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300: Playing Favorites
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Last year’s Sex & Connection two-part series with Irene Fehr broke the internet. Ok, not in a Taylor-Swift-tickets-go-on-sale way but calibrated against my podcast stats. (And IN TRANSIT ranks top 5% globally, so it’s no slouch. Have I thanked you for listening yet? Keep reading because I will.)
It’s no wonder the Sex & Connection duo were some of the most downloaded episodes of the past 100. A hot topic with taboo remnants, the series overflowed with superb expert advice for improved intimacy in long-term relationships.
Now, what you don’t realize was the discomfort I had to overcome to spotlight such subject matter on the show. Sex was something that didn’t get talked about during my conservative upbringing. So to go from that background to discussing it openly with the world forced me to stretch.
We’re continuing our Reflections Bean Pod by celebrating the podcast’s 300th episode and its sixth birthday. And with 2023 fresh as a daisy, I can now spy with my little eye my 10th business anniversary on the horizon, making this a perfect time to look back and ahead.
I’ll reveal some never-before-shared insights from my personal and professional journeys and give you a glimpse into what’s next. Thank you for being here. I have so much to be grateful for, and I’m convinced it’s all because of you.
What You’ll Learn in this Episode:
- Side effects of strolling around New York City
- Friendships that resemble flowers in a garden
- Sitting on a newly gained treasure chest of wisdom
- Why reverse ageism doesn’t exist
- You learn how to do it by doing
Listen to the Full Episode:
Featured on the Show:
Transformation, of any size, takes courage. You bring the ambition, and I’ll bring the support. Reintroducing Adapt & Succeed. Revamped and ready to get you through any life transition.
- Sundae’s Website
- Sundae’s Facebook Business Page – Sundae Schneider-Bean LLC
- Sundae Bean – YouTube
- Adapt and Succeed
- Wisdom Fusion: Ageism and Womanhood Collide Highlight Reel
- Trudi LeBron
- Amel Derragui
- Naomi Hattaway
- Ashton Applewhite: This Chair Rocks
- Wisdom Fusion
- 35 Best Expat Podcasts
- IN TRANSIT Hub
- Global Coach Coalition
Catch These Podcasts / Articles:
- EP123:Change Shame
- EP03: Celebrate You
- First Four Episodes
- EP100: Behind The Scenes – 100 Episodes of Expat Happy Hour
- EP200: Consistency Commitment
- EP226: The Space Women Crave
- EP287: Dismantling Ageism with Ashton Applewhite
- EP288: The Intergenerational Garden with Rabbi Hayim Herring
- EP289: Aging and Positive Psychology with Natasha Ginnivan
- EP281: Sex & Connection – Pt 1 with Irene Fehr
- EP282: Sex & Connection – Pt 2 with Irene Fehr
- EP226: The Space Women Crave
- EP266: The Constant Transition
- EP293: Responsible Leadership with Trudi LeBron
- EP297: Legacy by Design with Naomi Hattaway
- EP218: From Stuck to Sorted in 22 Minutes
- EP269: Rest vs Recovery
- EP278 called The Biology of Business
- Tap Into Intergenerational Wisdom At Work
We’re delighted to be in the Top 5 of the global Best 30 Expat Podcasts!
Full Episode Transcript:
Hello, it is and welcome to a very special episode of IN TRANSIT with Sundae Bean, we are recording from New York City in honor of our 300th episode and marking the sixth year of the podcast. It is 1 p.m in New York, 8 p.m in Johannesburg, and 1 a.m in Bangkok. Welcome to IN TRANSIT with Sundae Bean. I am an intercultural strategist, transformation facilitator, and solution-oriented coach, and I am on a mission to help you adapt & succeed through ANY life transition.
Thank you from the bottom of my heart for joining me in celebrating this 300th episode. Today is a huge milestone in my life and in the life of this podcast and of course, for my business and I hope as a community. And this is why I’m even more excited that I am recording this live from New York City because as I’ll tell you in a moment, New York holds a special significance to the podcast. And just a warning, I flew in last night, I’m a little bit jet-lagged and my heart is wide open so I hope not to get too mushy in this episode but you’ve been fairly warned.
I am humbled that you are still with me, 300 episodes in. It’s been an incredible journey and to celebrate that I wanted to give you a sneak peek on how it all got started. And then highlight the last most recent 100 episodes in three ways:
- First, a sneak peek into some of the personal evolution that was going on in my own world. How that impacted how you saw that come through in the podcast.
- Then also from a business perspective, what seeps through.
- And then of course, I want to talk about the impact on my clients and my listeners. Which episodes sort of hint to that.
And then maybe a little bit about what’s next.
So here we go. I’ve been thinking about this all morning. This morning, I woke up, I got a great night’s sleep, considering the fact that I’m on a six hour time difference and I walked around the city. I saw Rockefeller Center, I saw Times Square. I went to Central Park, I went to Grand Central Station and it just lifted my spirits. I’ve made a few special episodes around the city or a few videos for you around the city to sort of honor and celebrate this event. So if you haven’t seen them on social media, do check them out because New York is a little bit of a birthplace of the podcast and I’ll tell you a little bit about how that came.
Now in 2016, I was working with a media team, a media agent to help get my message out there more. I’m all about impact and we were looking at ways that I can create more impact for those that I want to serve the most. And one of the things that we did is we distilled the years and years, and years of learning. And strategies have been coming up in my coaching for my community into a program called Adapt and Succeed. And that’s how we got to get to know each other and work together. And I came to New York City. I recorded the podcast, and we had a wonderful time together.
He was very, very direct with me. And when I got back, he said, “Listen Sundae. I know, you’re ambitious, I know that you want to make an impact, but if you want to make an impact, you have to stop blogging. ”He goes, “I’ve seen you. I’ve met you. People need to experience you.” He said, “You need to stop blogging and start a podcast. If you want to make an impact, that’s how you’re going to do it.”
So here I am, I don’t even listen to podcasts. I hate the sound of my voice and he’s telling me I should start a podcast, right? So he convinced me because I am super committed to this idea of making an impact. I knew I would be able to reach more people if I did that. And for me, this is so personal, your journey is personal. My journey is personal and writing, while a really effective medium, isn’t always the best way to convey that.
So, in around November, December 2016, I recorded the first episodes of the podcast. And at that time, it was called Expat Happy Hour. And we released them January 30th, 2017. So if you haven’t checked them out, do not check them out, they’re awful. I mean, they’re good content, but what I listen to the quality of my recordings, I listen to what I was doing then. Oh my God, I was such a beginner. But, you know what? I sucked at it. I did, but I’m proud of myself because I learned how to do it by doing it. I didn’t wait until I was good to start. I started and I grew. And this is what I teach my clients all the time, right? So when I look back at episodes 1, 2, 3 4 probably very early, the first couple dozen there’s like “Change Shame” where I have a podcast episode on this, will have to link it for you.
But where I have a little bit of shame around how much I’ve changed. I’m proud of how I’ve developed but I’m shamey around where I used to be. And I’m grateful those episodes are still alive because I can honor my growth. And I did this challenge inside my free community, the IN TRANSIT Hub. And I shared one of the old episodes. I think, like, episode 3 about celebrating, and it’s still really relevant content wise and one of the members of my community said she noticed a dramatic difference from those early episodes to my new episodes.
And she said, not as a criticism of how bad. The first episode was, it was a compliment of the growth. And so I’m keeping it out there, honestly, God, my stomach turns when I think about it. But if you’ve been here since 2017, thank you for sticking with me. And if you want to celebrate the journey of building competence, just listen to the earlier episodes and then listen to the ones now. Like, that’s what growth is, it doesn’t happen by itself. You don’t achieve mastery by hiding, you put your skin in the game and you go for it. Anyway, that’s a little rant, but it’s relevant to the journey.
So back in January. 2017. We had four episodes that went live so that when people were interested, they could listen to more than one. We had some amazing guests early on in the show, and I thank them for their support before I even had an audience. And then I just went for it. Every week, putting out episodes, and here we are 300 episodes later. I had no idea then that I would be recognized on lists, “Top XYZ podcast.” That I was able to look at the tracking and find out that my podcast was consistently in the top 5% globally. Like, what the heck? So this is only happening because of you. And thank you for your trust in my messages, in my guests, in my ideas, and everything I do is centered on what I’m learning in my life and my community, and with my clients.
So, thank you for being part of that. Today as I said, I’m going to focus on three things, my personal evolution in the last hundred episodes what’s been going on and how that is trickled through into the episodes. Then we’ll focus on a bit about my business and then talk about some of the clients impacts that hopefully can help you as well. If you haven’t heard those episodes.
So the last hundred episodes, I’ve done a reflection, in episode 100, I had some amazing friends and clients celebrate with me and they made this gorgeous video. I will have to dig that up again, and they celebrated 100 episodes. 200 episodes in, I talked about the Consistency Commitment, about being consistent. We had 200 episodes week-after-week without a break and had lots of challenges in the meantime and why that’s important for your business.
