Episode 32: How to mine your .2mg of Gold and find your authentic leadership

Podcast Introduction:

[00:00:00] Roxanne: As much as we talk about the heart and the great wealth of energy, that we have within us, it's also important to recognize that that takes two spheres of our head. It's the left brain and right brain, right? The right brain is the creative side that gives us that juice, that fuel, that powers our engine. But we got to have this really well-defined and well-educated as well. We got to do the hard work. You got to make the tough decisions, you got to call it like, you see it, you got to be brutally honest with yourself and you've got to do the work.

[00:00:32] Aneta: We often hear people wishing us a long, happy, and healthy life. But what if the length isn't what matters most? What if instead, it's the breath, depth, and purpose of each day that matters most? Welcome to the Live the Width of Your Life podcast. My name is Aneta Ardelian Kuzma and join me weekly as I interview guests who may changes in their own lives to live more fully with intention, gratitude, and joy. Be prepared to be inspired by their stories of how they shifted their mindset. Took courageous action and designed the life that they always wanted to live.

[00:01:07] Aneta: Thanks for joining us on another episode today. I'm so excited about today's guest, Roxanne Kaufman. She's a leader gold miner. She helps individuals, teams, organizations, and corporations discover, unleashes, and develop their leadership potential. She believes that we each have 0.2 milligrams of gold, and that is where our individual potential lies, we just need to find the courage. And a determination to dig it out. Roxanne is a leadership gold miner, a certified leadership master professional speaker, facilitator, executive coach, author, president, and c e o of pro laureate, and also an immediate past president of the National Speakers Association. And to me, she's a dear friend who was my very first coach that helped me with my own transformation.

[00:01:59] Aneta: We talked about so many things during this episode. We talked about her own transformation journey, and it was very inspiring to talk about what that looked like, why the transformation journey is never a straight line and even those moments and the things that challenge us the most can be used for good. Nothing is ever wasted we talked a little bit about the importance of dreaming. Again, knowing yourself, creating that self-awareness, and building the life vision in order to get to where you want to go, and so many other things. I think you're really going to enjoy today's conversation. Take a listen.

Podcast Interview:

[00:02:40] Aneta: Hi, Roxanne. Thank you so much for coming to the show today.

[00:02:44] Roxanne: Aneta. Thank you for asking me. I've been so excited about this. I've been so looking forward to it. Thank you.

[00:02:50] Aneta: This is such a full circle moment for me because many people that have listened to the podcast or know me, have heard me affectionately talk about my coach, my first coach who changed my life, who worked with me to dream to imagine what could be, and that person are you. And so I am so excited to have you here and to talk a little bit about your journey, which is amazing and so inspiring. And, just for people to get to meet you because you were so near and dear to me in my heart.

[00:03:29] Roxanne: And thank you so much as you are to me. I've welled up. When I think about that time, what a journey, and yes, I'll be happy to share, kind of my journey as well. But first, I just want to say you are amazing and your journey of transformation has been just phenomenal. And to watch you and to be a part of it has been one of the greatest blessings of my life. So thank you.

[00:03:49] Aneta: Well, I'm so grateful for you and I want to go back to, sort of the serendipity sort of moments and how we actually met, because I was reflecting about this morning, thinking about how sometimes we meet people and we don't know who they will become for us. And so I was thinking back how you and I were at a conference, I don't know, Roxanne, it must have been like 20 years ago. I swear as I think back, it must have been like 20 years ago, like over 15 for sure. When we first, and sat next to each other, didn't know each other. And I remember you turned to me and you're like, I like your jacket. And I said I love your red hair. And that's great. Yep. And, then we were sort of reunited when our mutual friend Jeanie connected us and said, you have to meet my friend, and brought you to lunch with me.

[00:04:51] And we looked at each other and we said, we've already met. And then that's when you and I started spending time together way before I ever hired you as a coach.

[00:05:01] Roxanne: You're absolutely right. You just never know, people come in and out of our lives. And sometimes you just have an instant connection, as you and I did, way back and my business is now 20 years old, 20 year anniversary was this last January 23rd and 2023. 20 years, Aneta. I couldn't believe it. So yes, because it was just shortly after I started into the business that you and I had that serendipitous meeting at that conference, and it was just one of those things that didn't surprise me at all, that the universe struggled us back into each other's lives and in such a significant way for both of us.

