Sign up to get updates from us
In this episode of Sales Made Easy, host Harry Spaight welcomes Stephanie Kunkel, who shares her experience and insight regarding mental health. Stephanie shares her personal journey with depression, emphasizing the importance of embracing all the experiences life has to offer – both the highs and the lows. She dispels common misconceptions about mental health and encourages individuals to advocate for themselves and seek professional help. Stephanie highlights the need for leaders to support their teams and provides valuable insights on managing depression in the workplace. Join us as we delve into the "black hole" of depression and discover ways to create a more understanding and supportive environment for everyone. Don't miss this insightful conversation that will transform your perspective on mental health.
For more with Stephanie Kunkel: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shiftingperspectives/ and https://www.perspectiveshifters.com/contact-us-1
Special Offer: https://www.perspectiveshifters.com/theplatform
Listeners can get 20% off by using the discount code: DIGNITY25
I'm your host Harry Spaight and bring to you some 25+ years of sales and sales leadership experience in the hyper-competitive arena of office technology sales. I will be chatting with business owners and sales leaders that share their insights about growing their businesses and topics that will be of value. I will sprinkle in a little humor where we can fit it in because life is too short not to have a few laughs along the way.
Look for me on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/harryspaight/ and you can download a few chapters of Selling With Dignity here: https://sellingwithdignity.com/the-book/
We are recording, ladies and gentlemen. And with me
Speaker:today, folks, we have the world renowned Stephanie Conkel,
Speaker:And Stephanie is a leadership development specialist who inspires
Speaker:teams to lead with compassion, vision, and
Speaker:creativity. She's also an international best selling author
Speaker:and has written a book on managing depression at home and in the
Speaker:workplace. She has over 11 years of experience in coaching and
Speaker:training. She has a master's degree in leadership and management,
Speaker:and she's had, like, 19 years of experience
Speaker:in sales. So we are up for a great conversation.
Speaker:We're gonna cover a few different topics today. So, Stephanie,
Speaker:welcome to the sales made easy podcast. What is the good
Speaker:word? Thanks, Harry. Appreciate you having me here. I'm really excited
Speaker:to be here today. I'm glad that we were connected for sure.
Speaker:Yeah. So Stephanie and I connected through,
Speaker:motivation, sham to Dominic Domaseke. We're both authors,
Speaker:and we both, worked with Dominic who's been great in
Speaker:bringing up about a community of authors So, Stephanie, first,
Speaker:let's tackle that. What what's been a big surprise for you
Speaker:about becoming an author? Any anything can come to mind.
Speaker:Yeah. So I really thought that it was just about the writing piece,
Speaker:and then that would be it. I said all I need is just a team
Speaker:of people to handle the rest and You know, we Dominic has a great
Speaker:team of people, but there was a lot more involved than I thought. I think
Speaker:the biggest surprise for me was how often I would have to reread my own
Speaker:work. over and over and over again. And even after it's been published,
Speaker:having to kind of refresh myself on what my own book says is is
Speaker:quite a lot, honestly. Yeah. It's funny
Speaker:because I've had the same experience where people say something they've read about
Speaker:in a book and I'm like, yeah. Yeah. And I'm like, Did I write that?
Speaker:I don't remember writing that. Yeah. Yeah. It's
Speaker:funny. so your the book topic
Speaker:that you wrote about is mental health. So why don't you
Speaker:share a little bit about, the seriousness
Speaker:of mental health, and how it impacts people
Speaker:today and whatever else your thoughts are that because I think
Speaker:it's, definitely makes it, you know, it's a huge percentage of the
Speaker:population, and we're here to serve. So
Speaker:serving people that are struggling with mental health, that's all part of what we do.
Speaker:So take it away. Yeah. Thanks. So for me, the
Speaker:my my specialty is is not in the overarching mental
Speaker:health aspect. Because when you think about mental health, there's so many different aspects.
Speaker:there's anxiety, and there is bipolar disorder, and there is
Speaker:ADHD, and and there's just a lot of different aspects, and people are
Speaker:very unique as it is. So we all think differently. We all
Speaker:feel differently. My specialty is specifically in
Speaker:depression, because I have a history of depression, and
Speaker:I was in a very, very dark place. when I was
Speaker:pregnant with my daughter and I had my son, stay at home mom
Speaker:just kind of scrolling through life and it just
Speaker:nothing was looking good. it was in a very dark place. I actually call
Speaker:it the black hole of depression, because it's very
Speaker:encompassing, and it doesn't just affect to us as individuals,
Speaker:but entire teams of people that we work with, entire families, it it
Speaker:really does affect a lot. And it's kind of got a gravitational pool to
Speaker:it. We we tend to get comfortable. So
Speaker:what I learned about through this process of
Speaker:seeking help myself and growing and and learning about what
Speaker:depression is and how it works through your brain. As I learned that,
Speaker:1, I wasn't alone. which is something a lot of people need to
Speaker:hear because a lot of people think that they're the only people that feel that
Speaker:way, and that's just not true. but what I also learned
Speaker:was that it affects a large percentage of the population.