And now in this one, 300, I think it’s important to highlight how we bring our own Ambitious Transformation, our own life in Transition, how that becomes transparent in everything that we do, and how it can enrich everything that we do. But it is a process of having to be courageous to make it happen.
So, what probably you saw happening before it became official is I was already going through a personal transformation and a business transformation. But my branding and the naming and everything hadn’t happened yet.
This was back in May 2021, I did an episode 226 called The Space Women Crave and this was so vulnerable for me. It felt almost like I don’t want to appropriate the term “coming out,” but it felt like this revealing of something inside on the outside. And it was very close to my heart. I felt it very deeply and I hadn’t yet shared it with the world. And The Space Women Crave ended up being my battle cry for what would be Wisdom Fusion and intergenerational learning.
So here is something that I was going through personally and was inspired by a series of conversations with women that I care about and created a manifesto. Here’s a little sample:
I BELIEVE.
I believe that each woman has wisdom inside of her that is hard-earned, wisdom and experience that is underestimated, at best, undervalued at worst.
I believe that this wisdom may be buried under layers of shame, humility or self-doubt, and thus has not yet seen the light of day nor reached the capacity to fully touch other women’s lives.
I believe that each woman has hard-earned life experience, and if shared, the resulting wisdom from this collected insight could benefit another woman to overcome similar challenges.
I believe that keeping women separate from one another is keeping her away from an important part of herself.
I believe that there is commonality in our struggles and that there is value in sharing how those who have gone before us have faced them.
I believe that there are stark differences in our experiences and by sharing them we gain a more complex picture of ourselves and the myriad of ways one can be a woman.
I believe that when women come together in trust, humility and mutual respect that deep and meaningful collective wisdom can emerge.
So there you go, me baring my soul on what I believe. And as I said this became a battle cry or an invitation to explore intergenerational wisdom. It resulted in a community of women aged 20 to 70, plus. We spent eight weeks together having deep conversations, learning, and connecting. And there’s still so much more than I realized I haven’t shared about this experience. And when I was preparing for this episode, I realized I’m basically sitting on a treasure chest of wisdom that I gained during that special year together. We started out eight weeks and then we can continued to connect over the year and are still connected. And it made me think: maybe that’s something I should do in 2023? I will share that more with you but it has been powerful.
If you haven’t read the entire manifesto check out the Wisdom Fusion link.
It also led to an article being published in Forbes on the topic and lifetime friendships. It also was the springboard for me to get connected to other topics, which I’ll share more about with you, and then learn and get to know experts in the field. So from something that was so deeply personal And I took that space in my heart and in my business and I’m grateful for that.
So what led to that is beyond all the things I’ve mentioned before was a much deeper awareness around, not only the reason why intergenerational learning is so important for all of us but also a greater awareness of the importance of battling ageism. So I was able to get to know a group of experts who are making massive contributions in the field, in terms of intergenerational learning, dismantling ageism, focusing on more positive psychology around ageism to extend our life. And that is all because of my own personal journey and I was able to share that with you. And I’m so excited to share their wisdom, the guests that joined me with you as well.
So just briefly if you haven’t checked out those episodes, please go back to episode 287 Dismantling Ageism with Ashton Applewhite. She is a UN award-winning author of the book: This Chair Rocks. She has many, many other accolades to her name and her expertise is really top class. Here’s a little bit of what she had to say about ageism.
Sundae: You talk about how ageism casts a shadow over our entire lives. Can you say more about the scope of that?
Ashton: Ageism is any judgment on the basis of age. Anytime we make an assessment of what we think someone is capable of because of how old we think they are. Sometimes it’s called reverse ageism when it’s directed against young people, but it’s just ageism. We don’t need that extra label. And that is why it casts a shadow across our entire lives. Although we live in a youth-obsessed culture in the west we are youth is commodified. So I will say that older people bear the brunt of it.
Ashton was so amazing. She and I were able to connect later and we did a special feature inside my community, the IN TRANSIT Hub on The Intersections of Ageism and Sexism. So if you haven’t checked that out, then join us in the IN TRANSIT community Hub, and will make sure that you have access to that.
In episode 288, The Intergenerational Garden with Rabbi Hayim Herring, we did so much laughing and heart-to-heart talking about the importance of intergenerational learning. And what we can do to nurture our friendships and nurture intergenerational connection and why it is so important. So here’s a little bit from that interview:
Hayim Herring: But some friends of mine, good friends are gardeners. One day a friend of mine was talking about his perennials and describing how it’s the same root system, but every year, the flowers die off, they form seeds for the next iteration, they’re nourished from the same root system. But they look different, but you could also see similarities. And I was stopped in my tracks. I thought, “Wow, that is the human task,” right? It’s really to relinquish that which has restrained us. To retain that which is still helpful. And then, to make sure that we’re planting seeds for renewal that still has some continuity with the past. It doesn’t matter what age you are, you may not have the awareness depending upon your human development stage, that that’s what you’re a part of. But that’s something that I think by making – by articulating explicitly we can be reminded, “Oh, we each have a role in this. We have a stake in one another’s success.”
I was delighted to have Natasha Ginnivan join us in episode 289: Aging and Positive Psychology. She helped me really see the importance from a social scientific perspective, why we need to pay attention to our language when it comes around aging. Have a listen:
Sundae: So do you see patterns in attitudes to aging and how people are treated?
Natasha: Yes. I have to say that, unfortunately, ageism and things like elder abuse can occur in collectivist cultures and it’s known from a recent report from the World Health Organization that one in two people have moderate to high ageist attitudes. However, I think that when you have cultures where individuals are sort of raised to be mindful of keeping group harmony with this idea that they probably should show some respect to their elders. I think that informs your thinking as you go up that not only is that a great thing to keep group harmony within the family structures but it’s also for your own sort of psyche around aging and your own future self, you’ll feel better.
Because we know from the research that Professor Becca Levy, and many others in that space do, that as we transition through aging as we get older, if we haven’t had more of these more positive attitudes around aging, when we were younger, our own negative attitudes can actually turn on us as we get older. And that’s one of the things that we sort of are recognizing, now, more and more with the research.
I think what I appreciated most about this series is that by looking at the lens of ageism, we were also able to see how that bias and stereotyping actually are compounded by all the other ways that we stereotype and have bias against people. So if we enter through the access or the lens of ageism, we’re actually able to see the implications of other forms of discrimination even more clearly. So it helps, as if we don’t need more sense of urgency, but it helps see with even greater clarity on the sense of urgency that we have to break down some of the biases that we have. And the structures that are in place that actually harm all of us and harm some of us way more than others. And it’s through that lens of ageism that we can begin to have that conversation.
Okay, so far, I’ve talked about my personal journey, looking at this lens of intergenerational wisdom and ageism, but there’s one topic that was, how should I say this equally, uncomfortable or uncomfortable in a very different way for me. And that happened in episodes 281 and 282. Now, growing up as a kid in the midwest, from a Lutheran family, we talked about the “S word,” And the“S word” is sex.
Honestly, it was kind of a taboo topic in my family and that obviously impacted me growing up in the way in which I felt comfortable talking about sex with my friends and publicly. Even when I say this now, I’m like, “What are you doing, Sundae? Why are you talking to people about this subject?” So I notice the restriction I have grown up with culturally, this taboo I’ve grown up culturally around the topic. So when I invited Irene Fehr onto the podcast to talk about Sex and Connection, it was a huge personal stretch for me and at the same time, it was really liberating. So Irene and I spent two episodes talking about the intersection between Sex and Connection. Here is a listen:
Sundae: So it kind of sounds like you’re talking about connection and vulnerability is a way to go beyond our primal physical needs.
Irene: Absolutely. Absolutely.
Sundae: That like, “I physically haven’t had sex in x amount of time. Now, my body wants to have sex,” versus, “We haven’t had sex in a while, and we need to infuse vulnerability and connection to almost create desire before that physical level is met.” If that makes sense.
Irene: Absolutely. You put it beautifully. It’s the difference between, “I,” and the biological urges and, “We,” as in sex as the connective element in a couple.
And so in friction sex, it’s all based on “I” and “me” and my urges and my desire for my partner. And the “we” part is part of actually the third type of sex which is Connection Sex, which is really the one that’s sustainable and that gets created over time.
And so this is why friction sex and then the next type of sex that I’m about to share, they naturally die out. They naturally have a shelf life that doesn’t make them sustainable.
So episode 281 wasn’t enough, there was too much to talk about. So I invited her back to episode 282, where we talked even more about the connection between emotion, sex and connection. Here’s what she had to say:
Irene: And without that emotional connection that’s going to allow both people to really tune into each other and create something new, like something new that really fits the moment, that physical pleasure is going to go away, or it’s going to be really minimal.
