Self Care & Person Centered Leadership w/ Michele Thomson -36

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Shawna Rodrigues 0:00

Are there times when self care feels like one more thing that you just don't have time for? What it feels like another buzzword somebody's just throwing at you. And one more thing you are expected to add to your already overflowing plate. I know how that feels. I think we've all been there. I also think it can be valuable to keep it in the conversation, which is why we keep talking about it every week on the show. But it's also important to sometimes dust it off a bit and talk about in a little more depth. And that's what we're going to do on today's conversation, and talk about how it can feel like just a buzzword and what we can do about that. Our guest today is going to help us to deepen this conversation.

Shawna Rodrigues 0:42

Welcome to The Grit Show. Growth on purpose. I'm glad you found us. I'm Shawna Rodrigues. And I'm honored to be leading you on today's journey as part of this community growing together as seekers and thrivers. If it's your first time to listen, welcome. I hope you gain something valuable. And check out more of our episodes. If you've been around for a while, I'd be grateful if you took a moment to leave a review, or give us a star rating on whatever app you use and listen to. Apple podcast is a great place to do that. Your encouragement makes all the difference. Brittany462 gave five stars and said, I'm in love with the show. It's funny, witty, encouraging and educational. Thank you so much Brittany, it really does mean a lot. Now for a little more info on today's guest.

Shawna Rodrigues 1:30

Today we are going to chat with Michele Thomson. She is an RN who turned into a leadership development coach and consultant who helps professionals that are feeling burned out and frustrated, find joy in their work again, while creating healthy workplaces that people never want to leave, which is amazing. She is the CEO of Curis Consulting. Thank you so much for joining us today, Michele. I'm excited to chat with you.

Michele Thomson 1:55

Thank you so much. I'm very excited to finally be here. It's been a long time since we first connected. So this is really exciting.

Shawna Rodrigues 2:02

Yes. I'm most excited to learn a little more about your journey from being an RN to moving towards doing consulting. What helped make that transition for you?

Michele Thomson 2:12

Yeah, it's, it's a great question. And I also have the gift of gab. So if I go on for too long, just tell me to stop.

Shawna Rodrigues 2:18

Sounds good.

Michele Thomson 2:19

And several years ago, around: 2017

Shawna Rodrigues 2:19

Oh, wow.

Michele Thomson 2:19

Yeah. And they said, Can you do that? And I thought, yeah, I think I can do that. So my husband really, who is very much an entrepreneur and owns his own business said, you have to create your own business, you have to keep this separate. I said, I'm not doing that it's too much work. It's like, just do it on the side. It's totally fine. And he said, no, you need to start your own business. So I went down the path and did all the things and created that. And you know, I remember creating a website several years ago, and I looked at it about a year ago, and I just shattered. I thought, oh my gosh, so I had to kind of rebrand how quickly you grow in the, in the early. Yeah, right. And so you know, what I really realized in the gift of that is that I still work with this client, and I love them. I love working with them. They're just amazing.

Michele Thomson 3:50

But what I realized was that I didn't really love the work that I was doing, and that it's not what I wanted to do 100% of the time in my own business. And that's what I thought I wanted to do is creating deliver curriculum for people, because I love teaching. I love learning when I'm in front of people. And it was really surprising to me to realize that that really didn't bring me the joy that I thought is a new, you know, kind of business owner. And so I kind of had to go back and you know, you hear about figuring out what your why is. What's your why.

Shawna Rodrigues 4:20

Yeah.

Michele Thomson 4:20

What's the drop rate, and I couldn't figure it out for the longest time. And really, I think what what happened was is I found myself going back to an event that happened early in my career. When I moved out here to British Columbia. I live in Vancouver, British Columbia, I'm a Canadian if you hear it in my accent. And when I was starting in one of my first really senior leadership roles working in the healthcare sector, I went to go work for an organization that I thought was going to be very healthy and it was great. I had been interviewed several times on the phone and I had actually they had flown me out to see this this home and everything seemed fine and about three months into me taking the position and working, I came into work one day and I could start to sort of feel a subtle shift of staff and their behaviors and their attitudes. And I was doing all the things that you're told to do. Have pizza parties, engage with people, have them participate in decision making above where they are, and all of the things and so I thought I was doing everything right. And I didn't really understand like, what was happening. So I came into work. And I was told by our admin assistant that licensing was coming in to do an investigation, which is not unusual in Canada, they just like to come in sometimes spontaneously, make sure you're doing what you're supposed to be doing. And so I said, well, that's okay. We're, we have nothing to hide. And she said, No, I don't think you understand they're coming to investigate you. And it was like, someone had punched me right between the eyes. And I said, Excuse me, and she said, Well, somebody at this site accused you of covering up the death of a resident. And it was really in that moment that I, I like I went into full panic mode, and I literally could feel the blood drained from my body. And it's not because I knew it was true. It's it's because I knew it wasn't true. And I didn't know what to do. And I couldn't believe that someone who had been trying to create a more healthy workplace for could do this to me, like it became very much about my ego stepping forward and saying, I'm a victim here, how could you do this to me? And so I went through today investigation, and it was clearly identified that I did not do what I was accused of doing. And so when this person was, you know, asked like, why did you say these things? They said, Well, we, we had a thought that if we got got it could get her fired, things would go back to the way they were.