[00:05:35] Aneta: Absolutely. So I want for you to share a little bit about your business because I think your story is so interesting. You have had so many amazing things that you have done in your life. But share a little bit about your background. And maybe even go into what it is that you do tonight with your business.

[00:05:54] Roxanne: I'd love to thank you. And I was thinking about this and great anticipation of our time together today, and I thought, okay, how do I condense this whole journey? Like, we all have these huge life journeys, right? So, let me explain it this way. It's unusual, as a kid growing up, my dad was a salesman and we traveled a lot. When I graduated from high school, we had moved 22 times and I thought that was normal. I thought that's what every kid did, that you always changed schools, you always changed friends. And I say this and mention it because I realize now how that helped develop a lot of character and a lot of things about the way I think and the way I move through the world that has had an impact on me for all of my life not realizing it, right? But especially in the last several years, so in the very beginning of my career, I worked in nonprofits in performing arts. So I was a theater and communications major at school. And, stayed in that and worked as a performer for a while and some in some amateur stuff and summer stock and things like that. But then I went into the administration of performing arts. That also included over a period of time, restoring historic theaters. I became a restorationist working with a team out of New York City. So it was just an incredible number of years that I did that, learned so much, and loved it. And at one point then and traveled. I did this in Ohio, in Florida, spent some time in England and in New York, and kind of all over the place. But I really wanted to see the other side, I had been in nonprofits, and I had been in the arts. I had learned so much, worked with so many different funders, and so forth. But I wanted to see what the corporate side of things looked like. So at this point, I was in Florida, left there, and went to New England just because I always wanted to live there. So I found a role in a very unusual way with a global construction company of all things. Yeah, what about this and why would they ever be interested in someone like me? But it was a fascinating group and I loved what they did, and I loved the people.

[00:07:58] Roxanne: So we had several conversations and we did a trial run of 90 days and we all fell in love with each other. So I went to work for them, and that was a 14-year career. I was the first woman they. This was a sea of men in a very male-dominated industry. It still is today, but I grew up there in my career. The first part of it, not knowing at the time how foundational and how absolutely critical what I learned in those nonprofit days in the arts. All of the things that I was involved with would serve me throughout my career and again, didn't know it then. So I go to work for this construction company. And it became a Camelot, we took kind of an average company and we started growing it organically and hired great people, and we shifted the thinking of the organization away from, we got a product, we sell it, you have a need, this is going to fix it. Let's just do that. To who are you and what do you and what are you trying to do with your business who are your people and how do they connect with you? And that's what I did. I went out and I talked to all these contractors and all these folks that we used, applicators and other, partners that we brought into the business, not as business partners, but as customers and clients and so forth. And we grew the company exponentially throughout, North and South America and globally. And then, long story here. I wasn't an owner for many different reasons, one of which was that I was a woman, but that's another story for another time. I wasn't okay with it, but it was like, I'm not going to get weird about all of that.

[00:09:39] Roxanne: It never occurred to me that anything would be different for me going into this business than it would be for anyone else, just because I was a woman. And so it. That was one of the things that were a little bit different. So anyway, the three owners sold the business and they sold the business to a behemoth company that was diversified into so many different businesses that we got lost in the midst of it. And I realized that the heart and soul, and if you will, the spirit of community that we created in that business was being decimated, or what was happening in this merger and acquisition. I get welled up to this day thinking about it because I was going to be CEO of that company and we were going to change the world. And I knew that was not going to be able to happen, and it wasn't just a game changer. It was life-changing. So I left I was in Connecticut, and I was in Germany. I was all over the world. I traveled all over the world for most of those 14 years. I had an apartment here in Cleveland cuz my parents were nearby. Anyway, I moved back to Ohio. My parents were getting older and I needed to figure myself out. So I am not having any idea at this point really, the lessons. That I had learned and how well this was going to serve me. So I came back here and I did some consulting. No, consulting is not for me. I can't know enough about anybody else's business to call myself a consultant. So I didn't know what to do, but I kept a revenue going and all of that. Came back here and bought a house and said, okay, it took a year. Who are you? Where have you been? Where are you? And, where are you going? And vision statement. Remember how you and I started? How did you start? What is your vision? What do you see, right? Sky is the limit. Don't put any boundaries around it. Like we did with you, but you did, we started with some of the things we didn't want that didn't belong in that vision that had been there in our lives up until that point.