Speaker:So pre pandemic, we saw rates
Speaker:of impression of 1 in 4 to 1 in 5
Speaker:people would have a major depressive episode at some point in
Speaker:their adult life. So it's 20 to 25 population would
Speaker:potentially be affected at some point in their life.
Speaker:and then what we saw post pandemic Boston University
Speaker:came out with a study in 2021 in October that said that
Speaker:one in four people were experiencing symptoms of
Speaker:depression. at that time, which is huge. Like, that's
Speaker:a completely different ball game than we might experience at
Speaker:some point in our life. and what I
Speaker:learned through my expertise and in my experience
Speaker:from work and stepping into leadership was is that not
Speaker:only are we kind of lacking in the leadership development department, but we're
Speaker:also lacking in the idea that leaders where
Speaker:majority of the American population spend 34 hours a week at work
Speaker:are struggling to be able to connect with people who are in that
Speaker:25%. So the book was written from
Speaker:the perspective of me as a person just telling my
Speaker:story, as Dominic says, We need to just tell our
Speaker:stories, but it was also written from the idea of saying, you know, now
Speaker:that I have healed, I also see these behaviors and other people and
Speaker:how it impacts. and how to deal with it as a
Speaker:leader who has a sales team who needs to hit quotas,
Speaker:how do we deal with a sales team where 25% of them
Speaker:are experiencing this black hole of
Speaker:depression. And so That's kind of just that's what I do.
Speaker:It's what I write about. It's a subject that's super passionate and close
Speaker:to my heart. Yeah. It's really great. I mean, I'm just
Speaker:thinking through what you've been saying here. So, I mean, those numbers,
Speaker:1 in 5, basically, pre print pandemic,
Speaker:So people are the this is a
Speaker:very it's a very common experience But, you know,
Speaker:when I think about depression, I don't think I've ever dealt with
Speaker:anything really severe personally, not
Speaker:that I recall anyway. What what are some of the
Speaker:symptoms so that people can maybe think about, hey.
Speaker:Yeah. I've done that. or I felt that way, maybe I need to look
Speaker:into that further, or what's your thought? Yeah. So depression is gonna
Speaker:be different for a lot of a lot of different people. We all have different
Speaker:emotional barriers and experiences.
Speaker:what I found is the majority of people that I personally talk to It
Speaker:might start out with a sadness. So say you have a big life change, like,
Speaker:a grief, someone dies in your family and you have a big,
Speaker:grief load to deal with and you're just not dealing with properly, or maybe you've
Speaker:made a a big mistake and you're grieving the person that you thought
Speaker:you were versus the person that you actually are.
Speaker:And what we see is, 1, big life changes tend to affect people who
Speaker:have depression on a much bigger scale. What I have
Speaker:found is that there is a very common misconception that that's what
Speaker:depression is, is a grief or sadness. And while we may
Speaker:have a bout of depression, when we're dealing with grief or
Speaker:with, overcoming sadness, what I have actually found
Speaker:is is that depression as a mental health challenge
Speaker:is typically more along the lines of a numbness. So
Speaker:I I liken it to the black hole because that feeling of happiness
Speaker:and joy is absent as well as sadness. You don't
Speaker:really get a strong emotional reaction to a lot of different
Speaker:things, And what I think and this is just a theory.
Speaker:What I think is happening is is that we do have those strong emotional
Speaker:reactions in the beginning. and it gets so difficult
Speaker:for us to just process through with them and deal with them that we end
Speaker:up shutting down everything. because just shutting it down is a coping
Speaker:mechanism, and it allows us to just keep living.
Speaker:and it's only when you experience something that
Speaker:you can't shut it down anymore, essentially think about it like a soda bottle. You
Speaker:get shaken up enough, the lid's gonna pop off.
Speaker:Well, at some point, the lid pops off and then you see this overflowing
Speaker:emotional instability as other people might call
Speaker:it, when really it's really just been this
Speaker:numbness in effect. And the same things happen with black
Speaker:holes in physics. If you look at it, a black hole can only consume
Speaker:so much before it actually explodes. And then all of a
Speaker:sudden, you have stardust everywhere that creates stars. so
Speaker:entire universes are created out of black holes. So
Speaker:hence, you understand kind of the reasoning why I call it a black hole because
Speaker:it's all kind of the same thing. But I think
Speaker:that is important. Yeah. Yeah. Well, thank you for
Speaker:sharing that. So So it's a it's different for
Speaker:everybody, and it's this feeling of
Speaker:numbness where you know, so as a leader,
Speaker:you might, I mean, a person who is in leadership and, you know, I've been
Speaker:around sales leadership for a long time. And
Speaker:that's going to impact how a person sells. I
Speaker:can't even imagine, showing up to work or
Speaker:showing up where a person needs to make sales calls or something
Speaker:and they're feeling like, the black hole, so to speak,
Speaker:You know, and I I think of, you know, the mindset
Speaker:from before we're as more aware
Speaker:about this than in the past,
Speaker:I would think, well, you leave leave the home problems
Speaker:at home. You come to work? Yeah. You just worry about
Speaker:work. Home is for home. I can't help you with that.