Shawna Rodrigues 6:32

Wow.

Michele Thomson 6:33

That moment I realized that I was ill prepared to manage this dysfunctional team who had learned that this was a coping strategy that it was really each person for themselves, not how can we work together. And I also realized that my employer, who I don't think did this intentionally set me up for failure. Because like so many other employers, we hire people based on their ability to do their job, not on their ability to manage people and understand how we're hardwired to connect and how you build trust and safe environments. And so I didn't have the skill set to be able to move forward. Now luckily, for me, I did have a few people in that organization that were mentors, and I could learn from, but it was really in that moment, I knew I had two choices, I could either quit my job and go work someplace else, knowing that I would probably find a toxic workplace at some point in my career and be having to do this all over again. Or I could really lean into my stubborn Leo tendencies, and say, No, I'm going to figure this out. And I chose the latter of the two. And so,

Shawna Rodrigues 7:36

Wow.

Michele Thomson 7:36

It was, it's now been a 25 year career of really taking information that I've learned. And I've tried and iterated and kind of come up with my own processes to kind of now have a leadership process that I teach now too. So that feels really authentic for me, and I think it does for a lot of other people, because it helps them show up, and how to hold space for people as themselves. And so for me, I really think that leadership's an inside job, you have to figure out how and why you see the world and view the world before you can, you know, support other people.

Shawna Rodrigues 8:13

That's amazing. I'm so stuck on, I can't believe that somebody would think that getting somebody fired would be how to get the organization to go back to how it was. Like, how did you navigate like that feels to me, like, I'd feel so stuck after something like that?

Michele Thomson 8:29

Well, and I certainly did at that point in my career. And I think this is where you know, you you look back and you see the growth of how like how I would deal with that now is really that what I understand now and doing all of the deep dive into human connections and how we're hardwired to connect is an understanding that typically people who don't feel safe or very fearful of something, don't behave well at work, right. It's like a child who can have a temper tantrum, it's often elicited because it's a fear response to something. And so for me now, it would be really easy to not necessarily take that super personally in the moment. I'm like, there's a bigger core issue root problem here that I need to do it. But in that moment, exactly. As you said, I very much felt about, Well, how could you do this to me, here I am trying to create an environment that's going to be better for everybody else. I'm working all these extra hours. And then this happens to me meeting with every single person in that home for about 10 or 15 minutes. And I asked three questions. I asked them, What is your current work experience that you have? What is the experience you want to have? And what do you need from me? And then I just kind of reverse engineered it, I really tried to figure out like where there was common denominators in that and where there were gaps and then try to, you know, start to kind of move forward from that place. So yeah, it's, it's was just it's just a slow moving process and every situation is going to be a little bit different.

Shawna Rodrigues 9:58

For people able to answer the question like, what do you need for me? Or is that something that people had a hard time answering? Or were they quick to know what they needed?

Michele Thomson: 10:06

Well, some people were quick to know, like, you know, I think that there are some people that are very much they think about things from, you know, kind of, we call them the negative nellies. You know, they're, they're really quick to well, if you're going to ask me, I'm going to tell you exactly what I think and I'm not going to hold anything back. And, and that's okay. You know, I think that if we ask those questions, we also have to lean into the, to the concept that we're going to sometimes hear things that we either can't fix or do anything about are going to be hard to hear. And so I was okay with that. The majority of people were able to answer the first two questions much more easily than the last. And so, you know, what do you need for me was a little bit more difficult. But I think that, you know, I had already learned at that point, how to continue to ask those why questions. So if they said, well, I need you to make me feel like you trust me. I can ask like, Well, why? Why is that important to you? Well, we've never had that before. No one's ever given me autonomy. Oh, so what you're looking for is the ability to, you know, make more decisions in the work you do or within the scope of what you do. Yes, that's what I want. So it was really trying to kind of get to the under root of what some people were saying to me who were struggling a little bit was just trying to kind of flush that out together.

Shawna Rodrigues: 11:22

Yeah. Sounds like those why questions are kind of the key to find out what people are actually saying, because they don't know what they're actually saying all the time as well.

Michele Thomson: 11:29

Well, and the great thing about asking those why questions is, if you're truly asking from a place of humility and curiosity, it's one of the fastest ways that you can build trust with people because they see that you're being, you know, genuine, you're being authentic, but you're also being really vulnerable, because you're admitting that you don't know the answers. And so in that moment, what I didn't realize I realized that now, in that moment, I didn't realize that that was one of the first steps that I was doing to create a more trusting environment that it where I thought trust had been completely broken, not only for them, but also I thought, how am I ever going to be able to trust any of these people again, and for months, I came to work afterwards. And I would have panic attacks drive me to work in the morning. And the first thing that ever happened to me, yeah.