[00:11:45] Roxanne: So what was it? And I wrote this vision. And then I started breaking it down into the process, right? Okay, well what do we do? So along the way, I realized that there was one thing that I had done all of my life, no matter what role I played, no matter what job I had, what age I was, there was one thing that I always did and it was my superpower. I see things in people, and I see things in companies and in organizations, in whatever it may be. I see the moving, I see the connections and the disconnects. I see the holes in the heart, and I see the brilliance in the brains. And what I wanted to do is find a way to encapsulate that so that I could actually take that to people, to organizations, and help them see it too. And they start to grow and emerge, right? So as all this was happening, I mean, you're an entrepreneur girl, it struggles and it's like every single day it's 24/7, 365 days a year to make this stuff work in the beginning. And I was grinding it and slowly but surely I started to figure out, and this was the most important thing I had to figure out first what I did best.

[00:12:59] Roxanne: In this whole world of what was available to me, because when we start out in these things, we just go, I can do that, and I can do this cause I need the money and I want to trust my wings and all the, and so that's the way it started. But as I grew and, and started to go deeper within myself and really ask the tough questions here, That started to narrow and things started to like, okay, I'm going to say no to that one. Another big lesson. Say no to that one. I'm going to focus on this and eventually started finding that place where it isn't what I do, it's who I am. And now this beautiful thing is not what you do. It is who you are, and that's where you are right now. And that's where I've landed. So what occurred to me through all of this, of course, are all the lessons I learned from all the beautiful people, and souls that I got to know. Many of whom I still do like yourself, helped me learn these lessons along the way. The most fascinating thing to me now is that I look back all those years ago, in the very beginning, I was living my heart. I was living from my heart. I was my most genuine and authentic self when I was doing that work that I loved, I fell in love with the theater very early on because of its richness of it and the history of it, and the centuries that went into it, I mean, I was a real student of it, and I was a student of the human spirit, the human soul, and the human experience, and I didn't realize that.

[00:14:31] Roxanne: But that carried me through. That work that I did, that 14-year career I had in the corporation. I would never have been as successful as I was there. And I was very successful without that background because it gave me a different perspective. So I brought it here and I realized, I've just come around full circle. Now I'm just a few years older, hopefully. Yeah, a few years wiser, right? Now I get to do it on purpose. Now I get to do it intentionally. Now I just sit, I listen and I watch and what's beautiful about this is that I see what's happening in other people in their organizations, and we talk about that. And then now I bring like you, I completely reinvented right with the highest level certifications and the highest level quality of content and all of that I could possibly do and done some things on my own too that I've created that are born out of my heart and my brain and my experience.

[00:15:32] Roxanne: And I think if we can all find just even a small niche of that in our lives, you find absolutely true happiness and success in a way that you could never, never imagine it.

[00:15:44] Aneta: So true. You said so many amazing things, and I just want to go back to a couple of them, one is this notion of nothing is wasted. You think back and we have the luxury of looking backward, and I think Steve Jobs says you can't connect the dots going forward, but you can connect them when you look back and see how they all connected. So you think back, nothing is wasted. And so what would you tell someone? Thinks that it's too late to make a change or that they've spent and invested so much time in a particular industry or career that they're scared to do something different. What would you say to them?

[00:16:22] Roxanne: Well, the first thing I would say is, may I give you a hug?

[00:16:28] Aneta: Of course, you would.

[00:16:30] Roxanne: And if they say, yes, I would. And if they say no, I would say that's okay. Let's think about the mindset there. If you feel that there is something else there for you and there is for everyone. Would you be willing to set the mindset that you have aside for just a moment? And remember that if we continue to do the same thing in the same way and expect a difference, It'll be crazy and we'll be very, cause it's not going to happen. And if you would, I would ask you to take a journey with me, and let's just think about what this would look like differently. And I would ask you to tell me when you were a kid, what was your favorite dream? I know what my dream was, and I've always been a walker. It's the way I meditate. That's my meditation in motion. And I remember asking God in the universe if you could please make me a human being that can fly. I mean, fly like a road. I mean, leave here and fly. Right. Well, I didn't realize that that has happened. But it's metaphorical, of course. But still. What is it that you always dreamed of doing and what would it feel like to be able to do that now? I'm too old or I'm too tired. If you think you are, you will be.