Speaker:Yeah. That's just not the way it is, though, anymore.
Speaker:Well, I think it it's never really been that way. If you think about
Speaker:centuries ago, not centuries ago, sorry, decades ago, when that
Speaker:was a big thing. Like, you don't walk through the door with your home problems,
Speaker:you leave them at home, our brains don't work like that. And we have
Speaker:this thing in our brain called the reticular activating system that focuses on
Speaker:things that affirm our our own beliefs.
Speaker:So if you think about someone who is depressed, other
Speaker:symptoms that they might be experiencing are things like fatigue.
Speaker:So they might come in and they might be like, oh, man, I'm so tired
Speaker:today. So then what they're gonna see is an
Speaker:email box full of emails, a calendar full of sales
Speaker:appointments. fifteen people who've called and
Speaker:they've missed their call, and now they have to return their call and they're thinking
Speaker:to themselves, I'm so tired. This is why
Speaker:I'm so tired. See, I'm I'm too tired to do this work or but I'll
Speaker:power through it, and I'll push through it. And so that's also another
Speaker:misconception is you think about people who have
Speaker:depression like me who is been somewhat
Speaker:successful, and you think, well, why can't everybody do that? And I
Speaker:think the the challenge is is we have this pull yourself up by the
Speaker:bootstraps mentality. all we gotta do is change our mindset and shift
Speaker:our mindset, but there's a real science behind what happens in
Speaker:the brain with depression, and it's not just a mindset aspect. And
Speaker:cognitive behavioral therapy helped me all day long. I
Speaker:went, but I it took me 7 years to really start
Speaker:seeing huge life changes from that. So I
Speaker:saw changes in my life initially, but it took me a really long time
Speaker:to start really getting that mindset shift And
Speaker:that was partially, probably because I wasn't on any medication.
Speaker:And there is a real chemical imbalance that happens in the
Speaker:brain. There's also a cycle to this as
Speaker:well. So we get depressed and then we don't do anything. And if you are
Speaker:a high performing achievement person, when
Speaker:you go into those depressive states, what ends up happening
Speaker:is you go, oh, I didn't do that. Oh,
Speaker:man, I'm a failure. I'm worthless.
Speaker:I'm not good enough. And then what happens is your brain looks for ways
Speaker:for you to prove yourself. And
Speaker:then that's where this happens. So what I encourage leaders to
Speaker:do is, 1, you don't have a mental health background, typically. You're
Speaker:not a licensed counselor. You can only help people so much.
Speaker:but helping them to understand that if they make a mistake, It's
Speaker:one mistake, and they'll learn from it. And that's what helps them to grow, and
Speaker:that's actually what helps them to be a better version of themselves.
Speaker:so that they can pull themselves out of the black hole. I call it setting
Speaker:anchors. So if you think about if you have the gravitational
Speaker:pool of a whirlpool or black hole, and you
Speaker:needed to get out of it. How do you climb out? Well, you set anchors.
Speaker:So that way if you slip and you fall, you don't fall very far.
Speaker:And that's what leaders can do for their teams is set anchors.
Speaker:Nice. So the for the person that's going through this, do
Speaker:they Does it make sense to share what they're going
Speaker:through, or is that taboo, so to speak, of which
Speaker:HIPAA and so forth? Well, I I always
Speaker:on the side of just sharing it. And I say that as the person,
Speaker:I don't encourage leaders to say, are you depressed? Will you share with me while
Speaker:you're depressed? but I do encourage people who are going
Speaker:through these challenges to share that because your leadership team doesn't
Speaker:know. Mhmm. How about missing your sales
Speaker:quota for a month and going, man, I haven't
Speaker:shared that I have depression in they're not gonna understand. And they've maybe they've
Speaker:never had it, so they're not gonna understand. That's fair, but they can't
Speaker:even take steps towards understanding unless they understand.