Shawna Rodrigues: 12:11

Yeah. That was a hard thing to work through which then I get that comes to the part of the conversation around this self care piece, and how you were able to work through that and take care of yourself while taking care of the organization. Because I feel like in these helping professions, and healthcare and leadership roles, all those different places, like how do you take care of yourself while taking care of that too. Like, where do you draw the line of how much of yourself you give to help others to change that?

Michele Thomson: 12:34

Yeah, well, I mean, back then I wasn't doing anything to help myself with self care, I didn't really understand the importance of that. And I think I knew that it was this notion, and like so many people. I was in that place of, I don't have time for this. Like I don't, I got too many other things to do, and I was single at the time with no children. And I felt like I had no time in my schedule to devote to self care. Nor did I want to, because I felt like by the time I came home and took my shoes off, it was barely all I could do is eat, and I wanted to go to bed. And I thought like, self care is not self care if I'm so tired, that I'm not enjoying it. I think what I would tell you now is now that I'm teaching about self care, because I'm in the healthcare space, and I've been trying to help health care professionals, but also moms, like you know, entrepreneurs and women to figure this whole self care thing out, because it's this buzzword we hear all over. And I think people don't really know what it means or have this idea of what it is. And then we throw in words like resiliency, and it's just such a pressure to say, well, you would feel better if you were just more resilient. And you know, I think that it can be really toxic for us to sort of add those layers in and the guilt that people have. So I think now what I would say is knowing what self care is, it's very attainable for everybody who has a busy, busy, busy lifestyle. And it just takes a commitment to want to pick one or two things every day to focus on.

Shawna Rodrigues: 14:04

Yes, and I really do want to talk more about that. And I actually had a recent walk with a friend and a recent episode where my conversations like maybe we need to stop calling it self care. Maybe we need a different, it's like, it was easy think of like the tune up for your car. Like it's required maintenance like this, like self maintenance, like we need to have self maintenance and if I have a family and I have children, it's family maintenance. Mom taking a bath, mom taking a walk or taking care of herself. It's family maintenance, its relationship maintenance, if I have a partner. This is like required things in order for this to run well and function well for me to do my work. This is maintenance. This is not care. This is maintenance. And I think this whole concept that it needs to be rebranded because I mean as the more we've talked about self care on this podcast because we do bring it up every single week, the more I've been able to talk about it now weekly for this long on this podcast, I feel like it's made me be, you know what? It's not even. It's these different term is maintenance, self maintenance. It's family maintenance. Its relationship maintenance.

Michele Thomson: 15:06

Yeah. So I love that I have been starting to call it self restoration. But I like that. I like, you know, I like your word too. So,

Shawna Rodrigues: 15:15

I think it's what, I was thinking of my car. My car needs to go get maintenance. And it's one of those things that we all know that if we don't get the maintenance on our car, our engine might blow up. And there's a little light that comes on. And so I say, back to car maintenance for me, is a little easier analogy for making me realize like how important it is, and how it's necessary and not optional. And to help families and partners and kids understand in teaching ourselves about it, that is a little bit more of a maintenance thing.

Michele Thomson: 15:42

And that's a great analogy, because our bodies are really good at telling us what they need. We're just typically not good listeners. And so we sometimes need that red, like your light, your engine is going to burn out, light come on, for us to really say, oh, okay, like I really pushed it to the outer limits here. And if I keep driving this, it's going to completely break down. And this is going to be a much bigger problem that I'm going to have to deal with, we sometimes need that red engine light to come on. So that's a great analogy.

Shawna Rodrigues: 16:12

And actually, Michele, we're taking this to a whole other level, I love this thing. I think this is good for me as well. Because when I was younger, I drove the cars that were not expensive, and we're barely running most of the time. And it was so funny, there was a joke, because my dad has been a huge gift to my entire life about helping me with car maintenance and my vehicles running is because I've had him I could not afford to have a car, because of the cars I had to buy and without my dad helping me maintain them. So it's been a gift to have that. But when I was younger, the joke was that as long as my radio worked, my car ran fine. Because I turn the radio up, I'd ignore the sound, ignore the problem and just turn the radio up. And that really might be something about a life lesson for me. I could just turn the radio off, ignore the problems, instead of taking care of the maintenance, and taking care of the issues. So there's something in that analogy as well. But I know people who do a little bit of stop turning the radio up, start paying attention to the problems. So yeah, yes, that's important. But you do teaching around this, I think especially you say that it is something we can work in even we're busy. Even when we have kids. Even when we don't think we have time. So I'd love for us to talk more about that.