[00:17:43] Roxanne: Maybe if you just took one little step. Nothing is wasted. And when we start to look over here and over there and see, but what if or could I, might I, should I, I'm afraid. That's okay. Just take one little step. Teeny, teeny, teeny step little bits until you get a little, it's just like, if you haven't worked out in years and you want to start a workout program, just walk down the street and back. Start there and just do, then go one more step each day, right? Yeah. And I just give it a try and see how you feel and when you start to feel the exhilaration, what you do in a heartbeat, as soon as you align yourself with what you know is already, just give it a little bit of a try and see. Push it just a little bit and get some folks around you who believe in you, and who can help you continue with it.

[00:18:29] Aneta: Absolutely. And also the other thing that you mentioned is sometimes I find it's hard for people to dream again and to remember back to the things that they enjoyed doing or maybe they never really ask themselves, what do I really want to do? Because we are mired so much in the mindset of fear scarcity thinking and scared of taking risks or what if I fail? What are some of the things that have been helpful for either you personally, but also with your clients and helping people overcome some of the fears that do hold them back?

[00:19:01] Roxanne: Well, I will speak about that personally first. We are so conditioned growing up, and this is not anyone's fault. It's not like we take care of our kids, all that stuff. It's all fine. But we do have a lot of conditioning that gets into our heads and depending upon your experiences growing up, scarcity is one of the biggest fears in the world. And I've lived with it for years, a fear of scarcity and a fear of failure. And sometimes a fear of success. Right? It's very interesting because just over the last, I wouldn't say a few, but maybe several years I've been through, that's the next part. I mean, you go through phases in your transformations. Right? And this has been a particularly important one to me because I was locked into things that I had decided in my life would keep me safe.

[00:19:43] Roxanne: That would keep me away from that scarcity thinking, not realizing it was always there anyway. So when I actually started to have a little bit of breathing space in the business and I started thinking about this and I picked my head up and I pulled the blinders off and I fearlessly, although scared to death, fearlessly looked around me and I said to myself is this you? Does this make you happy? Is this where you want to be? Are you living, to put it in your words, the width of your life? Are you really, because I've always been about that. And I found myself in a place where I was not doing that. I was doing it in some ways, but I was not doing it fully. I made some very difficult and significant decisions in my life to change that. So then I could free myself from that and live fully. So with my clients, yes, that's why I see it. I see it immediately because it's me too. It's all of us. And I still have days when I go, whoa, what if? And I go, stop. And then I go back to, okay, you got to have faith, you got to have trust in yourself first, right? Yeah. I always use a quote from Peter Pan, and some people find it very silly to me. It's just completely profound and it's simple. It's faith, trust, and pixie dust.

[00:21:06] Roxanne: The faith in yourself. The faith in who you are as a human and what you bring to this experience. Trust yourself. Trust, and you and I know what we mean by trusting the universe, have faith in the universe. There's energy out there, there's more going, embrace it, put it out there into the world, and the pixie dust is the magic in your heart.

[00:21:31] Roxanne: I use this in my sessions and in my programs. In 2016, I was watching the opening ceremonies of the Rio de Janeiro, Summer Olympics. And I was studying some of my leadership work and building a program for a beloved client that I've had for years and years and years. And they were going through a transition too of this kind like you just said, of figuring out, okay, can we do this? Can we grow in this way? Can we make these differences? Right? So as I'm sitting there, this commercial came on and it was this man's beautiful baritone voice, and he was reciting these beautiful words. And the images were breathtaking. It was all Olympic athletes in struggle a woman boxer and two men fencers. One of the gymnasts on the rings. A woman diving. Then in the very end, there is a woman going around with a shot put like this. She goes around and around and then hurls it, and the narrative is about the earth being made of ancient minerals, magnesium, oxygen, carbon, and gold. How old is an ancient mineral every human being is born with 0.2 milligrams of gold in our body. Every single human, the majority of which lies in our hearts. Aneta this man's voice with amazing. When the woman is doing the shot put, she lets it go. His last line is, and only those with courage and grit, no. Only those can dig it out who have the courage and grit to do so. And it was all about Olympic champions, and that's what my whole company has been built on.