Speaker:Yep. And I also am challenged. A lot of people challenge me
Speaker:on that when I talk with them when I'm counseling, well, not counseling, but coaching
Speaker:them. And they'll say things like,
Speaker:well, but what if they fire me because they think I'm mentally
Speaker:unstable? And there's some HIPAA issues with
Speaker:that, some ADA issues with that. but
Speaker:overall, I kind of just challenge them back and say, listen, do you wanna work
Speaker:an organization that doesn't support you even at your lows. You
Speaker:know? And that's really where we're at right now. So we need to build
Speaker:ourselves up, and we need to supportive organization to be able to do that. So
Speaker:what I would say is, number 1, if you have
Speaker:an program or you have a counselor nearby contact
Speaker:somebody to get into a program to help and do that now
Speaker:because that takes a few months depending on where you are in the accessibility of
Speaker:counselors. here's what I'll also share with you though, Harry.
Speaker:On average, in the United States, it takes somebody who's experiencing
Speaker:symptoms of depression, 11 years to get treatment from the onset
Speaker:of symptoms. Wow. Many people don't even know that they're
Speaker:experiencing depression until they get to a
Speaker:point where they're like, wow. This is really bad.
Speaker:Yeah. So I encourage just kind of do a mental
Speaker:wellness checkup. Find a find a supportive
Speaker:therapist who's going to talk to you no matter what's going on in your life
Speaker:and consider that like a a preventative
Speaker:wellness visit. Yeah. That's really great
Speaker:advice. I had a conversation with someone a few months ago
Speaker:on the podcast. and people in my generation,
Speaker:older than you. And I we used to look
Speaker:at Well, we were told that, you know, the therapist had, you know,
Speaker:it was not it was not a good idea to go see therapist.
Speaker:They're referred to in a negative light And I
Speaker:remember saying some negative things about it shockingly.
Speaker:but I now have a whole different perspective. and having
Speaker:conversations with people like you. And now it's like, if you
Speaker:think about it, is that these
Speaker:therapists And I I would want
Speaker:to vet any therapist to make sure that their thinking is
Speaker:aligned with what my thinking and goals are in life and
Speaker:so forth. So I'm gonna put that out there. The thought
Speaker:is that these people are dealing with
Speaker:problems all the time and different perspectives of
Speaker:it and different people, different personalities, and we're just
Speaker:dealing it from behind our eyeball. Right? So we
Speaker:we just don't have a good viewpoint of it. So
Speaker:so talk to me on that. Do you think about a car? If your car
Speaker:is having problems and you don't know anything about cars, what are you gonna do?
Speaker:You're gonna take it to mechanic because heaven forbid,
Speaker:you snip a line, and it's not the line you're supposed to snip,
Speaker:or you change and put in a a a liquid into
Speaker:a a spot that it's not supposed to be in, and you can see how
Speaker:much I know about cars. And so when you think about
Speaker:that aspect, we take our mechanics to someone
Speaker:who's an expert in that. Why? Because they've worked in cars their
Speaker:entire lives, and they know how they work and they know what you need
Speaker:to do to tweak things. They know if that knocking sound is normal or
Speaker:not normal. And it's the same thing with mental health
Speaker:professionals. When you look at it from that perspective, they've been
Speaker:working in people's brains for a very long time. They
Speaker:have to have many, many, many hours of working with people's
Speaker:brains, thoughts, emotions before they can even become certified.
Speaker:and I completely agree with you. Align yourself with your therapist. Understand
Speaker:who you're talking to and and what those values align with.
Speaker:and and it's always okay to go into a therapy session,
Speaker:have a few sessions with that therapist and go, I don't know if this is
Speaker:a good fit. what you were
Speaker:saying around that negative perception
Speaker:of therapy, it wasn't that long ago where people would go
Speaker:to a therapist and then get institutionalized for things like
Speaker:depression. So it's understandable that we
Speaker:have that negative thought process around those things as a society,
Speaker:but that's not really how it works anymore. And
Speaker:when you reach out to a therapist for help, their number
Speaker:one goal is to, 1, assess and then 2,
Speaker:listen, which is part of that assessment process, and then
Speaker:3, gently guide, which I think is a very big
Speaker:difference than people are expecting. They're
Speaker:expecting sometimes they go to therapy and they expect that 1st session a
Speaker:therapist will go Yes. Let's fix it. Like, I've got all
Speaker:the solutions for you. Here's all the information you need. And they're like, yes. I'm
Speaker:better. It's not like going to the doctor and that we're seeing a surgeon. It
Speaker:doesn't work like that. So, I always tell
Speaker:people give people give whatever therapist you're working with, give them 6
Speaker:sessions. Because after those 6 sessions, you'll know, yes, that's the
Speaker:right therapist, or, definitely, it's not the right therapist. Yeah.
Speaker:Well, I can speak from my own experience where we went
Speaker:because we were questioning my wife and I, our ability to
Speaker:raise children. I think that's fairly normal, but
Speaker:go ahead. I just I I'm cracking up at it now,
Speaker:and and the therapist said he said, I mean, I remember him
Speaker:saying something along the lines, like,
Speaker:you don't need to be worrying about how you're raising your children.