Michele Thomson: 17:22

Yeah, well, I mean, I think the first step for a lot of people is to just to give yourself permission to be open to what self care is and how you can sort of incorporate that into your daily life. And so, you know, when I first started teaching this about a year and a half ago, maybe closer to two years now, I think that I was sort of setting some people up for failure, teaching about self care, because what I didn't realize until much later was that you know, and because I'm a nurse, and I speak to a lot of healthcare professionals, I use Maslow's hierarchy of needs is sort of my triangle so that people understand what I'm trying to get at. What I was talking about before was, you know, in order to get to the top of that pyramid, which for Maslow is self actualization, ie the best version of yourself or the highest version of yourself and replace that with self care. So self care needs to be at the top of the pyramid. And that's the goal, then what I didn't realize is that for a lot of people who have a hard time setting boundaries or who are people pleasers and perfectionist, and don't understand their value and their worth, which are those two bottom kind of corners, which are that bottom tiers around, you know, the things that we need for our survival. Food, water, shelter, air, if those core pieces are not already completed, and we don't understand how to set some healthy boundaries, and to let the whole perfectionism go, and to not be people pleasers, or at least give up some of that, then it's so much harder, if not, I would argue impossible to really incorporate self care into your daily practice. Because all those other things just take up too much time and energy to be able to get to that piece. So for me, it's really about helping people let go of some of those pieces. And in order to do that, you have to talk about how do you set boundaries? What does that look like? And so it's, you know, I think a lot of people want a quick fix, they're just like, lead me to the path of how to, just tell me what to do and I'll do it. And there are some simple things that everybody can start doing. But to really, I think, get into the meaning of self care is to really unpackage some of that. And so for me, I believe that self care truly at the core is that it is any activity. So this is going to be individualized. It's any activity that quiets your central nervous system, period. It's not a manicure, it's not a pedicure, it's not a half day at spa, it can be those things. For me that's more self nurturing. Those are just things that make me feel pretty or they make me feel like I'm taking time for myself, but I think we're we got hung up in this time commitment is like, I don't have time to go to the spa for half a day, I barely have time to go for a pedicure. Self care can be just taking five minutes a day to make yourself a cup of tea and sit down in a quiet room and read a book. Or going into your bedroom. You know, one of the things I do every day, when I get home from work, my poor husband, like he's so used to seeing me in a top knot and gross clothes that I don't even think he knows what I look like with makeup on anymore. And I call it jammy time. I go home, and I get into my pajamas almost immediately when I get home from work. And then I go downstairs and I make my lunch while him and I chat about our days and you know, for about 20 minutes, and I make my lunch right away. And it's done. So I'm connecting with him. But I'm also, you know, packing my lunch. And I'm getting comfortable. That for me is self care. Part of that is self care, because that's a routine and a habit that I do every single day. And I'm committed to that. But I also listen to what I need. Sometimes I listen to a podcast on my way home from work, sometimes I just turn the radio off, because all I need, what I really need is just quiet. And so it's really about listening to your body and asking yourself, what is it that I need right now? Or what's one kind thing I can do for myself today? You know, it's just really about allowing yourself to get quiet,

Shawna Rodrigues: 21:23

and listening to what that actually is.

Michele Thomson: 21:27

Yeah, and that can be like I said, it can be a multitude of things. I mean, part of my self care journey really was it was like throwing darts at the wall, it was really trying kind of all the things because, you know, I think a lot of people can get really freaked out with the woowoo that the journaling and the meditation and kind of that side of things. And I've really leaned into that in the last three years. I mean, three years ago, I would have given you a really inappropriate, disrespectful iral. If you would have said that I would be meditating and journaling every day, I would have told you there was no way. And I've really kind of found that to be something that I'm really leaning into. And I'm allowing myself to surrender to that. And which has been difficult for me. You know, I, I've told other people I've never been one to pick a word of the year ever in my life. And last year, the word that I picked was surrender. And for me, that always meant, you know, like giving up.

Shawna Rodrigues: 22:20

Yeah.

Michele Thomson: 22:21

And for I don't know why. But what I kind of, when that word came, for me instantly, it meant that I was letting go of what wasn't serving me, so that I could start to say yes to the things that were going to bring me more happiness.

Shawna Rodrigues: 22:35

That's beautiful.

Michele Thomson: 22:35

And soon as I saw that from a different lens, it was just like this gift of allowing me to have all this space and freedom to all of a sudden see the things that I was missing because I had these blinders on. And so and then this year, I thought, well, what are the odds if I'm gonna get another word, and I, you know, again, so that here my word was believe. And I thought, well, where's that coming from? And I really think I needed to have a year of surrendering, in order to get to the place where I could believe that some of the things that I wanted in my life, I could not only achieve and I was capable of, but that they were just sitting there waiting for me to go out and grab them. I just needed to be open to it.

