CPA 33 | Recharging Our Batteries

 

When you’re busy keeping up with the demands of life, you may forget that taking care of yourself is crucial for long-term success. Join your host Janine Hamner Holman as she talks with Certified High-Performance Coach Eva Medilek about harmony and the importance of recharging your batteries for productivity and growth. You can’t do everything all at once. You have to stop and rest. In this episode, Eva shares in-depth insights about having the time, money, and resources you need without sacrificing your health and relationships. Make time for what truly matters so you can show up as your best self and make a positive impact other’s lives.

GUEST: Eva Medilek | LinkedIn | Visit their Website: https://www.evamedilek.com/

HOST: Janine Hamner Holman | [email protected] | LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter |

Book me to Speak

Subscribe to my Newsletter!

 

Listen to the podcast here


 

The Importance of the Reset Button and Recharging Our Batteries with Eva Medilek

What am I paying attention to? It’s the myth of balance. We all have this idea that we can, or should be able to, achieve a work-life balance, or a balance in so many different areas of our lives. Rather than going for balance, a more achievable goal is harmony because when we work harmoniously, we get what we need, we may do a big push for something, and then we rest afterward.

I have a relatively new client. We had a huge win which was so exciting and it meant that I had a fourteen-and-a-half-hour day on Monday. To achieve our win, I had a big adrenaline rush to get through to the end and then I realized I was exhausted. I ended up rescheduling a call for the next day so I was able to come home, take a nap, and recharge myself as I didn’t have any commitments until about noon the next day.

The idea of harmony rather than balance is a much more achievable goal because honestly, balance is a myth. Our guest, Eva Medilek, coaches people how to have it all without sacrificing it all. Eva is a certified high-performance coach, an international speaker, a number one bestselling author, and a cultural inclusivity trainer. We met earlier this year, in February 2022, when we both had the honor to be speakers at the US Navy’s first summit on diversity.

Eva invited me to be a guest on her radio show What’s Important Now: Making Time for What Matters Most on the VoiceAmerica’s Influencers Channel. One of the things that I love about Eva’s work is her specialization in helping busy professionals have more time, money and success without sacrificing health, well-being and relationships in the process. Welcome, Eva.

Janine, I’m excited to be here. Thank you so much for having me.

You’re so welcome. Let’s hop right into it. I’m going to begin the way that I often begin, which is by asking the following question. What is something that you have become aware of that people are not paying attention to, either intentionally or unintentionally and consciously or unconsciously? What is the cost of that inattention?

People aren’t paying attention to the reset button and learning how to recharge. If you look at a NASCAR race or the Indianapolis 500, those cars are racing at dangerously high speeds trying to win the race or at least finish it without crashing and burning. When the car that was ahead would stop for a pit stop, my thought was, “Why are they stopping when they’re ahead? Aren’t other people going to pass them up? They’re going to lose. Nothing is wrong with the car.”

Success without sacrifice doesn’t mean there’s no sacrifice at all. We're just sacrificing the wrong things, and it's hurting us in the long run. Click To Tweet

They know how important pit stops are so that they can continue to race at peak or high performance without crashing and burning. What I find is that most of us are racing nonstop, trying to do everything we can to get ahead and please other people, working on other people’s agendas and priorities and trying to do it all so that we can have it all. We’re afraid that if we do stop or slow down, we’re going to fall behind and lose. Imagine what it would be like if you were to take strategic pit stops or resets throughout the day before you run out of gas. What we’re trained to do is to keep going when we get tired. We push through and then we stop and rest.

We get hungry before we eat; we don’t eat for fuel and performance. We wait until the tank is empty in all areas of our lives before we realize, “I probably need to stop and take a break.” You can continue that performance consistently if you take strategic pit stops throughout the day. You can end the day as strong as you began it. People don’t realize that we do that for our cars’ maintenance but we don’t do it for ourselves.

I love this distinction. I will confess that my default was always, “Whatever it is, I got it. I can handle it. I’m on top of it. I am calm and competent.” I would say, “I got it,” so much that eventually I didn’t have it anymore. I was in over my head. I would finally say, “I don’t have it.” It would be a crisis either, “I’m so overwhelmed,” or my engine would fall out. I would be not only out of gas but my engine would be on the ground and I’d need a long break to recharge. A good friend of mine used to tell me, “You are a Maserati. You are a high-performance car. The problem is you’re treating yourself like you are a Kia.”  