[00:23:14] Roxanne: Professional champions, pro laureate. That's, I thought it was a message from the universe to me. And I said that that's the heart of what I do. That is what I do. I'm a gold miner. I look for the gold in other people's hearts. So when it comes down to it, that's the pixie dust. To me, that's the grit. It's not soft, warm, and fuzzy stuff. This is the tough stuff. The stuff that allows you to get up in the morning when you're just exhausted, you can't take another step. I can't do this business anymore. I made a big mistake, and the voice says, no, you couldn't. Get up and do it anyway. You do it for the children, you do it for your families, you do it for the people that you touch with the work that we do, so yeah.

[00:23:56] Aneta: I love that. I remember that from your book. And it's such a beautiful reminder that we all have that gold within us. We all have that treasure within. And, sometimes we search for it externally. We read books, we ask people for help, all of that. But it really does require us to go internally and ask ourselves those questions. And the other thing you said that I really believe in is that as we're transforming and we're trying to figure out what to do next, you have to take some actions and identify, follow the energy, follow the feelings, and say, does this feel right or doesn't it? And like you said before, all of it is information. It's not failure. You can say. I can do this, but it doesn't light me up. It doesn't make me feel alive. I could do it just for the money, which, many of us have a long career doing, but also try other stuff and say, I like this. I'm going to follow this. I'm going to try a little bit more of it so it's not an intellectual exercise. It's experiential. It really comes down to going internally, trying different things, and trusting that all of the information, whether you like it or don't like it, whether it's something you want to do forever or not, it's all good. All of it is important to help direct you and guide you. It's not a straight path always. So I love that reminder cuz I think many people, get stuck, yeah, in the thinking and they fear taking the action and the steps because they think that if something doesn't work out exactly. That it's a failure and it's not failure.

[00:25:41] Roxanne: No, absolutely not. There's a great quote by Edison and Thomas Edison and I'll paraphrase it. A lot of people use it a lot. It's very cool. I haven't failed 10,000 times. I only found 10,000 times that didn't work until I found the right one, delightful, right? The other part of this is, and you just touched on it, and I think this is important because, as much as we talk about the heart and the great wealth of energy, that we have within us, it's also important to recognize that that takes two spheres of our head. It's the left brain and right brain, right? The right brain is the creative side that gives us that juice, that fuel, that powers our engine. But we got to have this really well-defined and well educated as well. We got to do the hard work. You got to make the tough decisions, you got to call it like, you see it, you got to be brutally honest with yourself and you've got to do the work. That's the good part. I always talk about grace and grit and that's the magic formula. It's in a lot of the programming that I do when I do a blend of management and leadership. It's all about leadership and everything that I do, which is everything I'm talking about. It's just different words, but I'll always say, management is what we do. So this is what we do over here. We do the hard work, we learn, we progress, and we grow ourselves intellectually over here. That's what we do. The way we do it is over here. And that's with heart and grace and leadership and Yes. A lot of grit. And yes, you've got to, pull that out too. So I wouldn't want anybody to misunderstand that this is soft stuff. It's anything but I think one the worst things that were ever given to leadership development, personal development, all of these things. The worst tag that was ever given to that was soft skills, is any but that yeah, they're emerging hard skills and if you don't tackle those early on, you'll struggle in your career at some point over and over.

[00:27:37] Aneta: Have you noticed any changes in terms of, you've been doing leadership development programs for years working with teams, working coaching executives? Have you noticed any changes or shifts in what is resonating with people right now, or what works best or most effectively with teams? Has that changed at all over the years?