Shawna Rodrigues: 23:17

Mm hmm. Yeah, that's amazing. It's a process though. It's one step at a time. And so how do you think people know that their central nervous system is settled? How do you think that people will know that it's working? That there was enough time? That it was, a deep breath was enough, or a short walk is enough, or the cup of tea is enough? Like how do you think they'll know that it's enough?

Michele Thomson: 23:42

Well, you can genuinely feel it in your body. It's really the kind of that feeling of you know, when you take a really deep breath, and you just exhale, and you're like, I just feel so much better. You can start to feel your muscles relax and parts of your body that are really tense. But sometimes it's an awareness of that. It's being aware of like, where do I hold my body? Is it in my stomach? Is it in my jaw? Is it in my back or my shoulders? Like where am I holding on to that energy, and then allowing that to kind of pass through and release. So, you know, there's lots of research on this, they'll say that, you know, you can 20 minutes a day, broken up into small segments can be enough to like, physical movement can be enough to kind of calm yourself. For me, it's really it changes every day. There's a lot of research around breath work. And a lot of the research is saying that if you do two minutes or less of just breathing. It doesn't have to be all these different types of breathing that are out that those are great, but if you just let your body do what it knows how to do, and just naturally breathe, you don't have to close your eyes. You don't have to be sitting and meditating. But if you can just sit in a space where you're comfortable and not where you're not going to be interrupted for under two minutes. If you know, if they were to hook your body up, they would see that that is enough to slow your heart rate, to slow your breathing, and they can start to see that your brain isn't really, there's not as much electrical impulses that are happening in your brain is kind of slowing down and allowing your central nervous system to come out of that fight or flight response, because that's what happens. So, you know, millions of years ago, when we were running away from a saber toothed tiger, our fight or flight response is what would save us from being eaten and would die. And that's still embedded in our genetics and in our DNA. But our life has obviously changed. We don't need it for that reason anymore. But hey, the response, it's still exactly, but the response is still elicited. So what happens is that when we stay in a heightened state of fight or flight response, then it gets stored, and it can be really good. So sometimes it takes a little bit longer like to kind of get into that place where you feel a little bit more relaxed. Other days, you might find that you're able to get to that place a little bit more quickly. Again, it's really just about kind of listening to your body. And it has nothing to do with how much resiliency you've built up, I wish we would just get rid of that word altogether, because I think that it puts so much pressure on the person and feeling like they've done something wrong, because they're not feeling better, because they went to a spa for half a day, and they should feel better, and that they're not resilient enough. And those two things don't fit together in my world. They're just they're very separate. And I think that that can be really damaging for a lot of people to help to feel like there's something wrong with them. Your body's doing exactly what it's supposed to do when it's in that state of stress. It's eliciting a response that was intended to save your life.

Shawna Rodrigues: 26:39

Mm hmm. Like how that works, huh?

Michele Thomson: 26:42

Yeah.

Shawna Rodrigues: 26:44

Yes, that's incredible. And so when you work with organizations, do you work more with individual people within the organization are showing the organization overall, to be able to do this kind of work?

Michele Thomson: 26:55

Yeah, lately, it's been really speaking to kind of frontline people who are, you know, the ones that are sort of providing care and feeling really stressed and burnt out, like our health care workers. For the most part, it's trying to give them some tools and resources to, we can't afford to lose any more health care workers. So you know, around the world, it's not just my country, it's, it's everywhere. So it's really just trying to give those people tools and resources to understand that how they're feeling is really normal. But also, I think some of the work that I do related to this is, is really helping those people recognize how they can support each other. And so one of the things and this is really around the workplace culture piece is that when we're tired, and we're burnt out, and we don't feel like we've got the trust of others, or people have our back, and we're not feeling seen or heard and valued, it's really easy to get a negative mindset. And to not feel like you have the bandwidth to care about anyone else. Because you can kind of barely get to work yourself. And that really creates a culture of it's all about me, it's not about us. And so one of the easiest ways to get back to if this is about all of us together, and how can we help each other is to really recognize what stress looks like for everybody in the workplace. And so what I've done with some organizations is I've gotten teens together. And we really create a safe space where people feel that they can be open and share knowing it's not going to be shared anywhere else. And I ask them when you feel overwhelmed at work or stressed, what does that look like for you? Some people will say, Well, I cry or throw my hands over my head or I yell or maybe I inappropriately swear, or I'll stomp away. And none of those are wrong. But then when I asked their co workers to do is to really take note of that, so that when they see that behavior in the future, they can go up to that person and say, Hey, Shawna, I remember when, when we had that meeting, and you share that when you get overwhelmed at work, you start to yell a little bit. And I, and I'm seeing that behavior now. And so I think maybe you're there like maybe you're feeling a little bit overwhelmed. Why don't you go take a walk or just take a step away for a little bit. When you come back, we'll figure it out together. What it does is it lets that person know I see you, I see you're struggling, and I'm validating that it's okay, but also have your back and I'm doing it with no judgment. It's not about me, it has nothing to do with me or in that moment. Some people will want to go to that place to be like, You know what, we're all tired. So get over it.