That’s how I was raised. I’m sure many people reading this are thinking, “That sounds like me.” You might remember this commercial in the late 1970s or early 1980s. It was this perfume commercial. It had this catchy little jingle. The woman comes out in three different outfits, “I can bring home the bacon, fry it up in a pan and never let you forget you’re a man because I’m a woman.” The tagline was, “The 8-hour perfume for the 24-hour women.” Subliminally, the message is that to have it all – the career, the domestic life and the sexy entertainment life – we have to be it all and do it all too. But what is being it all and doing it all costing us? One thing I realized about that commercial is at least we will smell good as we work ourselves to death.

Most of us are going through life feeling stressed out, burnt out, and overwhelmed. It’s affecting our mood, our health, and our interactions with other people because we’re always busy. We’re doing a lot and it’s exhausting. We’re doing so much to keep up with the demands of our work life and personal life that it is taking its toll on both. Women more than men feel that we’re supposed to be able to do it all. We’re superwomen until we can’t.

Our adrenals are blown out until we start having headaches and snapping at the kids and our husbands. One of my friends used to say, “I’ve got one nerve left. You’re standing all over it.” People are getting on our last nerve. We’re sacrificing trying to achieve all of our dreams in life. We’re sacrificing the very things that are important to us. It’s not that we don’t have to sacrifice but we’re sacrificing the wrong things. It’s hurting us in the long run. I offer a program called Success Without Sacrifice where I coach people in this so they can level up.

CPA 33 | Recharging Our Batteries

Recharging Our Batteries: We don’t eat for fuel and performance. We wait until the tank is empty in all areas of our lives. When we are empty and exhausted, it affects our interactions with other people because we’re doing a lot.

 

The overturning of Roe v. Wade is one of these things that is having an impact on especially women and certainly some great men too. I have a friend, Barry. Shout-out to him. He and I have known each other since the mid-1980s in New York City. He is a gay man. The issue of abortion and a woman’s right to choose has very little to do with his day-to-day life and yet he has been posting, especially on Facebook, about how this feels to him.

As a gay man, he has experienced instances of being overlooked, feeling like a second-class citizen and not feeling like he was being honored in the way that all people want to be honored in the world. Here in the United States, women are feeling like we have gone back 50 years, like we have taken an enormous step backward. Something is happening every day, whether it’s in your personal life or in the world. Recently, I lost a dear friend to pancreatic cancer, and I had three friends test positive for COVID.

It is true that we grew up with the myth that we can bring home the bacon, fry it up in a pan, and never let you forget you’re a man. I did not remember that it was a perfume commercial. That concept has become so iconic that we have lost track of what it was that they were marketing.

I have to speak as a woman because that’s who I am. We’re proud that we’re superwomen. We wear it like a badge of honor like martyrdom. “I can do it all, take care of my family, work, and still look hot in the process until I collapse from exhaustion,” which is part of my story. I want to share something with you that I learned. You may or may not know about this. You talked about the overturning of Roe v. Wade.

Back in 1987, there was a book written called The Birth Dearth by Ben J. Wattenberg who was an advisor to many presidents, especially conservative presidents. You can’t find that book anymore. It’s out of print but I was able to find it online and download it, and plan on reading it very shortly. The author was bringing to light the fact that the problem was there are not enough White babies being born and what the fear is in White supremacist society and communities. This is no news to anybody that Black, Brown and other immigrant people will outnumber the Whites. That has been the fear among Whites for many years, “They’re going to outnumber us.”

Here’s the thing with abortion. This book was after Roe v. Wade. 60% of the abortions are performed on White women, which means 60% of the babies that could be contributing to the White race were not making it. Here’s the thing. What he said was, “We could, like in Europe, pay them to have children but that would mean we would have to pay Black and Brown people too. That’s not going to work. We could open our borders for more immigration but that would mean more Black and Brown people would immigrate to the United States. That’s not going to work.”