[00:27:57] Roxanne: I think it has. I think it's changed and I think it's continuing to change. It also depends upon the organization, the company, and the industry. And the length of their history. Because there are a lot of cultural issues that are very different and very unique to each person and each individual in a lot of very traditional professional services organizations, that question would be answered very differently than it would be in maybe a young startup, everything in between. So it's really very individual, I would say, at a high level, just kind of like a theme, the overall theme is that the leadership development, teams development within organization reflects world development. We've been through a pandemic. We've had a huge shift to diversity, equity, and inclusion. All of these things were there all the time. But there was not a spotlight shining on these things as it should have been or could have been. But that's evolving now. The way that we work with each other, and especially now that I think most everybody is in some form of a hybrid environment. That is the new normal. I think maybe, I don't know, some people are back full, but I don't know. All the folks I work with are in some sort of hybrid working, an arrangement that makes the dynamic different because again, just uniquely in my background, I was surrounded by people who taught me, and showed me how to communicate. Not that I'm the best communicator in the world, but I have a little bit of an insight into it, whether I will be on a telephone in a one-dimensional flat screen, in the three-dimensional world, or anything in between. There are ways to communicate with people and you must have the communication in place in order to get to anybody, in a way that they are willing to engage in self-development because we can't develop other leaders. We can't develop our businesses, our relationships, or anything else until we start here. There's a hierarchy of that right? Itself, partners, teams, organizations, community, and the world. That's the pebble in the pond. The ripples going down. So, that's a long answer to a short question.

[00:30:10] Roxanne: I apologize, but. It's different wherever you go, but I think people are more open to different ways of thinking. I think that's one of the biggest things that I've seen. People are open enough, people are being more mindful of habits of thought that they have had from the past and of recognizing those and going, well, wait a minute I can turn that thought around. I can think about that differently. Communicating with teams differently, helping people to advance in theirs. Getting the right people in the right seats is a big focus in teams now. And before it was just like, here you go, here's your job, go do your job. That's a part of work, there's a whole lot, of being careful to be sure that if someone isn't doing well, it could be that they're not good for the company. They're in the wrong seat, let's get them to where they thrive. So I think there's more of a look at who is this person. How can I know this more inclusive way of going about our team building and our leadership and all of that? I think that's an evolving thing on my defense.

[00:31:16] Aneta: No, I love it. I've seen the same thing, which is great. So, Roxanne, tell me about some of the things. I know that you don't always like to brag or to showcase the things that you're proud of, but I do think it's helpful, like, as you look back on your career in your life, what are some of the things that you are most proud of and also most grateful for?

[00:31:35] Roxanne: I was first about, say the things that I am most grateful for are the lessons that I have learned and the people who were part of those lessons. Both the very hard ones and the exuberant ones, right? It's been all away. None of us do this alone, no matter how much we think none of us do this alone. So it's just huge gratitude for the people I have known throughout every stage of my career and how much they have helped me, whether they realized it or not. And even in some of the most devastating moments where people have just behaved badly. I'll just say it out loud if that's okay because there's a lesson there that I took away from that. So that was great. I would say right now, today, I give my thanks every single day for the beautiful clients, and they're not clients. Everyone I work with now is part of my extended family. And that's by design, right? No one I work with right now that I don't love, this is my extended family. And I know that we have great respect for each other and, trust, and it's all about that accomplishments. And then I've had and still do right now three incredibly fascinating and successful. Completely different careers, right? And, I rose to the top of each one of them, that's in my own mind. I'm not saying that by anybody else.

[00:32:56] Aneta: Yeah. Your own personal definition of success.

[00:32:58] Roxanne: That's right. It's different for anyone. I would say I think my greatest accomplishments are certainly the relationships that I've formed, but in business you know, I started this business with nothing. I maxed out my credit cards and got a second mortgage. I mean, I did nothing and I didn't take anything from anybody else to start it. And this business has been a gift to me and everybody who's been a part of it. And, I will just say that it has grown beyond anything that I put in a vision statement and that I ever imagined.

[00:33:38] Roxanne: And I just embrace that every day with humility. And it just makes me strive harder to bring more value. So accomplishments are one of the other ones, and this is just a paper, this was very important to me when I started in the business. I wanted certain certifications that were very important and very specific fields. So, I'm a certified master in the Leadership Challenge, which is a global leadership development universe. It's not just a program, it's a universe of thought and research that has been around for over 45 years, and getting the master's certifications, like getting a Ph.D. And I did that and it took me a long time.