Speaker:It's the people who don't come here that
Speaker:are the ones that are having the real issues the ones who are
Speaker:always trying and feeling guilty about it because they're
Speaker:not perfect parents. It's like, oh my goodness. It made
Speaker:such perfect sense. And, like, the therapist gave us
Speaker:tools when we're dealing with, one of our maniac children at
Speaker:the time in their teen years, It gave us
Speaker:tools to work with. Try this. And so we
Speaker:eventually had a strategy as whereas you know, before it would be, like,
Speaker:maybe if I yell even louder, it
Speaker:won't start to sink in, but clearly that wasn't working. So
Speaker:Yes. What is value in it, folks? Is what I'm saying? Yeah. And I love
Speaker:that so much. And I actually tell a story in my book about how you're
Speaker:already the perfect person because That's the same
Speaker:advice that my now boyfriend gave me several years ago because
Speaker:I felt like such a bad parent. And he's like, that's a good
Speaker:thing. And I'm like, well, you mean that's a good thing. And he's like, if
Speaker:you feel like that, you're on track because it's the people that don't
Speaker:feel like they're a bad parent. Like, they've got everything under control or just don't
Speaker:care enough to think that way that are not the great parents.
Speaker:So so I respect that so much. And I think that those
Speaker:are the you know, that's what I tried to pull out of my sessions is
Speaker:those nuggets. those little pieces of gold of
Speaker:saying we're not supposed to be perfect. Like, humans
Speaker:aren't perfect. We're all perfect. We'd be robots. and it's
Speaker:it's our compassionate understanding, but also our
Speaker:desire to be better that leads us to that
Speaker:place to to basically say, you know what? You are perfect
Speaker:because you want to be better.
Speaker:I I tell the story in my book too about my
Speaker:experiences, in in the therapist office,
Speaker:And specifically kind of to to circle back a little bit around
Speaker:my experience going the first time. And the first time I went where
Speaker:I said, I'm really hesitant to be here because I don't want you
Speaker:to take my kids away. And that was a very, you know, when you think
Speaker:about postpartum and prenatal depression, that is always a
Speaker:challenge to get women in the door because they're afraid of being perceived as
Speaker:having psychosis, which is very different than depression.
Speaker:and they're afraid that their children will get taken away from them
Speaker:or, you know, they'll be labeled in a certain line.
Speaker:and what I found is is that it's it's so common,
Speaker:but not enough people get help. And if you don't get help for
Speaker:depression early enough, sometimes it can into psychosis.
Speaker:and I think that that's that's an element of of
Speaker:just kind of respecting the process and just reaching out for
Speaker:help. And I would encourage people, you know, if you don't wanna reach out to
Speaker:a therapist, reach out to someone that maybe has a background.
Speaker:You know, it has an understanding has been through it before and can provide
Speaker:you with some some tools and some understanding. Yeah.
Speaker:I would think that might be you. It might wanna reach out to you
Speaker:because you seem to be fairly understanding and compassionate.
Speaker:Yeah. Well, and the reason I call the book perspectives through
Speaker:broken glass is because we all come from different perspectives. You know,
Speaker:you're not -- or wrong. You just are. And the question is is, do you
Speaker:wanna stay in the place that you're in, or do you wanna grow? And that's
Speaker:you know, I'm I'm happy to answer any questions or to be there for
Speaker:anybody that that needs help. I'm not a licensed counselor.
Speaker:but I'm definitely there for people when they need it for sure.
Speaker:What has been and this we're gonna put your information
Speaker:in the show notes so that, people can look you up and
Speaker:find you. what has been a
Speaker:big surprise in your experience
Speaker:about depression that most of us may not
Speaker:even be considering.
Speaker:I'm gonna I'm gonna ask you to reword that because I'm not
Speaker:I'm thinking about a lot of different prizes, but I wanna make sure that I'm
Speaker:answering the question the way that you need me. Yeah. So
Speaker:I guess what what what did you come across
Speaker:as far as, you know, how common it is or what
Speaker:the reactions are or something along the lines that
Speaker:for people I mean, I'm not I'm
Speaker:I don't wanna say I'm naive, but it's just like I if I haven't
Speaker:experienced it, I wanna be empathetic.
Speaker:And, you know, it's difficult when you're you haven't
Speaker:experienced something and you try to empathize with people. So that's that's
Speaker:the challenge. That's the challenge in life. So challenge in sales and
Speaker:businesses, we wanna be empathic. And that's exactly why
Speaker:I wrote the book because I understand that if you don't know what it's like,
Speaker:you're never gonna you're never gonna And that's why I wrote it
Speaker:was specifically for that reason so that people who've never been through it could
Speaker:understand. But from a surprise I think what was surprising
Speaker:the most to me was how understanding people actually work.
