Grief, Resilience, and the Female Recession with Marie Hale

Featured Guest

Marie Hale is the co-founder and owner of @revenue, a sales and marketing collaborative, and professional speaker who founded fwd@rEvolution with a true understanding of what it takes to be resilient. Between 2017 and 2018 she lost her life and business partner and her best friend. As she had to find the strength over and over again to reassemble her life, she felt deeply that what she had been through had a bigger purpose.

When the pandemic hit, and parents everywhere began to crumble under the stress of the new kind of schooling, and the female recession began pushing equality back by decades, Marie started to rage. And then she made a plan.

With her 20 years of experience running multi-national teams and heart for big vision with powerful operational structures, she and the amazing team at @revenue got to work creating a solution for what is happening to working mothers and fathers today, and a plan on how to change it for the better in the future.

RESOURCES

Join the rEvolution! Follow us on social, and check out our podcast, Clutching Our Pearls.

episode transcription

Heather Clark  00:01

Welcome to Unshakable Being, the podcast with inspiration and practical tools for purpose led leaders like you to relieve stress, build resilience, and unlock vitality in your life, body and business. I am Dr. Heather Clark, and I’ll be your host.

Heather Clark  00:18

Hello, and welcome to the show. Today we have on Marie Hale. She is the co founder and owner of @revenue, a sales and marketing collaborative and professional speaker who founded fwd@rEvolution with the true understanding of what it takes to be resilient. Marie, welcome to the show.

Marie Hale  00:38

Dr. Clark, I’m so happy to be here. Thank you for having me.

Heather Clark  00:42

Thanks. Call me, Heather. For people who are listening, we had a conversation a couple of weeks ago, just to ensure that we were both a fit for each other to be on the show. And I am so thrilled to have her on. We’re going to shift the structure of the show a little bit because I think it’ll really serve everyone better. Because what we’re getting at is finding resiliency in the face of incredibly difficult circumstances. So, Marie, let’s start with your origin story.

Marie Hale  01:18

Yeah, it’s a fun place to start, because I think a lot of people right now understand incredibly difficult circumstances. So I I grew up in Vegas, which admittedly not a great place for humans. And, you know, kind of started working at 12 and was helping my mom with the bills and, you know, really just knew what it was to be gritty at a young age.

Marie Hale  01:45

And at 17 when I knew everything, I relocated to the exotic land of Berwyn, Illinois. For any of you that are Chicago natives or aficionados, you will remember Svengali and possibly the stick with all the cars on it, that is the exotic land of Berwyn. And really kind of found my home here in Chicago. It’s I love the people. I love the pace. It made sense to me, the men smelled right, you know, they got to smell right. That’s how you know you’re in the right space.

Marie Hale  02:21

And at 22, I opened my first company. I opened shimmy shock entertainment, which I know that looking at me, you think? Well, of course, she had to be a belly dancer. Because I was for 15 years, and went through the entrepreneurial seizure of I can do this better get out of my way. And I shortly thereafter, kind of got that entrepreneurial bug and I opened a medical spa, I became the executive director of a women network, which was this.

Marie Hale  02:55

We grew up from 12 to 350 women here in Chicago, and I was 25. At the time, they had no business listening to me. And luckily one of my coaches and friends, Linda McCabe, who was an absolute gem, she is well into her 70s and my absolute twin turned me on to this really great sales coach. And I said, sales coach, okay, I need to know how to sell. I was making 24 a year. And his classes were 18,000 a year. I knew I needed whatever he was selling. So I came back and I made a deal with them. And I started at $200. And I paid more and it paid more.

Marie Hale  03:42

And it blooms into not only a successful career, but a really beautiful friendship. And for 10 years, we were very close friends. He was the first person to see my daughter after she was born. We traded business back and forth. And lo and behold, 10 years later, we became a family. And I would be remiss to say that I didn’t fall in love with him the minute I walked into that Panera.

Marie Hale  04:10

And somewhere living in Texas, we’ve got this idyllic life, except for it’s not Chicago. And so we moved back to Chicago with this bombshell of a baby girl. And took his sales company and the marketing company that I’d spent 10 years building and put them under the same roof and we started a family business. And all of a sudden I had I had every dream that I ever dreamed come true.

Marie Hale  04:43

My guru and the love of my life. I had this baby girl that I’ve been dreaming about since I was eight years old. And we had a failing business changing the lives of other business owners. I I woke up Every day, just humble and grateful. And seven months later, he didn’t pick our girl up from daycare.

Marie Hale  05:18

There is something that is very unique about being a widow at 37. But what was more difficult than just losing at that level was that I had to grieve on brand. I had to figure out if I was going to keep this company that we had spent 10 years formulating alive, and actually step into his role and run the company.

