the biggest things that hold us back. - Host Click To Tweet

That feels like we’ve got a seminar that’s three to four minutes. That was awesome. I’ve got a few notes. Be mindful. Stand in the midst of the chaos, dealing with stress and pressure. Ask the question, “What can I do to make sure I’m 100% present? What can I do to make sure that my family is feeling that I’m truly committed to them?” Consciously create the time. There’s a big difference between busy and productive. Do what matters most. Denial is one of the biggest things that holds us back. What part am I playing and what role am I playing in this thing? Whatever that thing may be conflict, good, bad or otherwise. How’s that for a synopsis? Do you get a little tip of the iceberg of the wisdom and genius behind what Christie stands for, who she is, what she does, what she can help you do? If you’d like to go deeper with her resource, if you’d like to go deeper to learn more about what she’s up to, how she can help you, Christie, how can people reach out to you and get in touch?

I’m creating this leadership mastermind. It’s basically a leadership academy mastermind. It’s the Mindful Choice Leadership Academy. If you go to my website, MindfulChoiceCoaching.com, please just reach out contact me and join the newsletter. You’ll be updated on everything that I’m up to. If you’re interested in joining the leadership academy, I just started my latest one, but there will be a new one that’s starting probably about January timeframe. Give me a call. Let’s get you on that list and have you joined the next mastermind to be able to start showing up and living your life to where it’s full, meaningful, and successful. A lot of times people say, “Everything is good. I liked my job, I like my life,” but it’s very stagnant. If you really start digging into what that really means, what is success and what is fulfillment? If now truly was your last day, would you be like, “That was a great life,” or there’s something new you should be doing? That’s where Leadership Academy comes into play.

I want to encourage you because, “Good is the enemy of great,” a quote by Jim Collins. You deserve better if you’re looking for a full, meaningful, successful home and business life. I want to encourage you to go deeper with what Christie has got going on at MindfulChoiceCoaching.com. You won’t be disappointed. She’s got a wealth of resources there and like she said, she made the invitation just reach out to her and you can get connected. She can talk to you about how she can help you, help your company, help your team, that and a whole lot more. Christie, I like to do a rapid-fire type thing. Here’s something that pops into my head. Is there a difference between leadership as a man and as a woman?

I think we’re in the perfect time frame of life to be talking about this. Personally, I don’t think there is. I think women are women, men are men. Yes, there are differences there but as far as leadership goes, there’s masculine and feminine energy. There are task-oriented people and there are people-oriented people. I don’t care if you’re a male or a woman, you have both of those qualities. As a woman, I probably have more masculine leadership skills than a man who has more feminine leadership skills. What I mean by that is I’m more task-oriented, that controller side of me kicks in.

The biggest thing is to know where your balance is, be able to recognize that the masculine leader is strong, direct, communicative, passionate, ambitious and the feminine leadership qualities are caring about people, empathy, making sure that you do what’s right and what’s fair for the people. If you mold both of those together, that’s when we have a well-balanced, mindful leader of the world. That’s where I think men, women, it doesn’t really matter, come together and find your most balanced leader and you’ll be successful.

Another question, earlier you brought up the idea of ‘I’ and shifting to ‘we.’ I talked about this experience I went through where I was in the hospital for days. I sign this disclaimer that freaked me out, one in x chance of dying with this procedure. It was a wake-up call and now when people ask me what do I do, how I choose to show up? I go husband as one, dad as one A, and everything else. Talk about this shift of I to we and what advice could you give somebody to move from I to we? Maybe their home life is not as a successful or fulfilling as their business life and if they really want that, but what advice would you give to shift from I to we?

The biggest thing is we live in a world that we’re raised as children to take care of ourselves. Not seeing our parents and all that stuff, but how to get A’s on your schools test, how to make the basketball team, how to become student council, whatever. As a child, you are great. How do I take care of myself? I think when you get in your twenties and you start your career, it’s even more so of that. How do you get to be the maverick? How do I win? How do I get the promotion? How do I get to take care of myself? How do I get to make all the money? How do I get to find the man of my dreams or the woman of my dreams? It’s always I and then all of a sudden there’s a point in life that gets you there.