Speaker:I really thought that if I kind of said, oh, well, I have depression.
Speaker:and I need, you know, I just need you to be more compassionate with me
Speaker:for right now. Yeah. Or I need this from you.
Speaker:I didn't wanna lay that burden at other people's feet,
Speaker:and I also didn't want to admit my my
Speaker:perceived weaknesses. And it was a it
Speaker:was a learning curve when I started to advocate for myself in saying things
Speaker:like today is a rest day because I have depression. And if I don't rush,
Speaker:I'll get over overworked, or I need to work
Speaker:today, or I need you to go on a walk with me today because
Speaker:I have depression, and I need the sunshine in the movement.
Speaker:And when I started advocating for myself, I was really surprised at how
Speaker:many people were like, Oh, well, 1,
Speaker:okay. I I see that. And, 2, I'm
Speaker:happy to help. How can I help? And then I was also surprised at
Speaker:how many people said, I feel that way too.
Speaker:Even people who weren't clinically depressed or weren't
Speaker:diagnosed or who had never experienced it, the things that I thought
Speaker:were so abnormal they had experienced too. And and I'll
Speaker:say this. I should say the things I thought were so
Speaker:abnormal that led me to think that I was broken that led me down the
Speaker:path that I was on to be in that black hole, those were just
Speaker:normal occurrences for the typical American, I would say. I
Speaker:don't know about other countries. I've never lived in other countries. but,
Speaker:you know, that that self doubt, that negative voice that sometimes comes in our
Speaker:heads and tells us we're not good enough, that we that we're not worthy,
Speaker:that we don't serve things. Those are voices that are
Speaker:in a lot of people's heads that talk to them
Speaker:and And I was really surprised when people would say things like, oh,
Speaker:yeah. I get that. I totally understand that too.
Speaker:and I was surprised with how many people would say,
Speaker:Yeah. How can I help? Or what do I need to do
Speaker:to support you? Yeah. It's great stuff. The
Speaker:thought of, you know, how people responded
Speaker:positively is just, I just love it. It just
Speaker:reestablishes faith in humanity. Yeah. Now that
Speaker:we're we're not all jerks and, you know -- When I
Speaker:think, you know, what what inference said in her
Speaker:diary. You know, I believe through everything that that
Speaker:people are good. And I do believe that. I think that everybody
Speaker:wants to do what's for them and their communities. And
Speaker:even in the world we live in right now, that still may not seem like
Speaker:it's connected and and It may seem like we're further
Speaker:apart than we've ever been before. The fact is is when you
Speaker:talk to someone, we all have those same core
Speaker:values. In fact, anthropologists find that we have 7
Speaker:core values no matter where you are on the planet, or what
Speaker:culture you were raised in. Now the the the actual value
Speaker:attributed to those different values or the priority in which they land for you might
Speaker:be a little bit different depending where you are. but they're all the same no
Speaker:matter where. And when we understand that, we see,
Speaker:oh, this person that may not be behaving the way that I think
Speaker:is is still a good person. They
Speaker:still want what's best for other people, and that's that's why we
Speaker:perspective shift. because a lot of times we get so caught
Speaker:up in the ego part of our brain that says
Speaker:you're or you're wrong. you're worthless or you're
Speaker:worthy, it it's not even,
Speaker:a good foundational starting point from a communication standpoint. And
Speaker:for me, that was the biggest shift for me. Just to understand
Speaker:that I wasn't -- or I wasn't wrong the way I felt wasn't or
Speaker:wasn't wrong. It just was and that I could have a
Speaker:conversation with someone and share how I was feeling
Speaker:without having to have them feel it too
Speaker:or to really even, change
Speaker:anything about the way that they were behaving, just the acknowledgement saying I feel
Speaker:this way was was very powerful. Yeah. It's beautiful. I
Speaker:was thinking, recently, I read the book, the 4
Speaker:agreements And are you familiar? You're
Speaker:nodding your head? I have not read it yet, but I have heard of it.
Speaker:But there's there's a line in it where it's,
Speaker:the author says that everything you've been taught is
Speaker:a lie. And If you
Speaker:think the how that benefits me is
Speaker:that every every problem there
Speaker:is every is just been
Speaker:passed on through generations, and we
Speaker:measure our self against what has happened to
Speaker:us or how we were raised and, you know, things that
Speaker:people have said, I mean, for instance, if you
Speaker:need a therapist, you need more than a therapist for help or something
Speaker:along those lines, or what they did back in the seventies.
Speaker:not that long ago. Yeah. All of those all of
Speaker:that nonsense when you can separate yourself from it and
Speaker:just kinda start fresh that is not wrong.