Self-care is not separate from productive action. It goes hand in hand. Click To Tweet

The conservative party’s number one focus for all of these years has been to overturn Roe v. Wade so that they can increase the White population. Everybody is focused on underserved communities. What is this going to mean to poor people, Black and Brown people, people who can’t afford an abortion, people who are victims of abuse and violence, or people with health conditions who need to be scared as White women? This is a direct response to what Ben Wattenberg calls the birth dearth.

Holy shit. All of my long-time readers know that I have a policy about swearing.

How is that working out for you, Janine?

It’s working out fine. My policy is I never swear for effect like, “She said a bad word.” I swear for accuracy. My reaction to that is holy shit. I had never heard that. I’m going to go check that out.

Google, “Jane Elliott’s birth dearth.” She did an interview with someone. This was years ago. We’ve got to do our research in a lot of areas because we’re being led by popular conversation and that’s what we tend to focus on. When I saw this clip, I thought, “This is the underlying fear of evangelical conservatives.” The White population is going to be a numerical minority in this country.

We are. Let’s get real about it. Eventually, it’s the way that things are going already. You and I are in California. You are in Northern California. I’m in Southern California. California is what is called a majority-minority state, which means that there are more people of color and people of non-Western-European descent than there are White people who look like me with blonde hair, fair skin and blue eyes. This is the trend.

That is the major fear because it’s all tied to power. It has been their agenda to change the makeup of the courts to rule. Who was the woman that was running for something? Trump was at a rally with her. She said it was a victory for White life. I mused, “Freudian slip much?”

CPA 33 | Recharging Our Batteries

Recharging Our Batteries: It’s so important for us to have the emotional energy to have the adaptability and resilience to create safe and inclusive spaces wherever we are in life.

 

I spent the first twenty years of my life working for social change nonprofit organizations. I am inherently concerned about it. Let’s face it. Women like me with access to wealth and money are going to be able to get abortions. You can still get an abortion in the state of California. California is probably going to codify it in November 2022 as a safe haven for people who need abortions and the right to choose what happens to our bodies. For young people and poor people of any nationality, it becomes much harder to access those resources. That has been the focus of my anger, fear and frustration.

There is a large majority of poor White people on government aid and assistance. This affects them as well but, as we all know, being in a White body gives you privilege and supremacy if you look at the makeup of those who stormed the Capitol on January 6th, 2021. My point is that they want to make it harder for White women to choose to end their pregnancies when they were going to be mothers. I wrote an article about this on LinkedIn called “Jesus in the Klan.”

If you look at the White evangelical Christian communities, multiple babies are a thing. They take, “Be fruitful, multiply and replenish the Earth,” quite literally. If you look at the Duggar family who got their show, 19 Kids and Counting, it is about keeping that White race as a numerical majority and the fear that it will not be if the liberals accept everybody and if equal rights are passed. It’s a huge fear in that population to lose power. If you watch the January 6 committees, power is the motivating factor.

This is a regulatory path for me and I’m sure for many of our readers. It’s certainly not the idea that White supremacists are afraid of losing power or afraid of this idea that Black and Brown people are trying to take over and other myths that are out there.

Part of our work is around inclusion, belonging and creating places where it’s not only safe but also great for everyone to belong. We’re creating organizations in places that are about belonging, whether what you do is make shoes or widgets or help make the world a better place. I’m working with a trash company. What they are about is having their employees be empowered.

The mission of the former CEO of Blinds.com for the company was to have his people be the best people they could be. It had nothing to do with blinds. I want to go down that more positive road and also explore with you a little bit more about how you help people have it all and not sacrifice themselves. That has been part of my journey over the last couple of years. I’m trying to carve out time to recharge and rejuvenate so that I don’t end up with my Maserati on the ground.

The key is you need love too. They are all connected because if you look at the climate on social media, we are so exhausted with the news, the challenges health-wise, the economy, the gas prices, the wars, the lying, the power, the lions, the tigers, the bears, all of it. It’s impairing our ability to show up as our best selves because of this level of exhaustion.