Marie Hale  05:58

And I had a great team around me, and they Luckily, I mean, they just wrapped me up and loved me, and carried me through those first few days. And I started to wear red lipstick. Honestly, because I figured if people were looking at my lips, they wouldn’t be looking at my eyes. And crying in public was my new hobby. So I needed some kind of distraction. And I really just kind of kept telling myself, just put on your lipstick and keep walking. You don’t have to get it perfect today.

Marie Hale  06:40

But you do have to get through today. So get up and just do. And after a while, you know, things start to clear because grief is effed up and foggy and exhausting. And just no matter how you lose somebody, it’s a loss. And about seven months later, I was kind of together.

Marie Hale  07:19

And finally one of my doctors listens to me which I had been an aesthetician for like five years, I can’t imagine why nobody listens to me. When I said I’ve got a spot right here. And it’s not right. And it turns out that I had skin cancer in the middle of my face. And my mom sat next to me as they cut and cut and cut until there was a cigar butt gone from the middle of my face. And they told me that my lips would be a quarter of an inch distorted.

Marie Hale  07:56

And I was kind of looking through that filter and going okay. If I’m going to put on my lipstick and keep walking, and my face is going to be deformed.

Marie Hale  08:07

What else is there besides this that I can do. And so I grabbed my phone and I started documenting it. And I asked my friends to take a picture of themselves wearing red lipstick and tag it, I will still wear red and promised to get themselves into a dermatologist within the year.

Marie Hale  08:30

And I think we had 300 people sign up for the challenge and 13 cases of cancer were found. And so I said, Okay, maybe there really is something to this. Put on your lipstick and keep walking thing. And it was an anchor. For those of you that are psychology junkies or get into that which if you do call me I will dork out with you.

Marie Hale  08:55

When you can find an anchor that’s either inside of yourself or external. It gives you something especially when you’re emotionally disconnected to come back to and most people don’t know this, but at that time I was having panic attacks that were so severe that I was dissociating from my body.

Marie Hale  09:23

That’s a scary place to be to wake up and not know where you were, or not know how long you had been in the vestibule of that building and put on your lipstick and walk into work like nothing happened. But you do it because the alternative What is it

Marie Hale  09:49

to fall apart to not be able to take care of your daughter. That wasn’t a thing.

Marie Hale  09:56

And I got oh my god incredibly lucky. Um, my very best friend, her name was Laura and she is walking love to meet her to hear her laugh brightens up your whole day, even if you don’t know who she is. And she actually she, God bless her, she moved in with me to help me take care of that baby girl and run my office for me.

Marie Hale  10:28

And it was like, I came back together. And one day, we picked Lily up from Camp. And Laura told me that she couldn’t breathe.

Marie Hale  10:44

And by the time we got her to the ER, she was having a pulmonary embolism and she was gone. Five minutes later. In the span of 18 months, I lost my entire chosen family.

Marie Hale  11:03

Just go on. And what I found remarkable is that there are pieces of resiliency that you don’t know are there to serve you when you pick them up. And a great example is I, Marie Hale, I’m a Franklin Covey junkie. I have been planning my year and my month in my week, and my day, since I was 22.

Marie Hale  11:43

And that first year, when I couldn’t see anything, I sat down at the end of the year, because let’s face it, I just got my new Franklin Covey in the mail, and I was gonna play with that thing. But I looked back at the goals that Jim and I had set. And I had achieved all of them, according to the timeline that we had put to them.

Marie Hale  12:07

Because I had spent time training my subconscious mind to pick me up and carry me when my legs couldn’t do it. The other piece that I found wonderful and difficult at the same time as life often is, is that when I let Laura in, and when I was able to be vulnerable. She helped me heal. She found the pieces of me that I was hiding. And lovingly pulling them up. And mostly laughed at them. But we laughed at them together, because they were fixable.

Marie Hale  12:59

And it’s pretty hard not to put up walls, after you’ve had that kind of loss. And just say, you know, this pain is too much. Oh my, if you ever go on another internet date, where somebody says, No baggage allowed. broke ass man, you are 40 I don’t think if you know if you think I am newly minted on this earth, but we’re all showing up with a little something, get over yourself.

Marie Hale  13:32

You’re gonna have things that come with you. But for me, and I expect that everybody’s journey is going to be different. There is no one way to get through grief or loss, whether it’s loss of business, or loss of loved ones, or even just a friend that doesn’t talk to you anymore. being vulnerable enough to show up with the people that are worth it. And not push them away, is going to benefit you so tremendously. It is worth the pain that you’re going to walk through. because trust me, life is going to happen all over you whether you want it to or not.

Marie Hale  14:25

Look at what we went through when the pandemic set in. I mean, Heather, that was grief. Everybody grieved at the same time. But they didn’t know what to call it. Right? They didn’t know that this was tremendous loss. And so and I get that this is kind of specifically a Marie thing that I like to put. I figure if I’m going through something, somebody else has gone through it.