Speaker:It's not it's just is. Yeah. It's,
Speaker:it's worth its weight in goals when you can get to that point and stop
Speaker:judging yourself and you stop judging others and you
Speaker:look for the good in life. And, yeah, it sounds like it's
Speaker:been a fascinating journey for you. it has. It's it's
Speaker:completely changed my life, and it's something that I'm still working through
Speaker:even today. I'm, you know, as you said, You can stop judging other
Speaker:people. I don't judge other people as often as I judge
Speaker:myself when I come to the table. You know? 75. Nope.
Speaker:73 unread emails in my inbox now. and
Speaker:I I still question sometimes, like, am I cut out for this? Am I doing
Speaker:the same? And it's really, like you said, it's about sitting back and
Speaker:going, you know what? You are where you are where you need to be, and
Speaker:it's okay. And you when you seek
Speaker:out happiness, when I mentioned the reticular activating system, again, that
Speaker:affirms our own beliefs. So if you think that the
Speaker:world is miserable, you're gonna find everything
Speaker:to figure out if the world is miserable. I I when I
Speaker:work with leaders, I've I talked to them about, the
Speaker:scenario of when you get out of bed in the morning. and you're like, okay,
Speaker:I'm going to work today, or I've got an appointment today. And you get out
Speaker:of work, or you get out of bed, and you stub your toe. Right? And
Speaker:you're like, ugh, that's not a good sign. And then you put your shirt on
Speaker:and you go and you get your coffee and you spill your coffee and you're
Speaker:like, uh-oh, that's really not a good sign. And then you get in your
Speaker:car and halfway there, you get a
Speaker:flat tire. So now you're running late, and you're going you're questioning now. Should I
Speaker:go back to bed? because this is not a good sign. And then you hit
Speaker:every red light on the way to where you're going, and you get
Speaker:there, and you're apologizing profusely, which by the
Speaker:way, this is a situation that actually happened to you. And I talk about
Speaker:this in the book and We have this perspective at that point of, oh,
Speaker:man, this is not gonna go well, and I should have just went back to
Speaker:bed, and then we're looking at every negative thing that had happened throughout
Speaker:that meeting. throughout that conversation, throughout the rest of the day.
Speaker:And then you feel at the end of the day that, man, I should have
Speaker:just went back to bed today. but I started deploying a tactic
Speaker:with kids when, you know, they were younger, and it was get your shoes
Speaker:on. And a couple minutes later, it was get your shoes on, and a couple
Speaker:minutes later, it was get your shoes on. We get in the
Speaker:car and everyone would be crying because I'm I yelled at my kids
Speaker:and they got yelled at and they're in trouble. and we'd
Speaker:start our drive, and I'd have to say, listen, guys, we had a rough
Speaker:morning this morning. And they'd say, yes. And I'd say,
Speaker:but that doesn't make our day. It was just one
Speaker:moment of the day, and the rest of the day is up to
Speaker:us. And they'd say yes. And then we'd have good
Speaker:days. And it's all about understanding that things are
Speaker:temporary. things are never going to be the exact
Speaker:way that they are right now for you ever. So you can choose
Speaker:if you want things to be better, or if you want things to stay the
Speaker:same. Totally. It's beautiful. You know,
Speaker:you think about every breath we take.
Speaker:is a miracle. Yes. And if you don't think
Speaker:it's a miracle, try to skip a breath.
Speaker:Try to hold it. And you think about all the
Speaker:times that stuff goes in the day,
Speaker:because you're able to take all of those breaths. Yeah.
Speaker:And then during one of those breaths, something happens.
Speaker:So but if you do the the numbers of the breaths
Speaker:and the incidents that happen in the day are
Speaker:seconds inside of all those breads.
Speaker:Yeah. Put it out on paper and you say, well, I don't know how
Speaker:many breads are we taking a day. But if you take that
Speaker:number versus the number of bad things happen, even if it's
Speaker:10, it's nowhere near all the good that's happened.
Speaker:That's just breathing. Let alone our eyesight
Speaker:that are touched, the hugs, you know, the
Speaker:humor and all the stuff that goes throughout the day. And that's what, you know,
Speaker:as you get older, you're or at some point in life, you start reflecting on
Speaker:that. and you realize that the little things that happen during the day really
Speaker:aren't so bad. Yeah. I heard an analogy that kinda puts it into
Speaker:perspective too in in it was floating around
Speaker:somewhere trending. and it was another, I think it was another podcast or
Speaker:something along those lines, but somebody had asked, you know, if I gave you
Speaker:$7,000,000,000, and you lost
Speaker:10. Would you sweat it?
Speaker:No. So why do you sweat 10 minutes out of the
Speaker:7000000000 minutes that you have in your lifetime? And I
Speaker:think that that's really I tell people I say, you know, from a
Speaker:perspective, why do we go to roller roller,
Speaker:coasters. Why do we go to theme parks and ride roller coasters? We pay big
Speaker:ticket money to go and buy a
Speaker:ride on a roller coaster. and it's not because
Speaker:it goes high and it stays high.