A morning routine generates your energy and wipes out 20% of stress that brings positivity to the day. Click To Tweet

That’s why preventing and reversing burnout is so important. It’s important for us to have the mental and physical energy but more importantly, the emotional energy to have the adaptability, the resilience and the skills to create safe and inclusive spaces wherever we are in life. It all goes hand in hand. If you notice the language being used on social media with people who don’t share your opinion about Roe v. Wade, defunding the police or Black Lives Matter is hateful language or shame, blame and guilt language.

It’s not language that is seeking to understand what is the underlying fear, motivation or concerns that you hold your beliefs into. What are you afraid of? What is fear? Help me understand more. That’s a skill-based communication effort for sure. However, for us to be able to be in a place to practice the skills that we all know like being kind to people, it doesn’t mean that they need to stay in your space.

Friends are only friends for a season. They have a specific reason for being in your life for that season. I lost twenty-plus-year friendships after George Floyd died because they didn’t think my life mattered. James Baldwin said, “We can disagree and still love each other unless your disagreement is rooted in my oppression and denial of my humanity and right to exist.” It still doesn’t give us the right to threaten people with violence like we’re seeing in the people in power who are bullying other people who want to do what is the right thing in their mind.

For us, as leaders of our families, and in our communities where we get a chance to role model behavior, you want to look at the great influencers like Mother Teresa and Martin Luther King and what they all have in common that had them influence the masses. They taught people not what to think but how to think. That’s what is missing. They role modeled the way and challenged us to be better, be outside of our comfort zone and take a stand.

The energy that we have behind us is to do that and show up as our best selves to be influencers and role models. We can’t do it if we’re burnt out, overwhelmed, exhausted and hangry. There are times when I feel like giving up and think, “What do I need to do to create even more energy? Sometimes I’m going 0 to 60, not cruising around at 25 miles an hour and preserving gas. What do I need to do to perform better, be conscious of that and not be on all the time?”

I call it my CPR of high-performance. That’s clarity, priorities and responsibility. We’ve got to get clear, prioritize and take responsibility for creating and setting boundaries that support our values and priorities. Those are the basic foundations that you’re going to build your high-performance life on because confused minds don’t fly right.

When you brought up Martin Luther King and Mother Teresa, the other person who comes to mind once you start going down that road is Gandhi. All three of themstood up against oppression, the patriarchy and the forces of evil-doers that were happening in the world in their societies at those times. All three of them were grounded in what I think of as the religion of love.

CPA 33 | Recharging Our Batteries

Recharging Our Batteries: Clarity, priorities, and responsibility are the basic foundations on which you will build your high-performance life.

 

They were all deeply spiritual and religious people not coming from a place of shame and blame. There is a lot of shame and blame in religion. You can also find love, grace and curiosity. When we lean into the love and curiousity, it becomes much easier and more possible for us to access the CPR that you are talking about. What do you think?

We’ve got to lean outside of our box of comfort. A lot of these religious concepts depend upon how you grew up and may be deeply embedded. There’s the Catholic guilt. I haven’t been Catholic since I was twelve years old. It never seems to go away. I was on a webinar with a friend. She was talking about Jewish guilt. Everybody has their thing. We’ve got our special way of dealing with what was built in us foundationally that we’re in a constant battle to lean outside of that because that’s a box of our comfort zone.

There are a lot of people who stay in abusive relationships because that’s what they grew up in, that’s what they know, and that’s what they’re comfortable with. They don’t like it but they know it. It feels familiar to them. Lean outside of the box. If you want different results, you’ve got to do things differently. What are the things that we can do differently that will have us show up as our best and highest selves in every area of our lives?

What do we have to do to take care of ourselves? Self-care is not separate from productive action, first of all. It goes hand in hand. Until you’re in a space energetically, emotionally and physically because this is draining on all three levels, then you can’t show up as your best and highest self to have that level of influence and impact encouraging your leadership.

Let’s get into the cross-section between where our guilt lies. Our feeling is that we should be pushing comes right up against our need for self-care. As an example, I was supposed to do a planning retreat with one of my coaches at the end of 2021. Unfortunately, she had an accident and broke her elbow. We were going to an Airbnb. It was beautiful and by the water, which is part of what recharges me. I couldn’t get my money back.