Marie Hale  14:54

And if they even just know that I’m there to hold space, then I’ve done my job. But I started talking about grief. Because nobody wants to talk about it like, it’s never gonna happen. Nobody’s making it out of here alive, I don’t know what y’all are planning for. If we can tear down some of that stigma around it, and give up and be vulnerable in that space, we’re not going to have to be afraid of falling down anymore. Because we’ve used that muscle, and we proved it out.

Marie Hale  15:36

And you can step a little bit more fully into the parts of life that you have. And that, for me has been the ultimate, the ultimate saving grace is that I was able to take at least some part and use it to lift somebody else up. Maybe it’s today, maybe it hits them 10 years down the road.

Marie Hale  16:09

But let’s talk about it. And let’s give people the tools that they don’t need, so that they’re there when they do. And that’s kind of where I’m at today. All of that kind of came together. And when I was sitting there in October, as a third grade teacher, which I was not meant to be he Oh, and everything was happening.

Marie Hale  16:40

And I was on the verge of a nervous breakdown. And then I saw the female recession. And I was like, Oh, hell no, this isn’t, you’ve got to be kidding me. I broke, like, I’m literally just broke inside. And then that old skill set of, if you’re going through this, somebody else is going through this, how can you fix it for everybody kind of came up to hold me.

Marie Hale  17:05

And I was able to reformat my entire business, to be able to support those that have been pushed out by the diversity recession, and not tell them what they should want their lives to be. If you don’t want to go back to the boardroom, guess what, we just proved that you don’t have to. But you also don’t have to be kicked down the ladder, 2030 years, there’s a different way to do things.

Marie Hale  17:30

Let’s be the difference. Let’s figure it out and make something beautiful and wild grow out of the scorched earth that the pandemic has left us with. And so I keep it moving forward. And if you keep letting me talk, Heather, I will keep going.

Heather Clark  17:51

I’m giving you the space to speak, because there’s a lot of really wonderful things in your story. And there’s a lot right alongside with the the horror, and the deep loss and the aching grief. There’s also beauty and an inner resiliency that’s come out. And what I especially like, is as you’re sharing it, it’s not like an I just pushed right through.

Heather Clark  18:19

It’s more No, I moved through. And, and you chose to move through. And it feels like the way you chose to move through was showing up fully as you like, this is what’s happening. And not with not with oversharing not with Oh, okay, everybody, here’s what’s going on. But more like, No, just an acknowledgement. This is what’s happening. This is where I’m at in this moment. And let’s move on. Okay, great. And I find I like I’m stopping now. Cool. Breathe, use those tools and then move to the next step.

Marie Hale  18:56

Yeah. And then drama doesn’t serve. It doesn’t. If you need to take a minute and cry.

Heather Clark  19:04

Take a minute and cry.

Marie Hale  19:06

It is terrifying. As people treat them to be, take a second cry, and then come back. But it doesn’t need to be a game stopper and you don’t need to play that victim role. Because that’s not going to get you or anybody else anywhere. Yes, it sucks out loud. Let it suck and then move on.

Heather Clark  19:31

Yeah, and it’s not like, Oh, I’m worried they’ll think I’m trying to manipulate them because there’s some people that just can’t be present with someone who’s crying and just okay, well let that be their problem. doesn’t need to be my problem. that’s their problem. That’s fine.

Marie Hale  19:49

Yeah, and you know what, we even took it and built it into our employee agreement. Tears are okay. We also expect you to be a smartass and be able to cuss a little bit If that’s what’s gonna make you a good fit, and if we can all show up and be in our own skin, how much more abundance do we get to bring?

Heather Clark  20:10

Exactly? And how much less work? Is it to be at work at that point? Or in life? Yeah.

Marie Hale  20:18

Yeah, that mask has to be the heaviest thing anybody wears. And I think one of the things because I’m always looking for like, What’s changed? What’s cool? What do I like about this? What? Right? So I’m looking at how networking has changed during the pandemic. And I got to the point where I dreaded networking. And this was a quote for me, because this is how I’ve built several businesses. So tired of seeing the, my business is great, everything is wonderful. I’m killing it, how are you?

Marie Hale  20:59

And I’m like, woman, I have known you for 12 years. Don’t show don’t you mask me. But it’s so much work to keep that up. And then I’m going to lose interest. Because I don’t need to help you throw that thing to the side, I was going to be here to love you, and not judge and hold space, and share awesome sauce.

Marie Hale  21:24

And if you need help, I’m going to find a way to get to you. But when we’re not vulnerable with each other, when we’re more concerned with the aesthetic of perfection, hello Instagram filters. We lose the value in the beauty of our human relationships. For more what’s too high of a cost

Heather Clark  21:46

Well you’re bringing up a very interesting point. Because yes, yes, networking has changed quite a bit. Although there’s a lot that still stays the same. There is a balance point in vulnerability, especially when you’re showing up as a service business. You don’t want to show up and just be like, Hi, everybody, I’m so and so. And my life is falling apart in this way.