Sundae: Create something new to fit the moment. Create something new to fit the moment. That’s really beautiful. You specialize in long-term relationships. So I’m thinking, that’s a lot to ask for. Create something new to fit the moment, when you’ve been together for 25 years, 30 years. What is it that people need to keep that spirit?
Irene: Well, the first and really biggest thing is to let go of this idea that, you know your partner because you don’t. This old idea that once we do something sexually, that is how we are is really damaging and it’s very limiting to our human potential. Who we were sexually 16 is not who we are at 46 and 66 and 86.
Now, these episodes are among some of my most listened to episodes, and I am because of that, so proud of myself for getting over myself, pushing myself to have this conversation so that you can have this conversation. Either with yourself or with your intimate partner or with your friends, whatever it is to not have it as a taboo. To be able to have this conversation because it impacts our emotional health, it impacts our relationships, it impacts our physical health, right?
So, this is an example of some of the ways I pushed myself in the last 100 episodes so that I could impact you. All right, obviously, this is just a taste of my own personal evolution that happened in the last 100 episodes, but you can see it filtering through the episodes. And they also came through my business.
So here’s a little sneak peek as promised into my Business Evolution. Now, if you have been following my community and my business closely, you might have noticed that at the start of 2022, I did what’s called a Brand Evolution or at least what I’m calling a Brand Evolution. By the way, 2022 feels like, I don’t know, a thousand years ago.
But what happened was, what we were seeing in the original episode of The Space Women Crave I talked about intergenerational learning, we started to see how what I wanted to talk about, and what I really believed in what I was hungry to discuss and bring into the world wasn’t always connected to expat topics. It was connected always to expats because we’re humans and because we’re in transition, right? But I was more interested in the juicy parts of life, rather than the one layer of the multiple layers of our identities. Or one layer of our lived experience. I was no longer comfortable with centering the global mobility aspect of our identity. And at the same time, I always wanted to center what was core to that identity and that was transition. So, you started to see that happen back with that episode, where I wanted more space to talk about juicier things. And then, I was able to do the business evolution to bring my brand and naming in alignment with that to give me more space to talk to you about more.
So I was able to take what I was already talking to my clients about, our lives IN TRANSIT. Our ambitious goals. How our lives are always in transformation, whether it’s internally-led or externally-led, or performance-led. That was always happening in my business with my clients. I just hadn’t made it transparent to you yet, to everyone yet, right? And I did this episode where I gave kind of an inside scoop on that process in an interview with Amel Derragui from Tandem Nomads. So I’ll put that in the show notes if you’re interested to get a behind-the-scenes view.
So what was going on for me in the beginning of 2022 was sharing with you my own ambitious transformation, and life and business in transition. And then helping you see how that was happening in your own life. So part of that was happening at the beginning of the year, you noticed my branding change. Some of the namings were changing. The podcast name changed. And it felt so right to do so. Even though I have to be honest, I was scared to do so. I didn’t want to lose you. I didn’t want to disappoint you. I didn’t want to make you mad by changing something that you were attached to. And I realized it was actually the opposite that people appreciated it and they felt more space for themselves as well and even more seen.
So anyway, thank you again for being so kind and generous in that transition for myself and my business. So in episode 266, we talked about The Constant Transition and here is where I’m different from other transition specialists. Most of the time when you hear literature in the global mobility space, they talk about transition and there is a beginning, a middle, and an end. And what I really want to say is, I call bullshit on that. Sorry, that’s my really frank way of saying that. That is not how that works. I wish it were that tidy. Transitions are messier than that. Our lives are not linear. Our emotions are not linear. We have too many layers of our lives and their identity in the complexity of things that we are managing for it to be a plus b equals c. And so I took a stand in that and that’s where we talk about transition, the constant transition. And now when I introduce this framework to my clients, they’re able to give themselves more grace for how they feel in their own transition and their own ambitious transformation. Because they are able to see the complexity, to see the multi-layers that are happening.
So if you haven’t heard the full episode, go to it 266, The Constant Transition. And here is a little taste:
The only constant is change. We know that, but do we accept it in our whole hearts and bodies? Are you radically committed to living your life IN TRANSIT with purpose and meaning? Living our lives IN TRANSIT with purpose and meaning is dropping that filter and looking at it and saying, “Okay. Now what? Where’s my agency? What can I do?” It’s recognizing that transitions are happening, always. And it feels like they’re coming from within us or happening to us. Right? And sometimes these changes are welcome and sometimes they’re dreaded, I hear that and it’s hard. Sometimes our lives are in transition because we self-initiated it. And sometimes it’s imposed by others. And you can feel powerless. Sometimes it feels right and other times, it might be met with resistance from yourself or from your loved ones or your community members.
That is what I’m talking about in this living IN TRANSIT. How do we live IN TRANSIT and both hold on to our agency and personal power and recognize the power these personal, familial, health, community, and global transitions have on us, all the same time?
As you can see, the episode is all about really tapping into your own personal power, when you feel like everything else is changing. Go ahead and check out the other episodes that were in that series because we talked about defining ambitious on your own terms and three levels of transformation that are happening to you. Whether it’s internally-led or externally-led, or performance-led. Sometimes it’s all three at the same time. So check that out. If you haven’t read it or listened to it, we have transcripts available. We have the audio and we have now video since August 2022. So check it out.
Now, as I said my own life and business has been IN TRANSIT since 2016, right? And one of the things and one of the ways in which it has been in transformation, is that I have increasingly amplified my commitment in showing up more responsibly as a business owner. And in doing my own work, as it relates to social justice. And I say it forefront, fallibly, imperfectly, and consistently but continuing to commit and recommit to the work. And Trudi LeBron has been such a powerful mentor to me on that front along with a host of another– a whole list of other amazing thought leaders in the field. But she has been someone who’s been by my side and she articulates something in this episode, which I’ll listen to, that I originally learned also from Naomi Hattaway when she came on the podcast and we talked about Linking Arms. About, how can we be more intentional in the spaces we create.
And because of that, that impacted what I talked about before with my community of Wisdom Fusion, it impacts how I do my work now. In fact, what it’s done, It has slowed things down on some levels to create depth and richness so that later we can work together more adeptly.
So you’ll hear an episode, 293: Responsible Leadership with Trudi LeBron, a little bit more about that intentionality and why that matters?
Trudi: And that is the case I think across the board. When you start to think about building a company, a business, an institution, whatever size, even a non-profit, really anything that gathers people. When you start thinking about how people will engage in the space and what you’re going to need to provide so that they have equitable access that they can fully participate, it makes the experience better for everyone because everyone now can be contributing at a capacity that they wouldn’t be able to contribute if you had these like inequities. And I think that that’s you know, when we look at any of the data around companies that are diverse that have better outcomes and better problem solving with it. There’s all this research around the benefits of it. What is true is that you get that – you only get those kinds of benefits when the environment isn’t just diverse but that is equitable, right? It’s not just that people showed up. It’s that people are contributing. And so if you don’t have an environment or if you only have an environment where people get to show up, but they can’t contribute you don’t get any of the benefits of having that diverse equitable space.
So you can see in that episode, we talked about the intentions, and how having clear intentions to create that space actually leads to more equitable treatment and results, right? The next idea about intentionality comes out clearly in the episode 297 with Naomi Hattaway where she’s back on the podcast, and she helped me shift my focus on the idea of legacy. Where we take the idea of legacy as something that we leave behind. She actually says, “It’s something you can set as an intention to carve the path forward.” And that is something that has shifted how I see myself, the impact I’ll leave with my work, my business, and as an individual. So here it is with Naomi Hattaway Legacy by Design episode 297:
Naomi: If we flip the switch and toggle forward-thinking instead of only in the back, that lets us lay out this beautiful runway of, “What do you want your legacy to be? How do you want it to align to your values?” And then you can pull in whatever you’re working on. A project. A team you’re working with. Whether it’s an individual journey. Whether it’s even as simple as preparing for your own death, which is something we all have to face. You can then lean into your values and lean into a way that really does create that legacy.
So a lot of times we also think about the red thread of our life and looking back, what are the things that stay true as we navigate different things and navigate different projects and experiences. And we always look back and say, “Well, that’s the red thread.”
All right, there you have it. I feel like I’ve just bared my soul to you about my own personal and professional journey in the last 100 of these 300 episodes. I do that because I want you to see the transformation, the transitions that have been happening in my own life. And how that manifests in what I share with you, right? I think it’s important that we make transparent our own journeys so when you’re on yours that it is normalized and you can see why it is worth it. Why is the work worth it? Because none of this I’ve shared with you has been easy. None of it has come naturally. It has come from within but it has come with some attachment to letting go of old patterns and letting in new patterns. And that is what I’m all about for you, right? I want to make an impact on you. And that’s what all of this is always been about. And that’s actually why I started this podcast to impact more of you.