I thought, “I’m going to the beach by myself for a few days.” What was still in my head was this was a work thing so I brought all my work clothes. I got to the beach. It’s the end of November. It wasn’t bathing suit weather even here in Southern California. I needed sweatpants, sweatshirts and fuzzy socks. I went to Ross, Marshalls or one of those places to pick up some comfy clothes because I didn’t have them with me. I read 3 novels in 4 days. That was what I did. I just read for fun. I took walks and ate yummy food. I got to be all by myself with no husband, dog, cat, kids or work. I came back with this feeling of rejuvenation and realized, “I need to build this into my work. Every few months, once a quarter, or whatever I can figure out, I need to have that getaway.” I was talking with another friend who’s a coach about how excited I was about vacation because, during COVID, I hadn’t had a chance to take a vacation. I hadn’t been able to go anywhere.

Three reasons to read are education, personal development, and entertainment. Click To Tweet

A staycation does not do for me what a vacation does. Almost always a vacation for me is my friend, the ocean, the sounds, the smells, the ebb, the flow and the kids running around. The ocean is my source. I was going to the ocean. I was going to be with my cousin and my husband. I was so looking forward to it. I couldn’t wait. I was telling him about all the great things that were then going to be possible for me because I had this vacation.

He said to me, “I get it. It’s going to be a great vacation. You’re going to have a great time. There’s no way that one 10 day vacation is going to provide you with all the things that you need. All the things that you’re thinking are magically going to be available for you to create from this one little period of rejuvenation. What if a couple of days a month on a Thursday, you blocked out your Thursday and went to the beach?” My first thought was, “Can I do that? That feels naughty,” but I can do that.

I own my business for years. I’m my own damn boss. I can do whatever I want. Most months, I don’t get to the beach twice. In some months, I don’t get to the beach at all. It is on my calendar every month and every week. It’s called Thursday time. I don’t talk about it very much because I still have this feeling that I’m being naughty. My thought is, “I’m skipping school. I’m playing hooky. I’m shitting all over myself.”

That’s a real concern with people who are creative, productive and thrive off of what they do. It’s not like we’re in a 9:00 to 5:00, “I have to go to work.” There would be no guilt over those vacation days. You and I chose to do things in life that lights us up, that we enjoy, that make a difference and have an impact. I have a PDF eBook that I created for people, Energy Generating Habits to Stay Focused and Productive.

When you look at a power plant, for example, it doesn’t have energy. It generates it. We’ve got to be intentional every single day to generate energy to avoid getting burnt out. I have six things on here. The first one is a morning routine, “There are six things you can do to generate energy for your relationships and your life. A morning routine wipes out 20% of stress and brings positivity to the day.”

I have a morning routine that I love. Working out isn’t always a part of it but there are certain things that I say and do in the cold shower blast for fifteen seconds. I’m saying my mantra in the shower and having some quiet time for 10 to 15 minutes to sit, create my intention for the day and show gratitude. That’s a given no matter what. Number two is 50-minute strategic resets. When you reset, everything shifts. You can set an intention.

For example, we finish having a discussion, I get to do a recording for my show. I’m not going to go straight into it. I’m going to take a break, get some water and maybe do a two-minute little intention-setting release meditation technique or sometimes I jump up and down like a crazy person or chase the dog around. If I feel like my wagon is dragging, then I’ve got to do something for energy.

CPA 33 | Recharging Our Batteries

Recharging Our Batteries: You have to lean outside of the box because if you want different results, you’ve got to do things differently.

 

If I feel that I’m carrying too much energy into the next thing, then I do something to release energy. It depends on what I need but I have something I can do for that. That takes five minutes tops. It’s that much. Eat to fuel and recover. We need a performance diet. It’s a diet that’s built for our performance during the day, not a diet that is in reaction mode to us getting hangry like the Snickers commercial.

The first thing that I put on my calendar is lunch. Everything else gets built around that. Sometimes the time of day varies depending upon what I have scheduled but it is blocked out one hour for me to do whatever I need to do but also to sit down and have a nutritious meal without rushing it. That’s the beauty of working at home. That’s a part of me not getting on Zoom and belching all over people as well.