Heather Clark  22:09

Like that doesn’t help. doesn’t build confidence and value in in the business either. And I completely agree. And I want to dig into how to do this. But I really agree that when people show up with that mask on, everything is great. Yeah, no, no, we can all smell that it isn’t. And nobody, yeah, nobody’s going to participate. So how are you finding that balance point? And how do you guide clients to find that balance point of being vulnerable? Without oversharing? And without being a detriment to your business or your career? wherever you’re at? Yeah, well,

Marie Hale  22:47

and I love that you brought that up, because it is a balance. And for those of us that need to be known as industry experts, hot mess is typically not the brand we lead with. One of the most powerful tools we have in our relationship building Arsenal, is allowing others to be of service.

Marie Hale  23:11

When you get to do someone a favor. How much deeper does that relationship become? Not that you’re expecting anything back in return, but you’ve had an opportunity to be of service. Ask for what you need. If you’ve identified that there is a absolute glitch in your bookkeeping system, you don’t need to say I’ve lost

Marie Hale  23:40

$100,000 that totally should have been in an account. But you can say hey, I’m really struggling with this bookkeeping thing. And right now it is priority number two, on my books, right underneath my clients, I need connections to and then share your values to a bookkeeper that is going to listen to me, help me understand what’s happening.

Marie Hale  24:12

And push back at me when I’m not thinking about things the right way so that we can get my books together and make it stick. Who do you know? Now they get the opportunity to be a hero. And so being very direct in your ask is critical. And you should not walk into a networking room that you don’t have something you can ask for. And that does not mean asking for new clients. Stop it. Casey we know if we know somebody that wants to give you large amounts of money immediately. We will make that introduction.

Marie Hale  24:53

But what is going to solve a problem for you and in that A space, you can open up and be vulnerable. And then as you build high quality relationships, which is the purpose of you going to networking events, if you build three great relationships out of a room of 300, you will get more value than if you walk in and blindly sell 10 people, because it will feed itself over and over. Find the people that are of quality, and know your values, so that you know when it’s appropriate to be vulnerable. And those are the people that are going to be there to pick you up.

Marie Hale  25:36

When your world. And those are the people that love you enough to tell you, you’re being stupid? How much money would you have saved in your business? If you had somebody that loved you enough to be like, hey, dummy, what are you doing?

Marie Hale  25:53

This is love.

Marie Hale  25:55

This is somebody loving you enough to say the uncomfortable thing. I have a list of friends that I call them my business girlfriends. anytime they need it, they get five minutes to call and scream, then they go back to their day. This is another way of just in sharing that vulnerability. And the fact that we’re business owners, we’re leaders, sometimes we need to lose our ship for a minute. So that we can come back to center and be that servant based leader that we want to be because perfection Ain’t nothing. Yet this

Heather Clark  26:38

is very similar to a conversation I just had with a good friend about conscious complaining. And we were examining some things that were going on, not just in the culture, but in life specifically. And like complaining can actually be a really helpful tool. The the losing your shit is actually a really helpful tool when applied appropriately. And then there comes a time when you’re just like, Oh, I’m just, it’s not just complaining, I’m bitching. Okay? Maybe that’s not helpful anymore. Or maybe the losing my shit was not it’s not therapeutic anymore. Maybe that’s my go to and perhaps I could look at that. But

Marie Hale  27:17

They love you enough to say something.

Heather Clark  27:19

Exactly. The whole Oh, we’ve we’ve heard this enough. Now. It’s time to take an action. or shut up about it like, oh, okay, thank you for that important insight that may or may not be difficult to hear.

Marie Hale  27:34

I’d rather hear it the not hear it.

Heather Clark  27:36

Right. And I love the characterization that it’s find somebody that loves you enough to give you that feedback. I had a client who’s has a very successful Facebook group. And she had somebody sent her a private message with what felt like a list of complaints about the group.

Heather Clark  27:55

And I was like, well, but first, can we just acknowledge how useful that is that somebody cares enough about this group to offer this feedback, albeit unsolicited. Thank goodness they care enough to. And then she was able to change her perception of what was happening. And then was, Oh, well, I feel like she has a point here. And I don’t agree with her here. It’s like thing, great. Run your group how you want to. But what an honor.

Marie Hale  28:25

Yeah, there are pieces like that, too. And I don’t know if if you have this experience, but I still have that. Do you remember in Sex in the City when Carrie got the first email from Aiden? And she looked shocked, because she wasn’t sure if he could see her. One of the times emails that come in that are like that, and I I have a team member that I’ll send them to and be like, I can’t I you know, I can’t open this one, can you just open it and give me some cliff notes so that I can not procrastinate and move through it. That kind of having that balance system. It takes the sting out of it, it takes the ego out of it.

Heather Clark  29:09

Right. And that’s a great tool. It’s an excellent stress management tool to use the support structures that are in place, you immediately identified because it seems like you either are normally an introspective person or you know life has happened. So now you’re an introspective person, but to have that awareness that this could be a problem. I know I’m probably going to put this off.