[00:34:19] Roxanne: And, that was a huge investment in a lot of different areas. And it's the best thing I have ever done. One of the hardest things I've ever done. And I think it was just one of the smartest things I've ever done. And I think that, and just, I think our accomplishments are relative. I don't put a lot for myself, it's not about title, it's not about position, it's not about any of that. I put those things on my website and in business cards and stuff because the corporate universe understands that stuff. I'm just mine for gold. That's all I do, rivers and I look for gold and people. And I think that's my greatest accomplishment.

[00:34:53] Aneta: I love that it comes back to people and knowing you, I know how sincere you are about that, and I think that's why people love to work with you because you do feel like you're extended family. And maybe that's one of the things that I've noticed in people and in companies, is that people are more authentic and a little bit more genuine and not just bringing a part of themselves to work any longer. They bring more of themselves and they are maybe given permission to be able to do that. And of course, every culture is a little bit different, but do you find that to be true as well?

[00:35:24] Roxanne: Yes. I'm so glad you mentioned that because as far as accomplishments go, I would say that's the top of the heap I am now. And yes, the genuine and authenticity, we take on so many of the personas that we are told we are all of our lives. Kind of friend, daughter, wife, whatever. Son, husband. And we take those things on like that is ourselves. And then we run into walls as we go along, which has been my story. And I go, well, wait a minute, that's not really me. And there was this inner me like you show up every now and then and shine and then hide away again. And I said, forget that. You know what? I just need to burst out of this cave thing and be absolutely my most genuine and authentic self.

[00:36:04] Roxanne: And I will tell you, I am more than now than I've ever been in my entire life. And by the way, you lose some filters and you draw some boundaries. And that's okay. You still have to be sweet and kind, it's appropriate. But I'll tell you what, there are times when it's in my head and it's words like, thank you very much, that's not going to be something I can help you with right now. That's a boundary, and that's important. And that's being genuine and authentic and not giving yourself away to other people and then resenting them for it later.

[00:36:36] Aneta: So true. And that's definitely something that I have worked on for myself and also with clients, and it is liberating and freeing to be able to say, I appreciate that, thank you, but it's not for me or I'm unable to do that at this time in a very kind way, but also very clear, and it doesn't have to be confrontational. I think that that's the fear sometimes people have with boundaries.

[00:37:02] Roxanne: And I will say that I've worked with you. In yoga and meditation and breath work and all of that and your book, it's the first thing I read every morning. I used to look at my cell phone first thing every morning, but now I don't. I just shared this with a client yesterday. She was struggling. She never has time for herself. I walked into my sanctuary room and I got your book, and I came it out and I put it up like this and I said, take five minutes. I'm going to read you today. I read her yesterday. I said that's all you have to do. Just do that and you've taken five minutes just for you to be alone with your thoughts. Think about that and let it carry you through the day. Don't look at your cell phone first thing in the morning. Look at the page in the journal in an eternal.

[00:37:42] Aneta: Thank you so much. I appreciate that so much. So I want to look forward. I want you to share because you are constantly transforming. You're constantly evolving. I love that there is no stagnation, you are just the epitome of someone who lives life fully. So I want to ask, what's next for you? Are there things on the horizon this year or near future that you're very excited about?

[00:38:08] Roxanne: Yes. So in May, I'm going to France for a week. I have a stepdaughter who lives there and I'm going to go spend a week with her and I just can't wait. We've talked for years about doing this to her and I so amazing France in the past, actually several times in the past, but I haven't been there in years now, so that'll be great. I also have a lot of really wonderful client work going on, so I'm traveling quite a bit for that. Bits and pieces though, it's really starting to level out now. The first part of the year's been really busy, but the summer's going to be nice. I'm taking up golf again, so I've been working on building core strength so I can do golf. I'm excited about that. And then, as you well know, we are going to Italy to Tuscany in September, I'm getting excited

[00:39:00] Aneta: I am so excited for those that listening, I'm doing a retreat in Italy. Roxanne was one of the first to sign up. I can't wait. It's going to be magical and it's something that, as you remember, I had retreats on my vision statement years ago. This is something that's always been something I wanted to do and I love that you are going to be one of my guests. Amazing.

[00:39:24] Roxanne: It's a dream come true for both of us. I mean, this is both in our vision statements, this kind of stuff, by the way. So the other thing that I'm doing, and I mean I don't want to let that go for just a moment because I haven't been this excited. I get very excited about things, right? Excited about where I'm going to be this summer. But this is something so extraordinarily special. The people that are going to be there, everything that you're planning for us and what we're going to be doing, and just that like minds and souls in Tuscany in a villa. I mean, come on, this, get any better than.