The fourth thing is to work out at least five times a week. I’m not going to the gym and getting all sweaty. What I did even before COVID but revved up during COVID was I’ve got a little mini-trampoline. In my workouts, I got my old-school Motown playlist that my husband hates. I can plug in and bounce around the Stevie Wonder for fifteen minutes every morning. That makes me happy. I’ve got a little Bill Withers on there. When you think about high-performance, high-performers workout, move and activate.

There are 5 and 6. I also do brain supplementation. What I mean by that is how I treat my brain and what I intentionally put into my brain. I read voraciously. I have three reasons to read: education, personal development, and entertainment. I am very careful of what my brain consumes, especially what time of day it consumes it. I also am intentional in resting my brain and making sure I take neuro-magnesium or something to nourish my brain.

Meditation is a part of feeding your brain. Finally, one of the most important other than number one or the morning routine is your sleep routine. You’ve got to have 7 to 8 hours of sleep to optimize your performance because your brain needs that rest. Here’s the best way to get optimal sleep. It’s the 3, 2, 1 rule, no food 3 hours before bed, no work 2 hours before bed and no screens 1 hour before bed. That’s how you can train your body to get optimal sleep.

For me, no food three hours before bed is no problem. I started doing that a long time ago. That is part of my routine. No work two hours before bed is usually not a problem. I try to leave my computer at the office and not do work on my phone when I come home. When I come home, I unplug. Occasionally, that doesn’t work out but that is my intention. The screen part is where I get challenged. I love to watch TV and play games on my phone. I’m training myself. I also love to read.

Remember that those books are made out of paper. I feel you. My husband and I watch Netflix every night but I usually end up leaving him down there because he’s a screen person and I’m not his coach. I don’t get paid enough to coach my husband. There’s no amount of money in the world where I’ll take that up. I go upstairs. What I usually do for my nighttime reading is People Magazine.

You have to have seven to eight hours of sleep to optimize your performance because your brain needs that rest. Click To Tweet

That is my guilty pleasure. I find recipes, skincare and haircare in there, “Let me try it.” It is mindless reading. They’ve got that little brain teaser, “Find ten differences in this picture.” That’s what I do at bedtime because it helps me wind down. Normally, we’re watching something on Netflix that is probably murderous or something. I need to stop doing that for my cortisol level and maybe just watch comedy.

The last 30 to 50 minutes are for reading. My husband makes his way into bed. We have our final discussion, tickle the dog and all kinds of things that happen in those last ten minutes before we turn off the lights. Get your minds out of the gutter. It’s a routine. Here’s one of the things we do as a reset. He and I have a weekly reset. We go to a local coffee shop. It’s the cutest little European coffee shop ever. They have dog biscuits for the dog. I meet him there every Sunday at around 9:00 AM.

My husband and I are in business together. We own a real estate company. We don’t talk about the business. We talk about dreams. The question might be, “If we were to move, what is a non-negotiable in a house for you? What do you have to have?” I’ll dream about the walk-in closet that I want or the kitchen. Our discussion might include, “Do we want an island? What color is it going to be?” It’s nonsensical stuff and vacations we want to take.

We’re getting ready to leave for Europe for six weeks. We get to dream about it. We have an apartment in Berlin, “Is this a year we get a new couch or not?” Sometimes it’s like, “How are we going to get the money to do that?” We get creative but it’s our create-and-dream moment. That’s a weekly reset because you need to have a daily reset, a weekly reset, a monthly reset and a yearly reset.

Whether we’re married or not and we have partners or not, we can do that with a friend or by ourselves.

I have accountability buddies I do that with too. We end our accountability, “What’s your commitment for fun this week?”

I love being intentional, fun and not taking it seriously. Let’s dream about a future house. This is nothing about like, “We need to move. I’m not happy.” This is like, “What’s next in life?”

CPA 33 | Recharging Our Batteries

Recharging Our Batteries: Be very careful of what your brain consumes, especially what time of day it consumes it.