So in the last bit of this episode, I want to share with you a few episodes from the recent 100 that have impacted my clients or have shown the impact that engaging in these kind of ideas and coaching etc. can have on your own life. In episode 218 was kind of a spontaneous thing that happened. One day, I went into my community, the IN TRANSIT Hub, It’s a free Facebook community that I have. And I said, “Hey, anybody want some free coaching? I’m going to offer that to you and in exchange, we’ll edit it, make it short, and put it into a podcast.” And I got an answer from someone in the community, who is a regular member. She said, “Sundae, I am feeling so stuck. I don’t think this will help but I’m willing to give it a try.” And here’s a glimpse of the big shift that happened in our mini session. It’s called: From Stuck to Sorted in 22 Minutes:
Sundae: So if you’re standing there at the road, how tight are the bungee cords right now?
Sharryn: They’re loose at the moment because I’m not moving anywhere. I’m sort of just stood there. Yeah, they’re okay because I’m making that decision of which way do I go. I don’t even know what the right bungee cord is. I don’t know what that one is. I know the left one is moving towards my dream and I know straight on is staying where I am now, on the path that I am now. But I don’t know what the right one is. I don’t know what that one is.
Sundae: Why don’t you pause for a second? Just get quiet and listen for what that might be.
Sharryn: I think it’s fear. I just think it’s fear. I don’t think it is a destination. I think it’s just fear.
Sundae: Sharryn I have chills up my arms right now.
Sharryn: I have tears in my eyes right now.
Sundae: You are amazing. Look at how hard you’re working and how clear you are being with yourself and where you are in this process.
So you can see, chills up your arms, tears in the eyes, it was a powerful 22 minutes, and she was able to experience that because she said, “Yes,” to herself. She said, “Yes,” to the experiment of seeing what would happen if she focused on her needs for 22 minutes. And at the end of our session, this is what she said:
Sharryn: I’m so grateful. Thank you for 20, 21 minutes and 18 seconds of your time. And you have unblocked like this whole- when I jokingly put that comment on your Facebook page, I was like, “Ah, she’s not going to do anything about it and nobody can do anything about it. It’s just going to have to fester for a while.” I didn’t for one minute think I would get this opportunity to sit with you and talk with you. And yeah, 21 minutes of your time and I know what I have to do.
So I hope what you’re seeing from that episode is that it is possible to be sitting in a place of blocked and in less than 20 minutes, you can gain clarity and know what to do next, right? So it’s all about impact and this is an example of how impact can happen in a very short amount of time. It doesn’t have to take long, it doesn’t even have to be hard. So speaking of impact, here is an episode that I hear consistently from my clients and from my listeners that has shifted their perspective. And that is why I wanted to include it here in our special episode today. It’s about knowing the difference between whether you need rest or recovery, and that is from episode 269: Rest vs Recovery. Have a listen:
So, this is an invitation to just think about your own life:
- Are you resting on the weekends or is what you’re doing really recovering? I talked to someone and they said that they feel bad when they go back to work on Monday because they spend their whole weekend doing nothing. And the point they’re doing nothing on the weekend is because they’re so exhausted from the week that they don’t have the energy to do anything else. So that’s recovery and not rest, right? So if that’s you, if what you’re doing is recovering, rather than resting what needs to change during the week so what you’re doing is just putting a pause on your responsibilities.
- Or if you are in a situation where recovery is the next step, are you just telling yourself that rest is enough? Or are you actively building in time and space for the process of healing?
- When you have something positive like I’ve shared here that you’re really were thankful you get to do, have you taken the right steps to proactively plan in time for clean up? Clean up after you’ve invested that extra time and energy in something?
My hunch is that many of you can see yourselves in these scenarios because I’m seeing it all over me and I’m seeing it myself.
So I hope you pause and answer those questions for yourself. And if you’re not sure whether you’re in recovery mode or need rest, chances are you probably are in recovery mode and need to do a bit more so definitely check it out.
All right, so I’ve shared a few ways in which clients have been impacted either through coaching or through an episode. And now, I want to focus a little bit less on the personal side and more on the business side. And one of the episodes I want to draw your attention to is episode 278 called The Biology of Business. Here, I share what I call the head-to-toe exploration of your business and this is exactly what I teach inside the program Global Coach Coalition. I give you the categories and the key questions you need to be asking in your business from head to toe. Now, the thing is, I used this in my own business when I was going through my brand evolution, I went back to my own material, and I asked myself these critical questions. Listen, in, on this question that could change everything:
This is a framework for you to do a deep dive in your business right now and see what areas need more attention and where you’re doing just fine.
- Head of your Business. The head of your business is; get in your head and ask the question, “Why?” What’s your big why?” Whether you’re at the very start of your business, you ask yourself, “Why do I want to do this? What am I doing this for?” But if you’re in the middle of your business, you have to ask yourself, “Hey, this is hard. Why is this all worth it?”
So, there you go. Start with the head of your business. Ask yourself what is your “Why?” And if you’ve been in business for a while, it is so important, to revisit this question because you’re “Why?” changes? Now I’m hitting my 10th business anniversary in June this year, and my “Why?” has changed dramatically at least three times. And returning to your “Why?” will help you keep the alignment between what’s going on for you personally, and what’s going on outside of you in your context, as well as what you want to be seeing in your business. So definitely ask yourself that question, if you haven’t already. This is what I use with my clients inside Global Coach Coalition and we start with our “Why?”
But then we go through all the other parts we talk about the face of our business, the heart of our business, the skeleton of our business and more because if one thing in your system, let’s say in your body is impacted negatively, everything else is connected. And that is why it’s important for you to do a head-to-toe analysis in your business, every once in a while, to make sure that things are on track because if you don’t, you might be putting your attention in the wrong area of your business. And then you’re going to lose time, money, and energy and joy in your business. So go ahead and check it out, if you haven’t already episode 278: The Biology of Your Business.
All right, there you have it. I hope you’ve seen that this podcast started six years ago, 300 episodes ago, because I am so committed to impact. The impact on you and your lives, in the way that you think, the way that you engage with your loved ones, the way that you show up for your business, the way that you experience your own transitions.
And I have been committed to sharing the straight talk on our lives, IN TRANSIT since the beginning. So thank you for being here. I have much more ahead. I’ll tell you a little bit more. We are episode 300, and there are a few things that I know for sure, and a few things that I’m kind of in the messy middle of transition. All right. So going to be really honest with you about that. Here are a few things that I know for sure.
- I am so excited that the program that I created in 2016 called Adapt and Succeed Abroad and has been tested and tried for many people from all the world as giving them tools to make their transitions easier and help their connections be deeper and to help find more purpose. I have redesigned it. Added a new material up branded it just basically made it even better for you. This was a labor of love that started in June and July 2022 and is now ready for you to check out. So I know for sure that this year, the impact that I want to be making in the world will be through sharing insight, like I have, in my podcast all this time, but in a much deeper way through my online program. It’s really bite-sized learning, but we go deeper in a kind of self-coaching guide and you have the community of Global Coach Coalition coaches at your fingertips.
If you want to go further and help someone be by your side along the way, besides me in teaching you the steps and strategies that have been tested in my global community. So check out Adapt and Succeed if you haven’t already. It is the absolute fastest, most affordable way you can work with me. And it’s immediate. You don’t have to make any appointments online. You don’t just show up on Zoom. It’s instantaneous, and it’s deep, it’s fun, it’s intimate, it’s playful, it’s professional all of it, right? So check it out, Adapt and Succeed. It is for anyone whose life is in transition, which means, it’s for everyone. So check it out.
- And if you are a coach and you want to serve people in transition, you are working with the globally mobile community, whatever that looks like for you. Check out my program, Global Coach Coalition. I haven’t talked about it much, but I do want to let you in on a little secret that I will be opening the doors for Global Coach Coalition, starting March 2023. I do not know if I will offer it again in 2023. So this is absolutely the time, check it out, Global Coach Coalition, go online, apply if it resonates with you, and then we can connect and have a look.
That is what I know for sure. That’s where my energy is for sure in 2023. There are some other things that are going on, that feel like the messy middle and I’m kind of excited because I don’t know what’s next. I did have a hint of that in preparing for this episode, that all of the wisdom I gained from my Wisdom Fusion Project, I’m sitting on, like a treasure chest. Honestly, I have hundreds and hundreds of pages of notes and wisdom gained from that experience, I haven’t shared with you yet. So that’s on my mind.
Lots of other things are in transition for me personally, and professionally. And I love it because I can’t wait to see what’s on the other side. Just like I couldn’t see what was on the other side when I started this in 2016-2017, I’m so grateful for where I am now, I couldn’t have seen it then and that’s how I feel about what’s ahead.
So thank you for being with me in this journey and I look forward to doing the next steps together. I’ve appreciated you, each and every episode. So I’m going to leave you with the words of Nelson Mandela. He says, “Remember to celebrate milestones, as you prepare for the road ahead.” I thank you for listening to IN TRANSIT with me, Sundae Bean. Thank you for celebrating this milestone with me and I look forward to the road ahead.