Heather Clark  29:30

Let me hand it off to somebody who can handle this in a way that fully supports me. And it’s more than just having somebody read an email. There’s like what in your life is a problem that you could reach out to a friend to a spouse, to an employee to you know, coach or mentor, a partner, right?

Marie Hale  29:48

You need to

Heather Clark  29:50

zactly and then get that shift. Without Oh, well I need to do it all myself. Like Who told you that? Where did you get that idea?

Marie Hale  30:00

Nobody said that. Nobody said that. And one of the things that is an absolute saboteur of your flow, your energy, your business, is when you start letting that stuff stack up behind you. And all of a sudden, the white noise prevents you from being present. Because that’s the only thing anybody really wants from you to be present, whether it’s your kid, your client, your team member, yourself, when you do that self care thing that I’m still trying to figure out. You got to be in skin.

Marie Hale  30:40

You can’t do that, if you’re paying attention to all of the things that you’ve put off swept under a rug, or are pretending are not there. Give them up,

Marie Hale  30:52

give them to somebody else. And men, does it pay to have somebody that just will professionally love you enough to tell you when your shit stinks. Maybe that can be the next business enterprise.

Heather Clark  31:16

I love it with this approach. It’s a different. It’s a different approach with vulnerability. And it sounds like you are have really built that muscle of being vulnerable, and allowing it to happen, and doing it in a way that’s appropriate for where you’re at.

Heather Clark  31:34

So at a networking meeting, I’ve been to a networking meeting where someone had an ask. And it was she hadn’t really processed it. So she was having a bit of a breakdown in front of us. And it wasn’t. First of all, that’s neither right nor wrong. And it was an environment where it was like, Well, okay, that’s interesting. And sometimes you can’t help that happens. And she was vulnerable. And I honor her for that, but she couldn’t get her ask out. And it was in an environment where people had a hard time there was a high proportion of people in this particular group that didn’t seem to be able to tolerate emotional intensity very well, is how I’ll put it. So she couldn’t get

Marie Hale  32:27

her way of saying it was a bunch of dudes.

Heather Clark  32:30

It was it was a group of women. Okay, I have it’s a whole I have a whole diatribe on this, which I’ll not go into here. But they were perhaps a bit disconnected. And we’re leaning very heavily on identity and how it looks. And and it’s like her being vulnerable somehow was a risk to them. It was really interesting.

Marie Hale  32:55

Yeah,

Marie Hale  32:57

I have to say watching people respond to tears is always interesting. You can tell the people that are crawling out of their skin. And I always wonder I’m like, what’s going on in there? Because you can see what’s going on in here. Cheers. I don’t even let my mascara run. I’ve really got this down pat.

Heather Clark  33:27

But yeah, they had a hard time receiving it. And she wasn’t able to get her ask out and and I think it was great that she was vulnerable. But there are different ways of being vulnerable. Like if you happen to fall apart, okay, you fell apart, whatever, that’s fine, that happens. But you had a very Matter of fact, approach to vulnerability. And so it’s like I’m being vulnerable here. I am not necessarily airing all of my dirty laundry and I have to tell people, oh my god, the disaster on my business on that’s why I needed the bookkeeper is more like, no, this is my ask, this is what I’d like, these are the values who you got. Done. Right.

Marie Hale  34:06

And I think it also goes for not talking smack about somebody that didn’t do a good job.

Heather Clark  34:14

Right?

Marie Hale  34:15

fell down, right. And that I will say that that process is for me. I journal and like I don’t journal in a diary cuz it drives me crazy. I do it in my Franklin Covey. But when I have joy, I’m like, okay, you know, here’s the pain behind it. Here’s the fear. Here are the gains that I need to get, what are my opportunities?

Marie Hale  34:44

And when you can take it out of the emotion and really understand what the business case is for it. Now you can move it forward. And yes, the feelings might still come up and that’s okay. If you sit down at your books and you realize that your business partner to $250,000, while you were filing bankruptcy, scream out, you go get the tequila and you do what you need to do. But you’ll get back up the next day and say, Okay, I’m going to face this head on, because I am 100% responsible for everything that happens in my life. Whether it happens to me, or I’m about to happen all over it.

Marie Hale  35:31

I’m the last stop. And when you’re the last stop,

Marie Hale  35:36

it’s your decision as to whether or not you’re going to move forward,

Heather Clark  35:40

but responsible for not to blame for

Marie Hale  35:43

right

Heather Clark  35:44

huge distinction that sometimes people aren’t making Oh, well, I’m responsible. And they mean, oh, I’m to blame, I should have done something I should have this I should have. That’s like, okay, that first of all, no. Second of all, this is what’s happened. This is your current situation. And you’re responsible for it. Meaning, how do you choose to move forward? What lessons do you choose to take with you on a go forward basis for what just happened? Let like, beat yourself up if you want to, not terribly useful.