Shawna Rodrigues: 29:32

Yeah.

Michele Thomson: 29:33

I don't have any place for somebody who's going to come to work and yell at me because, you know, we all have to just figure this out. And I think when we can take that piece away and look at the behavior not as someone who is being selfish because they can't regulate their own emotions in that moment, but someone who's struggling, it gives us then the ability to have the empathy and compassion to say go take a break and come back. Because what happens is, is when that person comes back, the majority of people will say, Wow, I want to reciprocate that not only for that person, but for everybody else, because now I feel like there's somebody here who sees me. And that over time, and consistency will start to build a really strong and trusting workplace culture, not necessarily created by leaders, but that, that's being created, you know, within a team environment, so that people start to feel like, I got people here who have my back.

Shawna Rodrigues: 30:28

When people turn towards each other instead of turning away. Yeah I know, as you were saying, I was actually thinking of even family environments where it's not such a bad conversation to have with your family, even with kids and with everyone else, like so what do you like when you're stressed? What do you like when you're sad or unhappy or mad or whatever else? And so we can have that conversation, even when there are kids, that do you remember what we talked to dinner about what you look like when you're angry? When you're not angry? So what do we do to help you with that, and so people can feel like they're turning in and towards turning away. And when those things happen, because we all have strong emotions, like that.

Michele Thomson: 31:02

It's perfect, because, you know, I, I've asked, I've been asked to speak on a few other podcasts, specifically for like moms, and, you know, female entrepreneurs. And I'm like, Well, I don't, it's not really who I work with. But to your point, I think that you can take all of this information out of the proverbial, you know, more formalized boardroom and use it in our personal life. And we should be, because that's often where we get the best evidence that it works is when we can try it on the people where we already have trusting, stable relationships with, you know, you can get the best outcomes and get practice there. And that was one of the things that when I, you know, I've talked about self care before with mothers and in family units is to say, there's this, you know, I think, issue that a lot of women have around, you know, showing up is kind of this is perfect. I need to have a perfect home, and I need to have the laundry needs to be done. And I need to have dinner on the table. And I'm not trying to, you know, go back to a time when that was kind of seen, as you know, the role that women would hold in, in a, you know, typical Maria figure. But I mean, I think a lot of us still hang on to that, you know, to be a good mom, I have to cook cookies, and yeah, I'm part of the PTA and all of that things. And, you know, what I've said to people is that here's the thing, I grew up as an only child and a single parent home, and my mom couldn't be there all the time, despite what she wanted. And I will tell you this from experience, there were times when we had Kraft Dinner three nights a week. And it wasn't because my mom was too tired to cook. Sometimes it's because we didn't have the money for anything else, because we grew up very poor. But I had no idea. Growing up as a kid, I thought we were super rich, I had no idea that, you know, my mom was on low income assistance and struggling because she had such a strong pride of home, that that, for me was not even part of anything like a notion that I thought of. But my point in sharing that is to say that your kids will not remember the week that you gave them Kraft Dinner three nights a week, because they'll probably think you're actually awesome. But they will remember the fact that that gave you time and energy to maybe throw on some music and have a dance party in the living room with them. That's what they're gonna remember. They're gonna remember the dance party when they're 15 or 16 years old, they're not going to remember the week that you think you were a crappy parent, because you put Kraft dinner on the table three times that week. So I think, again, it's a lot of around self care and how we speak to ourselves. And the compassion we have to have has to be around, A, is this a conversation I would have with a close friend or family member when I tell them that. When I tell them they were an awful mother because they did that? Probably not. So why is it okay for me to speak to myself that way. But it's also letting go of some of that perfection and peace because when you can let go of it. I think it opens up an opportunity for you to say, well, you know what, I didn't get it right the last time but I want to try that again. Because that was really fun. And maybe I'll try it a bit of a different way. And so it allows you to remain open to keep trying until you find something that feels right.

Shawna Rodrigues: 34:08

Yes, no, that's perfect. I love that the things that are important. And when we give ourselves credit for and don't give ourselves credit for it's amazing what actually matters sometimes.

Michele Thomson: 34:17

Yeah.

Shawna Rodrigues: 34:18

That's great. Wonderful. And so every episode, we do what we call a self care spotlight, where we actually ask you what you do for self care to help people get different ideas of the type of things that people do for self care, take care of themselves. And like you said, it's very individual for everyone listening, but what do you do for self care?