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218 episodes
Manage episode 352638965 series 2427769
Last year’s Sex & Connection two-part series with Irene Fehr broke the internet. Ok, not in a Taylor-Swift-tickets-go-on-sale way but calibrated against my podcast stats. (And IN TRANSIT ranks top 5% globally, so it’s no slouch. Have I thanked you for listening yet? Keep reading because I will.)
It’s no wonder the Sex & Connection duo were some of the most downloaded episodes of the past 100. A hot topic with taboo remnants, the series overflowed with superb expert advice for improved intimacy in long-term relationships.
Now, what you don’t realize was the discomfort I had to overcome to spotlight such subject matter on the show. Sex was something that didn’t get talked about during my conservative upbringing. So to go from that background to discussing it openly with the world forced me to stretch.
We’re continuing our Reflections Bean Pod by celebrating the podcast’s 300th episode and its sixth birthday. And with 2023 fresh as a daisy, I can now spy with my little eye my 10th business anniversary on the horizon, making this a perfect time to look back and ahead.
I’ll reveal some never-before-shared insights from my personal and professional journeys and give you a glimpse into what’s next. Thank you for being here. I have so much to be grateful for, and I’m convinced it’s all because of you.
What You’ll Learn in this Episode:
- Side effects of strolling around New York City
- Friendships that resemble flowers in a garden
- Sitting on a newly gained treasure chest of wisdom
- Why reverse ageism doesn’t exist
- You learn how to do it by doing
Listen to the Full Episode:
Featured on the Show:
Transformation, of any size, takes courage. You bring the ambition, and I’ll bring the support. Reintroducing Adapt & Succeed. Revamped and ready to get you through any life transition.
- Sundae’s Website
- Sundae’s Facebook Business Page – Sundae Schneider-Bean LLC
- Sundae Bean – YouTube
- Adapt and Succeed
- Wisdom Fusion: Ageism and Womanhood Collide Highlight Reel
- Trudi LeBron
- Amel Derragui
- Naomi Hattaway
- Ashton Applewhite: This Chair Rocks
- Wisdom Fusion
- 35 Best Expat Podcasts
- IN TRANSIT Hub
- Global Coach Coalition
Catch These Podcasts / Articles:
- EP123:Change Shame
- EP03: Celebrate You
- First Four Episodes
- EP100: Behind The Scenes – 100 Episodes of Expat Happy Hour
- EP200: Consistency Commitment
- EP226: The Space Women Crave
- EP287: Dismantling Ageism with Ashton Applewhite
- EP288: The Intergenerational Garden with Rabbi Hayim Herring
- EP289: Aging and Positive Psychology with Natasha Ginnivan
- EP281: Sex & Connection – Pt 1 with Irene Fehr
- EP282: Sex & Connection – Pt 2 with Irene Fehr
- EP226: The Space Women Crave
- EP266: The Constant Transition
- EP293: Responsible Leadership with Trudi LeBron
- EP297: Legacy by Design with Naomi Hattaway
- EP218: From Stuck to Sorted in 22 Minutes
- EP269: Rest vs Recovery
- EP278 called The Biology of Business
- Tap Into Intergenerational Wisdom At Work
We’re delighted to be in the Top 5 of the global Best 30 Expat Podcasts!
Full Episode Transcript:
Hello, it is and welcome to a very special episode of IN TRANSIT with Sundae Bean, we are recording from New York City in honor of our 300th episode and marking the sixth year of the podcast. It is 1 p.m in New York, 8 p.m in Johannesburg, and 1 a.m in Bangkok. Welcome to IN TRANSIT with Sundae Bean. I am an intercultural strategist, transformation facilitator, and solution-oriented coach, and I am on a mission to help you adapt & succeed through ANY life transition.
Thank you from the bottom of my heart for joining me in celebrating this 300th episode. Today is a huge milestone in my life and in the life of this podcast and of course, for my business and I hope as a community. And this is why I’m even more excited that I am recording this live from New York City because as I’ll tell you in a moment, New York holds a special significance to the podcast. And just a warning, I flew in last night, I’m a little bit jet-lagged and my heart is wide open so I hope not to get too mushy in this episode but you’ve been fairly warned.
I am humbled that you are still with me, 300 episodes in. It’s been an incredible journey and to celebrate that I wanted to give you a sneak peek on how it all got started. And then highlight the last most recent 100 episodes in three ways:
- First, a sneak peek into some of the personal evolution that was going on in my own world. How that impacted how you saw that come through in the podcast.
- Then also from a business perspective, what seeps through.
- And then of course, I want to talk about the impact on my clients and my listeners. Which episodes sort of hint to that.
And then maybe a little bit about what’s next.
So here we go. I’ve been thinking about this all morning. This morning, I woke up, I got a great night’s sleep, considering the fact that I’m on a six hour time difference and I walked around the city. I saw Rockefeller Center, I saw Times Square. I went to Central Park, I went to Grand Central Station and it just lifted my spirits. I’ve made a few special episodes around the city or a few videos for you around the city to sort of honor and celebrate this event. So if you haven’t seen them on social media, do check them out because New York is a little bit of a birthplace of the podcast and I’ll tell you a little bit about how that came.
Now in 2016, I was working with a media team, a media agent to help get my message out there more. I’m all about impact and we were looking at ways that I can create more impact for those that I want to serve the most. And one of the things that we did is we distilled the years and years, and years of learning. And strategies have been coming up in my coaching for my community into a program called Adapt and Succeed. And that’s how we got to get to know each other and work together. And I came to New York City. I recorded the podcast, and we had a wonderful time together.
He was very, very direct with me. And when I got back, he said, “Listen Sundae. I know, you’re ambitious, I know that you want to make an impact, but if you want to make an impact, you have to stop blogging. ”He goes, “I’ve seen you. I’ve met you. People need to experience you.” He said, “You need to stop blogging and start a podcast. If you want to make an impact, that’s how you’re going to do it.”
So here I am, I don’t even listen to podcasts. I hate the sound of my voice and he’s telling me I should start a podcast, right? So he convinced me because I am super committed to this idea of making an impact. I knew I would be able to reach more people if I did that. And for me, this is so personal, your journey is personal. My journey is personal and writing, while a really effective medium, isn’t always the best way to convey that.
So, in around November, December 2016, I recorded the first episodes of the podcast. And at that time, it was called Expat Happy Hour. And we released them January 30th, 2017. So if you haven’t checked them out, do not check them out, they’re awful. I mean, they’re good content, but what I listen to the quality of my recordings, I listen to what I was doing then. Oh my God, I was such a beginner. But, you know what? I sucked at it. I did, but I’m proud of myself because I learned how to do it by doing it. I didn’t wait until I was good to start. I started and I grew. And this is what I teach my clients all the time, right? So when I look back at episodes 1, 2, 3 4 probably very early, the first couple dozen there’s like “Change Shame” where I have a podcast episode on this, will have to link it for you.
But where I have a little bit of shame around how much I’ve changed. I’m proud of how I’ve developed but I’m shamey around where I used to be. And I’m grateful those episodes are still alive because I can honor my growth. And I did this challenge inside my free community, the IN TRANSIT Hub. And I shared one of the old episodes. I think, like, episode 3 about celebrating, and it’s still really relevant content wise and one of the members of my community said she noticed a dramatic difference from those early episodes to my new episodes.
And she said, not as a criticism of how bad. The first episode was, it was a compliment of the growth. And so I’m keeping it out there, honestly, God, my stomach turns when I think about it. But if you’ve been here since 2017, thank you for sticking with me. And if you want to celebrate the journey of building competence, just listen to the earlier episodes and then listen to the ones now. Like, that’s what growth is, it doesn’t happen by itself. You don’t achieve mastery by hiding, you put your skin in the game and you go for it. Anyway, that’s a little rant, but it’s relevant to the journey.
So back in January. 2017. We had four episodes that went live so that when people were interested, they could listen to more than one. We had some amazing guests early on in the show, and I thank them for their support before I even had an audience. And then I just went for it. Every week, putting out episodes, and here we are 300 episodes later. I had no idea then that I would be recognized on lists, “Top XYZ podcast.” That I was able to look at the tracking and find out that my podcast was consistently in the top 5% globally. Like, what the heck? So this is only happening because of you. And thank you for your trust in my messages, in my guests, in my ideas, and everything I do is centered on what I’m learning in my life and my community, and with my clients.
So, thank you for being part of that. Today as I said, I’m going to focus on three things, my personal evolution in the last hundred episodes what’s been going on and how that is trickled through into the episodes. Then we’ll focus on a bit about my business and then talk about some of the clients impacts that hopefully can help you as well. If you haven’t heard those episodes.
So the last hundred episodes, I’ve done a reflection, in episode 100, I had some amazing friends and clients celebrate with me and they made this gorgeous video. I will have to dig that up again, and they celebrated 100 episodes. 200 episodes in, I talked about the Consistency Commitment, about being consistent. We had 200 episodes week-after-week without a break and had lots of challenges in the meantime and why that’s important for your business.