That gets you to your point of where the ‘I’ matters but then it’s like, “What about the next chapter?” When you start becoming a parent, when you start becoming a leader, a boss or even a friend who’s busy, you have to start being a we. You have to start taking care of the bigger picture and if you’re still focused on, “How do I take care of me? How do I protect me? How do I win? How do I get liked?” Then you have selfish motives and that just doesn’t win anymore. Being able to picture how do we all win? How do I get to show up and get to the finish line, but make sure everybody’s there with me? That just comes back to that being conscious, being present and being aware of your actions and your motives for why you do what you do. That’s the missing link that I think most of us have, is the motivation why we do what we do, and being able to be conscious of that is where the power is.

Good is the enemy of great – Jim Collins Click To Tweet

As you’re reading, I hope that you’re jotting down some notes to be able to put this into play. There is a bigger picture and it’s a lot more fun when you can help other people get to the finish line with you. That’s for sure. What were you known for in high school?

This is actually a funny story about my own ego. I was the class president in my senior year. I was big into softball. I wasn’t necessarily the kid that loved high school, but I was very involved. I’m really active in that sense. I always had this crazy insecurity about being pretty and it sounds silly. Even to this day, I’m not just a pretty face, I have a brain. That’s where my ego shows up and it has held me back in life because of that. One of the things I got nominated for in high school was the prettiest girl in the class.

I swear I had this mental breakdown, I cried. I was so upset and so disappointed that that’s all I got acknowledged for in high school. I have a brain, I’m involved, and I do all this other stuff that’s meaningful. It just shows that everybody has a story. Everyone has a thing and I have worked through that I don’t have to prove that I have a brain anymore, whatever, it is what it is. The egos in the stories we create from childhood definitely shadow how we show up in the world and how that ego pushes us forward. We all have an insecurity somewhere. Make sure you know what yours is.

As you’re reading, what is that shadow for you? We can help you overcome that. We can put some sun on it. We can help you make the transition, make the shift and Christie can help you. Go check out what she’s doing. Christie, this has been a blast. What are one to three action steps that you hope that our audience takes as a result of our time together?

I just hope that people walk away feeling a little more empowered to take back control of their life. Don’t settle for, “This is just me, this is my life, this is how it is.” You have the power to change it. If you don’t like how it is, change it. If you know that you can be better, figure out how. It just takes 1% of you choosing to be better every single day that gives you a massive shift in your impact at the end of the year. There are three more months left this year in 2018, how can you change your impact, and how can you walk away 2018 feeling proud and accomplished not just with the awards and the tangibles, but just personally in that deep fulfilling, meaningful arena of your life as well?

Christie, it’s been an amazing pleasure to have you on the show. Thank you.

Thank you, Dan. It’s been a lot of fun. I appreciate all your insight as well.

There you have it. I want to encourage you to take action with what Christie’s been sharing with you. If you never want to miss an episode, you can join us at GrowthToFreedom.com/Subscribe, just follow the links through to iTunes. As I look at the notes here, first of all, it’s about being mindful. It’s about leadership. Leadership is as leadership does. Own your story. Be 100% you, whether it’s divorce or whatever might be. Take the time to focus in on who you are and own it. Move from the I mentality to the we. There’s a whole lot more. Come back to this episode. I encourage you, take action with what Christie shared with you. Seize the day, make it a great week and we’ll see you next time on GrowthToFreedom.com.

Resources mentioned in this episode:

• Christie Garcia
• Mindful Choice
• @Dan_Kuschell on Twitter
• MindfulChoiceCoaching.com
• GrowthToFreedom.com/Subscribe

About Christie Garcia

Christie Garcia is a Leadership Coach, Speaker, Facilitator, and Founder of Mindful Choice. Christie has 17 years of experience in sales, recruiting, and coaching. Eight years ago, Christie had a life-changing fall from a 30ft fire escape. Luckily, she walked away with no physical damage and a huge reality check to start living her next chapter. She courageously left corporate America and started her leadership coaching business, Mindful Choice. Over the last 7 years, she has worked with leaders from fast-growing organizations including Airbnb, Twitter, Oakley, and Sunrun. Christie builds programs that help individuals and teams maximize their impact through self-awareness, ownership, communication, alignment, and accountability. Her services include Leadership and Management Development, Productive Communication, Ego Management, Team Building, Offsite Retreats, Speaking, and Event Facilitation.