 

We do it for this life. We make it happen. It’s not a pipe dream. It’s like, “How are we going to make this happen?” We plan it out, “What needs to happen? What do we need to sell? How much money do we need to make? When we dream, we’re planning real dreams. I’ve got no control over what happens in the next life so I’m not going to worry about it. It’s being in present creation.

“Where are we going to move to? What’s the next state for us?” One day, we sat there. We said, “It’s such a nice day. What are we going to do?” All of a sudden, both of us realized we were an hour from Napa. People get on a plane to take a vacation in Napa. We can get in the car and drive for an hour and we’re there. We loaded up the car and went.

We spent a day in Sonoma and went for a hike. We ended that hike wine tasting. We walked around Sonoma Square, got ice cream, laid down a blanket and took a quick nap before we drove home. I thought, “We have to take care of this before we leave California.” Here’s the fun part about dreaming for me anyway. Other people are different. It’s figuring out how we’re going to make these dreams come true.

We can dream about things that we have no intention of making happen but your idea is, “Let’s dream about things and then create intention.”

“How are we going to do this?” We’re in the process of finding a way to leave California. We’re not 100% decided on where. That’s when the fun trips come in, “Let’s check out different areas and see what we have done.” We make it an adventure.

The more that we can view life as an adventure, a possibility, and an opportunity to learn new things, be in relationships with new people, reach outside of our comfort zone and get comfortable with being a little uncomfortable, that’s when the richness of life reveals itself.

I’ll add to that. Have something to look forward to. A lot of us lost vision when the lockdown happened. True leaders in our world keep their eye on the vision regardless of what challenges are coming up around them. They look at the bigger vision or the bigger picture. You may not get there tomorrow or the next year even but you always want to take steps to get closer to what that vision is for you. That’s how I view my life. I don’t want to be like, “This is it. I’m settled. This is everything.”

I love to be in creative energy. If I get to my dream, my dream wasn’t big enough. I get to dream bigger because I want to die still reaching for my dreams. Whatever I get to create along the way is part of the fun of life and the adventure. I’m looking forward to what our next house looks like. I’m like a senior in high school. I’ve already checked out of the one I’m in, “I don’t even want to clean it anymore because we’re going to be moving.”

We may not move for a year or two. Who knows? I’ve got senioritis like, “The carpet is disgusting. We have to rip it.” I see everything wrong with the house I’m in because I’m already planning and seeing myself in the new house. We’ve got to keep our ability to be focused on the vision. That’s where the clarity comes in. Does the vision you have for your life match your reality? What do you need to get there? What do you need to prioritize so that your actions support your goals and vision?

That’s when we might say, “I don’t know what to do. I can’t decide,” or we do everything. It’s the Shiny Object syndrome. Once you’re clear on what the vision and the goal are, you can make decisions easier, “That’s going to distract me and move me away from my vision. I’m only going to say yes to things that get me closer to it.” It’s easy to create that boundary and to say no.

I am realizing our time is almost up. This is what happens when I get to be with people who I enjoy. I get to have these fun, rich and enlivening conversations. I learn new things and grow as we challenge ourselves and our audience together.

Eva, thank you for sharing your dreams, wisdom and experience. Thank you for sharing some great tips and tricks. Thank you for who you are to me.

It’s my pleasure. Thank you for having me on the show. It was such a fun conversation. We could dream and envision together forever and we will.

Here’s to your dreams and visions. Remember that great leaders make great teams. Until next time.

 

Important Links

 

About Eva Medilek

CPA 33 | Recharging Our BatteriesEva Medilek is a Certified High-Performance Coach, International Speaker, #1 Best-Selling Author, and Cultural Inclusivity Trainer. She has worked with men and women in the areas of personal development, leadership, inclusive intelligence and mastering habits for success.

Eva specializes in helping busy professionals have more money, time, and success without sacrificing health, well-being and relationships in the process. As a keynote speaker, Eva shows you how to generate the energy needed to reverse the burnout we experience from trying to do it all.

Most recently, Eva is a radio talk show host on Voice America’s Influencer Channel. Her show, What’s Important Now; Making Time for What Matters Most, brings to light hot topics and guests that focus on important matters facing us today.

She uses her personal experiences along with her leadership, relationship and high-performance training to teach you how to have it all without sacrificing it all.