And now in this one, 300, I think it’s important to highlight how we bring our own Ambitious Transformation, our own life in Transition, how that becomes transparent in everything that we do, and how it can enrich everything that we do. But it is a process of having to be courageous to make it happen.
So, what probably you saw happening before it became official is I was already going through a personal transformation and a business transformation. But my branding and the naming and everything hadn’t happened yet.
This was back in May 2021, I did an episode 226 called The Space Women Crave and this was so vulnerable for me. It felt almost like I don’t want to appropriate the term “coming out,” but it felt like this revealing of something inside on the outside. And it was very close to my heart. I felt it very deeply and I hadn’t yet shared it with the world. And The Space Women Crave ended up being my battle cry for what would be Wisdom Fusion and intergenerational learning.
So here is something that I was going through personally and was inspired by a series of conversations with women that I care about and created a manifesto. Here’s a little sample:
I BELIEVE.
I believe that each woman has wisdom inside of her that is hard-earned, wisdom and experience that is underestimated, at best, undervalued at worst.
I believe that this wisdom may be buried under layers of shame, humility or self-doubt, and thus has not yet seen the light of day nor reached the capacity to fully touch other women’s lives.
I believe that each woman has hard-earned life experience, and if shared, the resulting wisdom from this collected insight could benefit another woman to overcome similar challenges.
I believe that keeping women separate from one another is keeping her away from an important part of herself.
I believe that there is commonality in our struggles and that there is value in sharing how those who have gone before us have faced them.
I believe that there are stark differences in our experiences and by sharing them we gain a more complex picture of ourselves and the myriad of ways one can be a woman.
I believe that when women come together in trust, humility and mutual respect that deep and meaningful collective wisdom can emerge.
So there you go, me baring my soul on what I believe. And as I said this became a battle cry or an invitation to explore intergenerational wisdom. It resulted in a community of women aged 20 to 70, plus. We spent eight weeks together having deep conversations, learning, and connecting. And there’s still so much more than I realized I haven’t shared about this experience. And when I was preparing for this episode, I realized I’m basically sitting on a treasure chest of wisdom that I gained during that special year together. We started out eight weeks and then we can continued to connect over the year and are still connected. And it made me think: maybe that’s something I should do in 2023? I will share that more with you but it has been powerful.
If you haven’t read the entire manifesto check out the Wisdom Fusion link.
It also led to an article being published in Forbes on the topic and lifetime friendships. It also was the springboard for me to get connected to other topics, which I’ll share more about with you, and then learn and get to know experts in the field. So from something that was so deeply personal And I took that space in my heart and in my business and I’m grateful for that.
So what led to that is beyond all the things I’ve mentioned before was a much deeper awareness around, not only the reason why intergenerational learning is so important for all of us but also a greater awareness of the importance of battling ageism. So I was able to get to know a group of experts who are making massive contributions in the field, in terms of intergenerational learning, dismantling ageism, focusing on more positive psychology around ageism to extend our life. And that is all because of my own personal journey and I was able to share that with you. And I’m so excited to share their wisdom, the guests that joined me with you as well.
So just briefly if you haven’t checked out those episodes, please go back to episode 287 Dismantling Ageism with Ashton Applewhite. She is a UN award-winning author of the book: This Chair Rocks. She has many, many other accolades to her name and her expertise is really top class. Here’s a little bit of what she had to say about ageism.
Sundae: You talk about how ageism casts a shadow over our entire lives. Can you say more about the scope of that?
Ashton: Ageism is any judgment on the basis of age. Anytime we make an assessment of what we think someone is capable of because of how old we think they are. Sometimes it’s called reverse ageism when it’s directed against young people, but it’s just ageism. We don’t need that extra label. And that is why it casts a shadow across our entire lives. Although we live in a youth-obsessed culture in the west we are youth is commodified. So I will say that older people bear the brunt of it.
Ashton was so amazing. She and I were able to connect later and we did a special feature inside my community, the IN TRANSIT Hub on The Intersections of Ageism and Sexism. So if you haven’t checked that out, then join us in the IN TRANSIT community Hub, and will make sure that you have access to that.
In episode 288, The Intergenerational Garden with Rabbi Hayim Herring, we did so much laughing and heart-to-heart talking about the importance of intergenerational learning. And what we can do to nurture our friendships and nurture intergenerational connection and why it is so important. So here’s a little bit from that interview:
Hayim Herring: But some friends of mine, good friends are gardeners. One day a friend of mine was talking about his perennials and describing how it’s the same root system, but every year, the flowers die off, they form seeds for the next iteration, they’re nourished from the same root system. But they look different, but you could also see similarities. And I was stopped in my tracks. I thought, “Wow, that is the human task,” right? It’s really to relinquish that which has restrained us. To retain that which is still helpful. And then, to make sure that we’re planting seeds for renewal that still has some continuity with the past. It doesn’t matter what age you are, you may not have the awareness depending upon your human development stage, that that’s what you’re a part of. But that’s something that I think by making – by articulating explicitly we can be reminded, “Oh, we each have a role in this. We have a stake in one another’s success.”
I was delighted to have Natasha Ginnivan join us in episode 289: Aging and Positive Psychology. She helped me really see the importance from a social scientific perspective, why we need to pay attention to our language when it comes around aging. Have a listen:
Sundae: So do you see patterns in attitudes to aging and how people are treated?
Natasha: Yes. I have to say that, unfortunately, ageism and things like elder abuse can occur in collectivist cultures and it’s known from a recent report from the World Health Organization that one in two people have moderate to high ageist attitudes. However, I think that when you have cultures where individuals are sort of raised to be mindful of keeping group harmony with this idea that they probably should show some respect to their elders. I think that informs your thinking as you go up that not only is that a great thing to keep group harmony within the family structures but it’s also for your own sort of psyche around aging and your own future self, you’ll feel better.
Because we know from the research that Professor Becca Levy, and many others in that space do, that as we transition through aging as we get older, if we haven’t had more of these more positive attitudes around aging, when we were younger, our own negative attitudes can actually turn on us as we get older. And that’s one of the things that we sort of are recognizing, now, more and more with the research.
I think what I appreciated most about this series is that by looking at the lens of ageism, we were also able to see how that bias and stereotyping actually are compounded by all the other ways that we stereotype and have bias against people. So if we enter through the access or the lens of ageism, we’re actually able to see the implications of other forms of discrimination even more clearly. So it helps, as if we don’t need more sense of urgency, but it helps see with even greater clarity on the sense of urgency that we have to break down some of the biases that we have. And the structures that are in place that actually harm all of us and harm some of us way more than others. And it’s through that lens of ageism that we can begin to have that conversation.
Okay, so far, I’ve talked about my personal journey, looking at this lens of intergenerational wisdom and ageism, but there’s one topic that was, how should I say this equally, uncomfortable or uncomfortable in a very different way for me. And that happened in episodes 281 and 282. Now, growing up as a kid in the midwest, from a Lutheran family, we talked about the “S word,” And the“S word” is sex.
Honestly, it was kind of a taboo topic in my family and that obviously impacted me growing up in the way in which I felt comfortable talking about sex with my friends and publicly. Even when I say this now, I’m like, “What are you doing, Sundae? Why are you talking to people about this subject?” So I notice the restriction I have grown up with culturally, this taboo I’ve grown up culturally around the topic. So when I invited Irene Fehr onto the podcast to talk about Sex and Connection, it was a huge personal stretch for me and at the same time, it was really liberating. So Irene and I spent two episodes talking about the intersection between Sex and Connection. Here is a listen:
Sundae: So it kind of sounds like you’re talking about connection and vulnerability is a way to go beyond our primal physical needs.
Irene: Absolutely. Absolutely.
Sundae: That like, “I physically haven’t had sex in x amount of time. Now, my body wants to have sex,” versus, “We haven’t had sex in a while, and we need to infuse vulnerability and connection to almost create desire before that physical level is met.” If that makes sense.
Irene: Absolutely. You put it beautifully. It’s the difference between, “I,” and the biological urges and, “We,” as in sex as the connective element in a couple.
And so in friction sex, it’s all based on “I” and “me” and my urges and my desire for my partner. And the “we” part is part of actually the third type of sex which is Connection Sex, which is really the one that’s sustainable and that gets created over time.
And so this is why friction sex and then the next type of sex that I’m about to share, they naturally die out. They naturally have a shelf life that doesn’t make them sustainable.
So episode 281 wasn’t enough, there was too much to talk about. So I invited her back to episode 282, where we talked even more about the connection between emotion, sex and connection. Here’s what she had to say:
Irene: And without that emotional connection that’s going to allow both people to really tune into each other and create something new, like something new that really fits the moment, that physical pleasure is going to go away, or it’s going to be really minimal.