Speaker:It's because it has ups and downs and interns and loop de
Speaker:loops all around. And we love that because it's exciting.
Speaker:So think about how life would be if it was all
Speaker:highs. I used to tell people when when my mom and I
Speaker:would go to church, when I was younger, I used to tell people, I don't
Speaker:wanna be here. And they'd say why? And I'd say I don't wanna go to
Speaker:heaven. And they're like, what? And I'd
Speaker:say, I don't wanna sit around all day on a white puff puffy
Speaker:cloud. as the common misconception of what heaven is.
Speaker:Right? because it's boring, and I want to have
Speaker:another exciting life. And I want to do something different.
Speaker:And I want every day to be different. I wanna experience things.
Speaker:And it and it took a really long time for me to understand
Speaker:that that's really what I was looking for was experience it. And
Speaker:I think that's what most humans are looking for. And I think
Speaker:when we can be in that space where we just understand that even
Speaker:the saddest moments of our life, it's just an experience.
Speaker:And that's what we are designed to do as humans is to experience
Speaker:life, is to experience what it is to be a human,
Speaker:If we can sit and go, oh, that's what that feels
Speaker:like. Okay. And maybe it doesn't feel
Speaker:good in that moment because we have a conception. Think about when
Speaker:you were younger, and they taught you what the emotions were. What
Speaker:it what it what happened when we were parents and our
Speaker:kids were crying. What do we want to do? Help them stop
Speaker:crying all the way. We we assumed
Speaker:that it didn't feel good for them. Yeah. We need you to stop crying because
Speaker:we don't want you to cry because it's a negative emotion. But crying is
Speaker:the most therapeutic thing you can do. it calms the heart rate. It
Speaker:releases endorphins, and it and it helps us
Speaker:to offset cortisol in our bodies, which is our stress
Speaker:hormones. So when we think about our negative
Speaker:thought processes around being sad or angry or frustrated
Speaker:as we were growing up, and how we would get in trouble for throwing
Speaker:our cup across the roof. We realized that we've
Speaker:been kind of trained to behave a certain way, which is good for the
Speaker:betterment of society. Right? but at the same time, it's
Speaker:it's led us to believe that certain feelings aren't acceptable, which I think
Speaker:is exactly where the problems with depression lie. When you're
Speaker:sad or grieving or you're frustrated and angry or you
Speaker:want the world to change you aren't given a chance to
Speaker:fully experience that, to experience that low or
Speaker:that upside down moment. And because you can't experience it, you
Speaker:can't move through it, and then you get stuck there.
Speaker:Yeah. Well, this has been great, Stephanie. I really
Speaker:enjoyed listening to you and, you know, it's opened up my
Speaker:eyes and definitely going to be on the lookout more
Speaker:for the way people are showing up
Speaker:to see if there's maybe a little extra attention, little
Speaker:extra love or something. Yeah. You know, and if you think
Speaker:about the numbers, 1 out of every 4 or 5 people are experiencing
Speaker:it at sometimes their lives. These are people who are coming across regularly
Speaker:and you know, instead of saying what's wrong with that
Speaker:person or, you know, would you get up on the wrong side of the bed?
Speaker:Maybe we show a little more empathy with people and Yeah.
Speaker:Because nothing is wrong with them. They're just in the spot in their life
Speaker:that they do need that little extra compassion and care
Speaker:for and Yeah. It really is up to
Speaker:us to change the world with respect. So -- you're definitely doing
Speaker:that. It's great stuff. So, Stephanie, where can people find more of you, my dear?
Speaker:Yeah. So I actually have 2 websites. one is for
Speaker:the online platform that I'm developing for coaching, which is
Speaker:at selective shifters.com. so if you're interested in leading the
Speaker:charge and having more conversations like that, that's where I would encourage you to go.
Speaker:Otherwise, you can visit my personal website, which is stephaniecunkel.com,
Speaker:first and last name, and then you can see my book there and,
Speaker:you know, from a leadership development standpoint, talks and
Speaker:speaking engagements, coaching, you can find all of that there. Yeah. It's just
Speaker:such a great topic. It's probably rarely discussed in a
Speaker:corporate environment. So Yeah. That helping
Speaker:people become more aware would be great. Yeah. We're getting more awareness, but
Speaker:it's definitely still not talked about widely enough.
Speaker:And Leaders definitely aren't given the skill sets to be able to
Speaker:understand what's going on and how to deal with that. And I think that that
Speaker:is where we are imperatively missing the mark. because of the time that we
Speaker:spend at work. So Yeah.
Speaker:Great. Well, we appreciate what you're doing. Keep inspiring,
Speaker:making the world a better place, Stephanie Conkel. Thanks for showing up today on