Michele Thomson: 34:35

Yeah, so when I realized that having a morning and bedtime routine was that was a game changer for me. And so about a year and a half ago, I, I read I think it was like the 5am club book. So I'm just gonna preface this first of all, it's a great book, so go get it. But you don't have to get up at 5am to do this. So I was one of those people that would wake up, my phone would wake me up, and I would then start scrolling. Immediately I would check emails, I would do all the things and an hour later, I would realize that I was still laying in bed and I was still scrolling on my phone. So what I do now is I will wake up, and I don't touch my phone other than to turn off my alarm. And I do three things. So the first thing that I will do is generally, sometimes I will go downstairs, sometimes I do it in our bedroom I meditate for about anywhere between 10 and 30 minutes, depending on how I feel, I will then go to our "gym", which is really just a treadmill in our garage, and I will get on my treadmill for about half an hour. And I will either walk or run, depending on what my body's telling me. And then I generally will make a cup of tea. And I will write in a journal or set an intention or think about something mindful for the day. And then I kind of start on my routine. And I really do the same thing at bedtime. It's just in the reverse order. And often though, the physical activity for me isn't getting on the treadmill, again, I'm going to see a chiropractor, and he's given me a lot of exercises that I have to do when my son would have homework going to have a lot of exercises. And I actually find them really relaxing to do in the evening after like a day where I've been sitting in a chair at the office or maybe haven't had the best posture, a lot of these activities, are these, are these exercises he's giving me to do that I find really helpful and relaxing. So I typically will do those in the evening. So yeah, and you know, I think it's, it's, for me figuring out the morning, and the bedtime routine was a complete game changer.

Shawna Rodrigues: 36:41

Oh, that's great. And it was the book is called the 5am Club. Is that what it's called?

Michele Thomson: 36:46

Yeah, I think it's called the 5am Club. And again, you do not have to get up at 5am, you can take that it's really finding three things that you're willing to kind of commit to on a regular basis. And, you know, that's one of the things that I like to tell people is that I don't do this every day. And if I don't do it every day, I don't think it's failure. I would have thought it was failure before. I listened to my body. The other morning, I was like, I'm not getting up. Like I just wanted to be in bed a little longer. I didn't get on my phone. I wasn't mindless scrolling. But I instead what I did was I put my earbuds in and I listened to a podcast, you know, like that was I found really educational. And it gave me a lot to think about for the day. So I felt like that was a good use of my time. But I allowed my body to be like today, I just don't feel like it. Yeah. And so I think that that's important for a lot of people to remember it's about what are you willing to commit to to do on a regular basis? It doesn't mean that you have to do it every single day. And if you don't, you're failing.

Shawna Rodrigues: 37:48

Yeah, no, it's the routine piece of it as well. And like committing to yourself and what you want to do first thing and last thing and taking ownership of your days. I like it.

Michele Thomson: 37:56

Yeah.

Shawna Rodrigues: 37:57

That's great.

Michele Thomson: 37:58

And it makes it easier, I think to incorporate new things like, you know, this year, I thought, what do I want to change? Well, there's lots of things that I want to change. But one of the things that I've been really wanting to do is I want to read more. And so I thought, well, how can I incorporate more reading into kind of what I'm already doing. And so you know, one of the things I teach about self care and how to incorporate it is to look at habits and rituals you already have in your day, and to kind of inject self care into those established routines. So for example, you know, in the morning, when I'm brushing my teeth, I'm often thinking about mindfulness. So this morning, I was thinking about this time that we were going to have together how I wanted to show up on this call and the energy that I wanted to bring to it and you know, thinking about how excited I was about, you know, finally being able to meet you and speak to your audience. So you know, whereas before, it would just be the act of brushing my teeth. But in terms of reading, a lot of the times in the evening, after dinner, I would find myself either on my phone, or on my laptop doing work, or I would, you know, be scrolling YouTube videos. And that's fine. And it's fine. But to do that every night.

Shawna Rodrigues: 39:04

Yeah.

Michele Thomson: 39:05

So instead of doing that now, I pick up my book, which I leave right beside the sofa where I sit every night and I'm already three quarters of the way through a book that I started two and a half weeks ago.

Shawna Rodrigues: 39:15

Yeah.

Michele Thomson: 39:16

And it's just because I'm replacing one thing for another. So it's, I haven't changed anything. I haven't changed any times or anything I do my routine is exactly the same. I've just now made a choice and a commitment that more often than not, I'm going to pick up my book rather than picking up my phone or my laptop.

Shawna Rodrigues: 39:35

Being more intentional. I like it. I like it a lot. Well, and the other thing we do for our guests, is the thank you for you coming on here is we give you a copy of one of the coloring books. So you get to have your choice of either Vintage Mermaid and Magnificent Ocean or You've Got This just inspirational quotes for coloring books. Which one can we send to you?

Michele Thomson: 39:55

I think You've Got This sounds really interesting.

Shawna Rodrigues: 39:59

Ooh, well good. So because you've got that, so we definitely, we will definitely let you have it. That sounds perfect. Yes. And the other thing that we also do is that we also have our grit wit, which is something that we can do this actionable that we can offer to our audience to be able to kind of apply something immediately. What are your thoughts on what they can take away from our conversation today to apply to their life?