Sundae: Create something new to fit the moment. Create something new to fit the moment. That’s really beautiful. You specialize in long-term relationships. So I’m thinking, that’s a lot to ask for. Create something new to fit the moment, when you’ve been together for 25 years, 30 years. What is it that people need to keep that spirit?
Irene: Well, the first and really biggest thing is to let go of this idea that, you know your partner because you don’t. This old idea that once we do something sexually, that is how we are is really damaging and it’s very limiting to our human potential. Who we were sexually 16 is not who we are at 46 and 66 and 86.
Now, these episodes are among some of my most listened to episodes, and I am because of that, so proud of myself for getting over myself, pushing myself to have this conversation so that you can have this conversation. Either with yourself or with your intimate partner or with your friends, whatever it is to not have it as a taboo. To be able to have this conversation because it impacts our emotional health, it impacts our relationships, it impacts our physical health, right?
So, this is an example of some of the ways I pushed myself in the last 100 episodes so that I could impact you. All right, obviously, this is just a taste of my own personal evolution that happened in the last 100 episodes, but you can see it filtering through the episodes. And they also came through my business.
So here’s a little sneak peek as promised into my Business Evolution. Now, if you have been following my community and my business closely, you might have noticed that at the start of 2022, I did what’s called a Brand Evolution or at least what I’m calling a Brand Evolution. By the way, 2022 feels like, I don’t know, a thousand years ago.
But what happened was, what we were seeing in the original episode of The Space Women Crave I talked about intergenerational learning, we started to see how what I wanted to talk about, and what I really believed in what I was hungry to discuss and bring into the world wasn’t always connected to expat topics. It was connected always to expats because we’re humans and because we’re in transition, right? But I was more interested in the juicy parts of life, rather than the one layer of the multiple layers of our identities. Or one layer of our lived experience. I was no longer comfortable with centering the global mobility aspect of our identity. And at the same time, I always wanted to center what was core to that identity and that was transition. So, you started to see that happen back with that episode, where I wanted more space to talk about juicier things. And then, I was able to do the business evolution to bring my brand and naming in alignment with that to give me more space to talk to you about more.
So I was able to take what I was already talking to my clients about, our lives IN TRANSIT. Our ambitious goals. How our lives are always in transformation, whether it’s internally-led or externally-led, or performance-led. That was always happening in my business with my clients. I just hadn’t made it transparent to you yet, to everyone yet, right? And I did this episode where I gave kind of an inside scoop on that process in an interview with Amel Derragui from Tandem Nomads. So I’ll put that in the show notes if you’re interested to get a behind-the-scenes view.
So what was going on for me in the beginning of 2022 was sharing with you my own ambitious transformation, and life and business in transition. And then helping you see how that was happening in your own life. So part of that was happening at the beginning of the year, you noticed my branding change. Some of the namings were changing. The podcast name changed. And it felt so right to do so. Even though I have to be honest, I was scared to do so. I didn’t want to lose you. I didn’t want to disappoint you. I didn’t want to make you mad by changing something that you were attached to. And I realized it was actually the opposite that people appreciated it and they felt more space for themselves as well and even more seen.
So anyway, thank you again for being so kind and generous in that transition for myself and my business. So in episode 266, we talked about The Constant Transition and here is where I’m different from other transition specialists. Most of the time when you hear literature in the global mobility space, they talk about transition and there is a beginning, a middle, and an end. And what I really want to say is, I call bullshit on that. Sorry, that’s my really frank way of saying that. That is not how that works. I wish it were that tidy. Transitions are messier than that. Our lives are not linear. Our emotions are not linear. We have too many layers of our lives and their identity in the complexity of things that we are managing for it to be a plus b equals c. And so I took a stand in that and that’s where we talk about transition, the constant transition. And now when I introduce this framework to my clients, they’re able to give themselves more grace for how they feel in their own transition and their own ambitious transformation. Because they are able to see the complexity, to see the multi-layers that are happening.
So if you haven’t heard the full episode, go to it 266, The Constant Transition. And here is a little taste:
The only constant is change. We know that, but do we accept it in our whole hearts and bodies? Are you radically committed to living your life IN TRANSIT with purpose and meaning? Living our lives IN TRANSIT with purpose and meaning is dropping that filter and looking at it and saying, “Okay. Now what? Where’s my agency? What can I do?” It’s recognizing that transitions are happening, always. And it feels like they’re coming from within us or happening to us. Right? And sometimes these changes are welcome and sometimes they’re dreaded, I hear that and it’s hard. Sometimes our lives are in transition because we self-initiated it. And sometimes it’s imposed by others. And you can feel powerless. Sometimes it feels right and other times, it might be met with resistance from yourself or from your loved ones or your community members.
That is what I’m talking about in this living IN TRANSIT. How do we live IN TRANSIT and both hold on to our agency and personal power and recognize the power these personal, familial, health, community, and global transitions have on us, all the same time?
As you can see, the episode is all about really tapping into your own personal power, when you feel like everything else is changing. Go ahead and check out the other episodes that were in that series because we talked about defining ambitious on your own terms and three levels of transformation that are happening to you. Whether it’s internally-led or externally-led, or performance-led. Sometimes it’s all three at the same time. So check that out. If you haven’t read it or listened to it, we have transcripts available. We have the audio and we have now video since August 2022. So check it out.
Now, as I said my own life and business has been IN TRANSIT since 2016, right? And one of the things and one of the ways in which it has been in transformation, is that I have increasingly amplified my commitment in showing up more responsibly as a business owner. And in doing my own work, as it relates to social justice. And I say it forefront, fallibly, imperfectly, and consistently but continuing to commit and recommit to the work. And Trudi LeBron has been such a powerful mentor to me on that front along with a host of another– a whole list of other amazing thought leaders in the field. But she has been someone who’s been by my side and she articulates something in this episode, which I’ll listen to, that I originally learned also from Naomi Hattaway when she came on the podcast and we talked about Linking Arms. About, how can we be more intentional in the spaces we create.
And because of that, that impacted what I talked about before with my community of Wisdom Fusion, it impacts how I do my work now. In fact, what it’s done, It has slowed things down on some levels to create depth and richness so that later we can work together more adeptly.
So you’ll hear an episode, 293: Responsible Leadership with Trudi LeBron, a little bit more about that intentionality and why that matters?
Trudi: And that is the case I think across the board. When you start to think about building a company, a business, an institution, whatever size, even a non-profit, really anything that gathers people. When you start thinking about how people will engage in the space and what you’re going to need to provide so that they have equitable access that they can fully participate, it makes the experience better for everyone because everyone now can be contributing at a capacity that they wouldn’t be able to contribute if you had these like inequities. And I think that that’s you know, when we look at any of the data around companies that are diverse that have better outcomes and better problem solving with it. There’s all this research around the benefits of it. What is true is that you get that – you only get those kinds of benefits when the environment isn’t just diverse but that is equitable, right? It’s not just that people showed up. It’s that people are contributing. And so if you don’t have an environment or if you only have an environment where people get to show up, but they can’t contribute you don’t get any of the benefits of having that diverse equitable space.
So you can see in that episode, we talked about the intentions, and how having clear intentions to create that space actually leads to more equitable treatment and results, right? The next idea about intentionality comes out clearly in the episode 297 with Naomi Hattaway where she’s back on the podcast, and she helped me shift my focus on the idea of legacy. Where we take the idea of legacy as something that we leave behind. She actually says, “It’s something you can set as an intention to carve the path forward.” And that is something that has shifted how I see myself, the impact I’ll leave with my work, my business, and as an individual. So here it is with Naomi Hattaway Legacy by Design episode 297:
Naomi: If we flip the switch and toggle forward-thinking instead of only in the back, that lets us lay out this beautiful runway of, “What do you want your legacy to be? How do you want it to align to your values?” And then you can pull in whatever you’re working on. A project. A team you’re working with. Whether it’s an individual journey. Whether it’s even as simple as preparing for your own death, which is something we all have to face. You can then lean into your values and lean into a way that really does create that legacy.
So a lot of times we also think about the red thread of our life and looking back, what are the things that stay true as we navigate different things and navigate different projects and experiences. And we always look back and say, “Well, that’s the red thread.”
All right, there you have it. I feel like I’ve just bared my soul to you about my own personal and professional journey in the last 100 of these 300 episodes. I do that because I want you to see the transformation, the transitions that have been happening in my own life. And how that manifests in what I share with you, right? I think it’s important that we make transparent our own journeys so when you’re on yours that it is normalized and you can see why it is worth it. Why is the work worth it? Because none of this I’ve shared with you has been easy. None of it has come naturally. It has come from within but it has come with some attachment to letting go of old patterns and letting in new patterns. And that is what I’m all about for you, right? I want to make an impact on you. And that’s what all of this is always been about. And that’s actually why I started this podcast to impact more of you.