Marie Hale  36:21

calories or anything, like I don’t know why we’re doing this. If there were some other value, I would say, enjoy. But I don’t think it strengthens the lesson that you learn. It sure as hell doesn’t make the people around you any happier. And the if there was somebody that you wronged you beating yourself up about it, unless they’re kind of just a messed up human, that’s not going to have value to them either.

Marie Hale  36:50

Put your energy where it’s actually going to do some good, right. And, you know, the so for those of you that are jack, Canfield junkies, me, that’s the that is chapter one in success principles. 100% responsibility, you can only be responsible for the things that you can impact.

Marie Hale  37:10

But that includes your response. If you can start there, and then make the best decision you can at the time, with the information that you have, you’re going to get so much farther, and yes, you’re going to fail. And yes, you’re going to fall down. But fail fabulously. Get out there and get scraped knees and get bombed, bruised, and pick yourself back up.

Marie Hale  37:42

Because it’s that experience of allowing yourself to be hurt. So that you can grow and strengthen your skill set. and not being afraid of being hurt. Because, again, life, you don’t get to control the whole thing as much as you’d like to. The only thing that you can control is your response, your attitude and your actions. And then just try not to be a screaming asshole. There’s that.

Heather Clark  38:21

But yeah, and it. And I love these conversations about responsibility. And it’s a balanced responsibility, because a fair number of clients that I work with tend to try and take on responsibility that isn’t theirs, which is incredibly stressful. And then you’ve got all this crap to wade through, that’s not even yours to wade through.

Heather Clark  38:41

And it’s it’s diluting your attention. It’s diluting your focus. It’s like, Well, you know, I gotta manage so and so’s emotions is like, No, you don’t got to do nothing. And that’s an interesting choice. It’s neither right nor wrong to do it. But does it work for you? Is that a balanced approach?

Marie Hale  38:59

Yeah. And you’re also training people how to treat you. Now, if I have a choice, in how people are going to treat me, tiny blonde woman to put on their problems on is not on the list for me, nor is cleaning up somebody else’s crap because they didn’t take responsibility for it.

Marie Hale  39:28

One of my favorite terms is I invite you to be yourself by yourself. That’s a quote from Suicidal Tendencies for anybody who was into ska death metal back in the 90s. But if you’re not going to show up like a grown up, please be yourself by yourself. Because if I’m going to change the world, if I’m going to be the person that I want to be, that I’m going to be proud of which is where it should start? I can’t do it if I’m carrying all your crap and dealing with my own. And I don’t want to just slug through life I want to dance.

Heather Clark  40:18

Yeah, it’s, it’s like, wow, that’s an interesting choice to take on that from someone else. Okay. And again, it is neither right nor wrong, but please recognize that it’s a choice.

Marie Hale  40:30

That is, oh, that’s the hardest part. Because you think you’re saving somebody you think you’re doing something good for him?

Heather Clark  40:36

Oh, yeah, no, that is, that’s total Drama triangle thinking. And that does not lead to joy does not lead to an empowered life doesn’t get you what you want. It just has the appearance of relieving stress right up front. And it feels great to do because it’s socially acceptable, but it is, it is actually not helpful at all.

Marie Hale  41:00

Nope. And then we train entire generations of folks to not take responsibility for everything, and to have expectations. And oh, let me tell you about your expectations. And my responsibility to make everything okay for you.

Heather Clark  41:21

Sure is,

Heather Clark  41:22

and then you set the boundary. And then the challenging part is when you first set boundaries for most people is just letting people respond. However they respond or react, however they react, and the more important the boundary is to set. Typically, the more pushback you’ll receive, like, Okay, well, enjoy. Try and make me the villain. Okay. It’s total Drama Triangle move. enjoy that. Okay.

Marie Hale  41:51

that serves you. Fantastic, but it no longer serves me. Yeah. I think that’s the part of resiliency that I’d like to tie it back to is being truly resilient, is simply the choice that you make every day to choose you. Yes, it is you in pain. Yep, you wish it was you and somebody else. But you can at least choose yourself every day.

Heather Clark  42:26

And that is the deepest part of profound self care. Because that’s one of the things I teach people about self care, because it’s one of the things I deal with the stress. And in the research. That’s one of the biggest stress busters and resiliency builders is self care. But people tend to misappropriate it, and they’re, and again, it isn’t wrong.

Heather Clark  42:49

But they’re using self care in a way to manage a crummy situation that may not exist if they were putting themselves first. So put yourself first, ruthlessly, relentlessly without fail. And sometimes it’s just asking, Well, what do I require here? What do I desire? And it’s like, it’s just questions like that. But if you’re not at the center of your own life, ain’t nothing gonna work. And it’s a muscle to build, or at least for many people, it’s a muscle to build.

Marie Hale  43:24

Yeah, and I think so often we look for self care outside of ourselves. I can only take so many Epsom salt baths.