Michele Thomson: 40:22

Yeah, I think probably just, you know, sort of what I just spoke about is, there's a couple of questions that I generally ask, you know, people that I work with, to kind of ask themselves, so that they can start thinking about some things that they can maybe tweak or change. So, you know, really quickly, I think one of the first questions is like, where do I want to be 30 days from now? I think sometimes we're like, where do I want to be six months or a year from now? And that's great. Don't get me wrong, but that's like, lofty. I'm like, some days, I'm just happy to keep myself alive. So where can I be 30 days from now? And what do I want to introduce into my life? And so I think when you can think about it in that context, it gives you this short term opportunity to really say, Okay, how, where can I move the needle in the next 30 days? You know, like I said earlier, what am I willing to commit to what are one or two things that I'm willing to commit to, on a regular basis, that's going to help me achieve where I want to be in 30 days. And then I think the two other important things that I wish I would have thought about when I was starting this journey, and I do now was to say to myself, like, on the days I spoke about, on the days that I don't want to do the thing that I said that I'm going to commit to, what can I say to myself, because it's really important that we start to change the stories and the narrative that we've created for ourselves, and start to put some positive change in there. So that that's that incentive, we also kind of need to make us do those things. So you know, like, what are some of the things that you can come up with something that you can say to yourself when the days that you're not feeling so, you know, so quick to want to kind of get up and do that. So, you know, it could be something like, you know, it's okay, change is hard, and committing to something new, that means that I'm super brave, and I'm deserving of everything that I desire for myself. You know, it's, it's putting that positiveness back into it. And then, you know, I think that you can also say to yourself something like, you know, today, I just need a break, I'm listening to myself, my body, and I'm becoming more aware of what it needs. And I'm giving myself the same empathy I would give to others, and I'm doing the best I can. And tomorrow's a new beginning. You know, I think it's really just allowing yourself to have that grace and apathy for yourself that we give others and sometimes we just, we don't think we're as, as worthy of it. So I think those are some things that I would ask people to think about doing.

Shawna Rodrigues: 42:48

Nice. So the first thing is just in 30 days, what would I like to have different about my life in 30 days? Would it be that I would like to be somebody who, who walks three times a week and in 30 days? And then what can I do to make that actionable? If I'm not getting there what am I going to say, to motivate myself and not judge myself? That kind of sounds like what is your?

Michele Thomson: 43:07

Absolutely, and you can do those things. Thinking you, you know, you had said, if you're gonna walk three times a week, you don't have to find that time on your own. If it's not super stressful, take your kids with you. Go walk with a girlfriend, you know, and then you're sort of killing two birds with one stone so to speak, you're also getting that, that connection and that socialization with with someone that you care deeply for, and making that connection, so or break it up into small 10, or 15 minute segments, I think that if you can work within existing habits that you already have, it just makes it a lot easier to incorporate those things into routines that are already established, so that you're not trying to check one more thing off your to do list.

Shawna Rodrigues: 43:46

Yes, I love that. That sounds great. Well, wonderful. So Michelle, when people want to connect with you, what is the best way for them to find you? Where can they can get in touch with you?

Michele Thomson: 43:55

Well, listen, I'm 51 years old. And so social media is the bane of my existence. So I'm not super present on social media. So I generally tell everybody just to go to my website, which is just CurisConsulting, it's a .ca. Because I'm in Canada, if you do .com, there is a Curis Consulting, but it's not me. My social media attachments are there. So if you go there, if you click on the LinkedIn, little icon, I do have in my bio, some self care journals and some like workbooks that you can go and, and get for free. And then I'm also going to be offering kind of a mini course starting at the end of March, early April of this year, for people who are wanting to really kind of figure out how to live the life that they really want and they desire and if they're feeling really stuck, and they don't understand how or why I want to kind of help them get through those breakthroughs and to be able to have the life that they is going to be most fulfilling for them. So if you're interested, go sign up, and I would love to have people join us.

Shawna Rodrigues: 44:57

Oh, that sounds wonderful. So just Curis, C-U-R-I-S consulting.ca.

Michele Thomson: 45:04

Correct.

Shawna Rodrigues: 45:04

So people can come and find you and get connected. That'll also be in the show notes. So you don't have to remember it, you'd have to click on it on the website on the links of where you're listening. So that's perfect. Thank you so much for coming and sharing with us today Michele. It has been very valuable.

Michele Thomson: 45:18

Thank you so much for having me. It's such a pleasure.

Shawna Rodrigues: 45:25

I appreciate your time. Thank you for sharing it with us. I hope you're already on our mailing list. Please send us a note each week to remind you about our episode. And every so often, we send you a little something more. We even set up coloring pages as a thank you for joining. So head on over to coloringpages.thegritshow.com to get your coloring pages and be added to the mailing list. In case you haven't heard it lately, you are the only one of you this world has got and that means something. I look forward to connecting again next week.