So in the last bit of this episode, I want to share with you a few episodes from the recent 100 that have impacted my clients or have shown the impact that engaging in these kind of ideas and coaching etc. can have on your own life. In episode 218 was kind of a spontaneous thing that happened. One day, I went into my community, the IN TRANSIT Hub, It’s a free Facebook community that I have. And I said, “Hey, anybody want some free coaching? I’m going to offer that to you and in exchange, we’ll edit it, make it short, and put it into a podcast.” And I got an answer from someone in the community, who is a regular member. She said, “Sundae, I am feeling so stuck. I don’t think this will help but I’m willing to give it a try.” And here’s a glimpse of the big shift that happened in our mini session. It’s called: From Stuck to Sorted in 22 Minutes:
Sundae: So if you’re standing there at the road, how tight are the bungee cords right now?
Sharryn: They’re loose at the moment because I’m not moving anywhere. I’m sort of just stood there. Yeah, they’re okay because I’m making that decision of which way do I go. I don’t even know what the right bungee cord is. I don’t know what that one is. I know the left one is moving towards my dream and I know straight on is staying where I am now, on the path that I am now. But I don’t know what the right one is. I don’t know what that one is.
Sundae: Why don’t you pause for a second? Just get quiet and listen for what that might be.
Sharryn: I think it’s fear. I just think it’s fear. I don’t think it is a destination. I think it’s just fear.
Sundae: Sharryn I have chills up my arms right now.
Sharryn: I have tears in my eyes right now.
Sundae: You are amazing. Look at how hard you’re working and how clear you are being with yourself and where you are in this process.
So you can see, chills up your arms, tears in the eyes, it was a powerful 22 minutes, and she was able to experience that because she said, “Yes,” to herself. She said, “Yes,” to the experiment of seeing what would happen if she focused on her needs for 22 minutes. And at the end of our session, this is what she said:
Sharryn: I’m so grateful. Thank you for 20, 21 minutes and 18 seconds of your time. And you have unblocked like this whole- when I jokingly put that comment on your Facebook page, I was like, “Ah, she’s not going to do anything about it and nobody can do anything about it. It’s just going to have to fester for a while.” I didn’t for one minute think I would get this opportunity to sit with you and talk with you. And yeah, 21 minutes of your time and I know what I have to do.
So I hope what you’re seeing from that episode is that it is possible to be sitting in a place of blocked and in less than 20 minutes, you can gain clarity and know what to do next, right? So it’s all about impact and this is an example of how impact can happen in a very short amount of time. It doesn’t have to take long, it doesn’t even have to be hard. So speaking of impact, here is an episode that I hear consistently from my clients and from my listeners that has shifted their perspective. And that is why I wanted to include it here in our special episode today. It’s about knowing the difference between whether you need rest or recovery, and that is from episode 269: Rest vs Recovery. Have a listen:
So, this is an invitation to just think about your own life:
- Are you resting on the weekends or is what you’re doing really recovering? I talked to someone and they said that they feel bad when they go back to work on Monday because they spend their whole weekend doing nothing. And the point they’re doing nothing on the weekend is because they’re so exhausted from the week that they don’t have the energy to do anything else. So that’s recovery and not rest, right? So if that’s you, if what you’re doing is recovering, rather than resting what needs to change during the week so what you’re doing is just putting a pause on your responsibilities.
- Or if you are in a situation where recovery is the next step, are you just telling yourself that rest is enough? Or are you actively building in time and space for the process of healing?
- When you have something positive like I’ve shared here that you’re really were thankful you get to do, have you taken the right steps to proactively plan in time for clean up? Clean up after you’ve invested that extra time and energy in something?
My hunch is that many of you can see yourselves in these scenarios because I’m seeing it all over me and I’m seeing it myself.
So I hope you pause and answer those questions for yourself. And if you’re not sure whether you’re in recovery mode or need rest, chances are you probably are in recovery mode and need to do a bit more so definitely check it out.
All right, so I’ve shared a few ways in which clients have been impacted either through coaching or through an episode. And now, I want to focus a little bit less on the personal side and more on the business side. And one of the episodes I want to draw your attention to is episode 278 called The Biology of Business. Here, I share what I call the head-to-toe exploration of your business and this is exactly what I teach inside the program Global Coach Coalition. I give you the categories and the key questions you need to be asking in your business from head to toe. Now, the thing is, I used this in my own business when I was going through my brand evolution, I went back to my own material, and I asked myself these critical questions. Listen, in, on this question that could change everything:
This is a framework for you to do a deep dive in your business right now and see what areas need more attention and where you’re doing just fine.
- Head of your Business. The head of your business is; get in your head and ask the question, “Why?” What’s your big why?” Whether you’re at the very start of your business, you ask yourself, “Why do I want to do this? What am I doing this for?” But if you’re in the middle of your business, you have to ask yourself, “Hey, this is hard. Why is this all worth it?”
So, there you go. Start with the head of your business. Ask yourself what is your “Why?” And if you’ve been in business for a while, it is so important, to revisit this question because you’re “Why?” changes? Now I’m hitting my 10th business anniversary in June this year, and my “Why?” has changed dramatically at least three times. And returning to your “Why?” will help you keep the alignment between what’s going on for you personally, and what’s going on outside of you in your context, as well as what you want to be seeing in your business. So definitely ask yourself that question, if you haven’t already. This is what I use with my clients inside Global Coach Coalition and we start with our “Why?”
But then we go through all the other parts we talk about the face of our business, the heart of our business, the skeleton of our business and more because if one thing in your system, let’s say in your body is impacted negatively, everything else is connected. And that is why it’s important for you to do a head-to-toe analysis in your business, every once in a while, to make sure that things are on track because if you don’t, you might be putting your attention in the wrong area of your business. And then you’re going to lose time, money, and energy and joy in your business. So go ahead and check it out, if you haven’t already episode 278: The Biology of Your Business.
All right, there you have it. I hope you’ve seen that this podcast started six years ago, 300 episodes ago, because I am so committed to impact. The impact on you and your lives, in the way that you think, the way that you engage with your loved ones, the way that you show up for your business, the way that you experience your own transitions.
And I have been committed to sharing the straight talk on our lives, IN TRANSIT since the beginning. So thank you for being here. I have much more ahead. I’ll tell you a little bit more. We are episode 300, and there are a few things that I know for sure, and a few things that I’m kind of in the messy middle of transition. All right. So going to be really honest with you about that. Here are a few things that I know for sure.
- I am so excited that the program that I created in 2016 called Adapt and Succeed Abroad and has been tested and tried for many people from all the world as giving them tools to make their transitions easier and help their connections be deeper and to help find more purpose. I have redesigned it. Added a new material up branded it just basically made it even better for you. This was a labor of love that started in June and July 2022 and is now ready for you to check out. So I know for sure that this year, the impact that I want to be making in the world will be through sharing insight, like I have, in my podcast all this time, but in a much deeper way through my online program. It’s really bite-sized learning, but we go deeper in a kind of self-coaching guide and you have the community of Global Coach Coalition coaches at your fingertips.
If you want to go further and help someone be by your side along the way, besides me in teaching you the steps and strategies that have been tested in my global community. So check out Adapt and Succeed if you haven’t already. It is the absolute fastest, most affordable way you can work with me. And it’s immediate. You don’t have to make any appointments online. You don’t just show up on Zoom. It’s instantaneous, and it’s deep, it’s fun, it’s intimate, it’s playful, it’s professional all of it, right? So check it out, Adapt and Succeed. It is for anyone whose life is in transition, which means, it’s for everyone. So check it out.
- And if you are a coach and you want to serve people in transition, you are working with the globally mobile community, whatever that looks like for you. Check out my program, Global Coach Coalition. I haven’t talked about it much, but I do want to let you in on a little secret that I will be opening the doors for Global Coach Coalition, starting March 2023. I do not know if I will offer it again in 2023. So this is absolutely the time, check it out, Global Coach Coalition, go online, apply if it resonates with you, and then we can connect and have a look.
That is what I know for sure. That’s where my energy is for sure in 2023. There are some other things that are going on, that feel like the messy middle and I’m kind of excited because I don’t know what’s next. I did have a hint of that in preparing for this episode, that all of the wisdom I gained from my Wisdom Fusion Project, I’m sitting on, like a treasure chest. Honestly, I have hundreds and hundreds of pages of notes and wisdom gained from that experience, I haven’t shared with you yet. So that’s on my mind.
Lots of other things are in transition for me personally, and professionally. And I love it because I can’t wait to see what’s on the other side. Just like I couldn’t see what was on the other side when I started this in 2016-2017, I’m so grateful for where I am now, I couldn’t have seen it then and that’s how I feel about what’s ahead.
So thank you for being with me in this journey and I look forward to doing the next steps together. I’ve appreciated you, each and every episode. So I’m going to leave you with the words of Nelson Mandela. He says, “Remember to celebrate milestones, as you prepare for the road ahead.” I thank you for listening to IN TRANSIT with me, Sundae Bean. Thank you for celebrating this milestone with me and I look forward to the road ahead.
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