Marie Hale  43:32

Yeah, really,

Marie Hale  43:33

I prune very easily. And so I think that’s the gift that I get to take away today. Dr. Clark, is that resiliency is, is choosing you and doing it from a place of strength and joy. And it’s gonna take practice, does,

Heather Clark  43:54

it does take practice for a lot of people, not everybody. And usually, one of the first questions is Oh, but what if I end up being a jerk? Like, well, if you’re a jerk right now, you probably will be a jerk when you put yourself first if you’re not a jerk, then it’s unlikely. But that’s actually what’s gonna happen.

Heather Clark  44:13

Like, it’s more like, oh, people are responding to you, or reacting to you putting yourself first. And maybe those are the people that that inconveniences. Maybe their strong reaction is about, they don’t want to have to put themselves at the center of their own life and take whatever responsibility is there. Like or maybe

Marie Hale  44:33

it’s an opportunity to ask them to be themselves by them.

Heather Clark  44:39

Love that.

Heather Clark  44:43

So, I want to do a little bit of a turn because I want to find out a lot more about the female reception recession, the diversity recession. Tell us what that is. Tell us what’s going on. And then you know what to do about it. Go

Marie Hale  45:00

So what happened was the pandemic hit. And all of the social constructs that we thought we had set up, completely fell apart. And it became very clear very quickly that in our, and even I hate saying this, but in our desire as feminists to have it all, let’s face it, we all have to work, we all have to pitch in and raise the kids.

Marie Hale  45:36

And if you have one of those enlightened souls and partners in your life, that is an equal distribution of work. High five, because you’re like a unicorn. Start writing your novel now because everybody wants to figure out what it is you did. For the rest of us who are single moms, or who happened to make slightly less than our husbands or our diverse.

Marie Hale  46:08

We saw an absolute massacre. In the job industry. 2.4 million jobs were lost for women in the past year, 30 years of pay equality, gone in the first six months. And it was, it’s called the feminine recession. But it truly is a diversity recession. Because when they started cutting jobs, where did they start? Right?

Marie Hale  46:43

It starts at the lower income brackets, most of those jobs are filled with, with African American and Latin people, and you name it, and then it started moving up and people were getting mommy tracks, right? Because what happens when you have to take a day off to take care of your kids?

Marie Hale  47:03

Oh, there goes Catherine again. She’s got to go take care of her kids. When Kevin does it. Oh, my God, Kevin is such a good dad. Look. Are you kidding? You know that some woman spent four hours getting ready for Kevin to take over for that day. And it’s going to come home and clean it up to like, let’s, let’s take a reality check.

Marie Hale  47:31

So we lost a massive amount of diversity at every level of industry. And we are expected to hit a $5 trillion deficit to the GDP in the next five years, just from the loss of talents. How, right. And I will tell you like I get it when I was trying to jump through the hoops that the Chicago Public School District had my eight year old at the time going through.

Marie Hale  48:09

And I’ve been in martec marketing technology for 15 years. And I can’t figure out how to get into this zoom like. And the stress is just building and building. And I’ve been through some stuff without having a full nervous breakdown. And that almost put me over the edge. She hated me. Everything was horrible, terrified about my business. I can’t imagine what it was what it would have been like if I was in a less secure position.

Marie Hale  48:47

And so we’ve got this huge part of the workforce that has been pushed out. Many of them are going to choose not to go back. We just proved that we don’t have to do things the way that things have always been done. And so we can go back and do them the way that they always were just to get ourselves back. And it’s our fault. I really hate it when shits my fault. So I kind of lost it at that point.

Marie Hale  49:15

And, and I started thinking about like, what when my business girlfriends reached out and pulled me out of the muck and wire. The first things they did is said one Hey, stupid you’ve been an entrepreneur since you were 22 you don’t play by the rules. Why are you bothering now? Oh, right. I forgot that I had choices. This is what strips us of our power. Right? Because money and choices. Give people power.

Marie Hale  49:50

I don’t need people to empower us. I don’t need you to hand me power. I should have power because I should have power. That’s it. Thought. So I was like, okay, so if I can give them choices, let’s grab the homeschool consultant that walks you through how to actually create an enjoyable and stress free homeschool experience. And that hybrid schooling person, and the person that can teach us how to work on flexible incomes, because Hello, money ain’t gonna come in the way that it used to.

Marie Hale  50:26

And oh my god, you’ve just lost your entire identity, because you played by the rules for 30 years, and get kicked in the forehead. And now you’ve no idea who you are, let’s find somebody that can help with that, too. And I started putting together all of these people that I’m like, if I had a magic wand, and if I could say to people from every walk of life, and I’m gonna say this lovingly, don’t hold it against me.

Marie Hale  50:53

But really, there’s like seven to 12, middle aged white guys that I’m letting him. Most of the rest of them have kept their jobs, they’re fine, they can keep going. And they can help us because they need to be looking at us saying that is not allowed in my world power of choice.

Marie Hale  51:16

But if we can start taking care of the whole person first. And find ways to connect them to work and keep them at the top of their game, we can do what really true feminist movement should do, which is look at the human sitting across from you and say, What do you want? What works for you?