[00:39:56] Aneta: Amazing. And going back to that idea of pixie dust, or I always say leave room for magic. It was so interesting because in my mind I had a vision so clear about what this retreat was going to look like. I had a vision of the house, the villa in Tuscany, outside of Florence, in wine country, all of these things, Olive Grove surrounding us, like in my mind, like I could feel it, smell it, taste it. And then I looked for a house. I literally went to Airbnb and I saw it and I found it and I was like, here it is. I couldn't have drawn it any better myself there it is.

[00:40:31] Roxanne: That's how this stuff happens. It really does work that way.

[00:40:34] Aneta: It really does work that way. So super excited about it. Roxanne told me, and because you just shared all the things that you do, which shows that you're living a full life, but I always ask all my guests, what does it mean to you to live the width of your life? And what are some ways that you do that?

[00:40:54] Roxanne: To fully live the width of your life you first have to know who you are and what you want your life to be. Otherwise, you're living somebody else's life and the worth of theirs and not yours. And I've been real good at that. For most of my life, I've lived everybody’s life to the width. I'm not my own. So you got to know this and be very honest. Take the time to really understand who you are, what really, really matters to you, where you want to be, how you want to live, what kind of people you want to be around, and where you want to go. This trip to Tuscany is a perfect example of what to me is the richness, depth, width, the richness of life. But what do we need to think about in order to do that? Go to a quiet place, and settle the chatter. Let the chatter just go. And really think about it, even if you've never thought about it before, just start dreaming.

[00:41:58] Start dreaming about it and use it outside. We all know what insight is, but one of the things I talk about in my coaching and programs is used outside. That commercial, by the way, was Dick's Sporting Goods that ran that commercial of all, Dick's Sport, right? With zero-point milligrams of gold. I always have my peripheral vision, keeping an eye on messages and signs that come in. You see a license plate, you see a street sign, and you see this commercial that pops that changed. That changed my life because it changed my thinking in my brain and it opened. More of the width of what I'm doing.

[00:42:33] Yeah. It deepened it and it widened it and do I have the courage? Am I brave enough to actually say that out loud and take it out? So my suggestion would be to live the width of your life. Know who you are and what you want your life to be. In all of its facets. Not what somebody else's is. Design it and own it. And then, Immerse yourself in it.

[00:43:01] Aneta: Beautiful. I love that so much, and I know that that's how you live your life. And, because of you, I am living the width of my life as well from SAR time together so many years ago. Roxanne, how can we best support you and where can we find you?

[00:43:18] Roxanne: You can find that right now. My website is live and it's fine, but I would love everybody to understand that's going through a complete transformation in the next few months. But if you want to get some snippets and bits and pieces of where I've been and where I am. That's a great place to go. And it's simply, ProLaureate, which translates into professional champions. But you spell it P R O L A U R E A T E dot com. That will take you there. You can reach me through email and it's just rcaufman@prolaureate.com on LinkedIn, I don't have the exact handle for that there's that line. Just go ahead and type my name. We'll include it. Okay, thank you.

[00:43:56] Aneta: Perfect. I will include all of the links to your website, to your handle to LinkedIn, and to your email in the show notes. I just really want to take another moment here and just express such gratitude to you, not only for what you mean to me and how influential you've been in my own life but just the amazing work that you do in this world and the love that you bring to everything that you do. Thank you for being you.

[00:44:20] Roxanne: Aneta, thank you. I would say the same to you. Thank you so much. Appreciate you.

[00:44:26] Aneta: Of course. Thanks so much for joining me.

[00:44:28] Thank you for listening to today's episode. If you're inspired to finally take courageous action on a personal or professional goal that has been in your heart for some time, then follow this podcast because every week we'll have intimate, authentic conversations with guests who have redefined success. Created healthy new habits to support optimal health, and finally release the stories and limiting beliefs that kept them stuck in the life they didn't love. If you want to start or grow deeper in your own transformation journey, then I am happy to answer questions on a one-on-one 30-minute transformation strategy call at no cost to you. Head on to my website to book your slot today, and I will see you next time.

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