Marie Hale  51:41

Let’s create that, as opposed to what was imagined for you by somebody 40 or 50 years ago. And so we started the revolution. And I knew that I had a business model that could handle parts of it. But really, because you know, you can probably tell them don’t go small here.

Marie Hale  52:08

And really, the purpose is to work out all the bugs and make sure that we’re solid and flying high, and sell the ability for people to work on their own terms to every industry that is ready for a revolution.

Marie Hale  52:22

Go be the revolution of engineering and get brilliant minds that they take care of their parents, and it only works for them to work 15 hours a week, or go get that brilliant mind that is an absolute badass in their industry. But they just realized they don’t need to work 60 hours a week, if they’re working for outcomes as opposed to time served, you get a completely different experience.

Marie Hale  52:51

And then let’s help those people that want to start their own companies because they’re going to be damned if they have to go back and work for the guy that took their job when they got cans and do his job. Well, he makes more money than they do. Let’s break it open, shake it down, and then give it back into the world so that people have the money and the choices. They need to be in control of their lives. I think that’s what you asked me,

Heather Clark  53:23

that’s that’s what I asked. And I really love that because so even just tying something like self care back into this, there’s you can’t self care your way out of a total lack of infrastructure.

Heather Clark  53:39

So this I love because there is a total lack of infrastructure or at least fully supportive infrastructure for people who, because it’s, a lot of times it falls to the woman to get things done. I have a friend who partway through the pandemic discovered she was suddenly working from home.

Heather Clark  54:01

And her partner was working from home, but it was her at the kitchen table with both of her daughters on their computers not getting her work done because she was supporting them on their zoom calls. And I was like there is another adult in that home.

Heather Clark  54:15

I just don’t really think that that was an isolated incident. Right? Kind of like when there’s childcare duties. You alluded to that. It’s typically the woman when there is someone who is ill like and an aging parent. Like, who’s the one that creates the time out of their schedule to show up and do it and then has to listen to it while you know you’ve got better availability like really

Marie Hale  54:47

well, but really, that is not that way, right? Because we make less our jobs are more disposable. We’ve got the social construct that we can take care of every And we wanted to do everything, we wanted to have it all. So here you go, like, Oh, great.

Marie Hale  55:08

That’s not how that’s supposed to work kids. And so we’ve got a lot more work to do. And we have to look at our allies. The cool thing is, we’ve got a world where people don’t expect to retire from one place. And so those of you that are in those decision making jobs, you’ve got to be able to look at your team and say, if you’re not standing up for the people that kept this world together, during one of our most crucial times, I’m going to go find a company that will. And I guarantee you, you’re going to be part of the change. But you got to make a choice.

Heather Clark  55:51

Yeah, and there are some industries that are, in my opinion, ripe for this revolution. But it’s very difficult to bring it up. And I’m thinking of all the different facets of healthcare, like, you know, this could be the Armageddon we’ve been waiting for same time, because it is typically highly dysfunctional.

Heather Clark  56:13

And the way that people get paid is through different channels. So it, you have to be there for the time and have your productivity up, and all this other good stuff, just to get paid. So it’s very difficult. How do people in a position like that begin to essentially you’re talking about disrupt the industry, but in a way that really works for them, but still maintaining their income.

Marie Hale  56:41

Right. So when you’re looking at pieces like that, and this always gets touchy, because we are talking about medicine. So when I say things like sell close client, know that it’s coming from a place of these are things that have to happen, if we don’t think medicine is a business.

Marie Hale  56:58

Welcome to it.

Marie Hale  57:00

But when you’re dealing with clients, being able to have subsidiary streams of revenue, that fall under the same brand, is incredibly powerful. Being able to condense and operationalize using things like natural language processors, and RPMs, that can really empower a tech stack that can get your medical billing done.

Marie Hale  57:28

And all of those things is going to allow you to reduce the amount of time invested in each patient, right, because you don’t need to sit there and do eo B’s, and put in tons of notes by hand with every click this is it’s a huge time suck. And there are tools out there that can help you increase that, streamline it and add.

Marie Hale  57:50

And then you’ve got to put up boundaries that are good for you. Right, if you are a night person, do not book yourself at eight o’clock in the morning, when your executive function is pop. Make sure that you’re following things like your circadian circadian rhythm, which is part of self care, to position you for moments of brilliance when you’re on and hold those big, sexy, beautiful boundaries, like they are gold.

Marie Hale  58:21

Because if you are functioning within your boundaries, and you’re looking at how to maximize that time, what’s it going to do, it’s going to force you to think outside the box, you’re going to have to put together the pieces you need to scale or increase per patient revenue. And there are ways to do it ethically, which is number one, but to also do it to better serve the patients that you have.

Marie Hale  58:51

Because there’s so many times that we don’t offer that next thing. And again, not outside the parameters of your licensure but

Heather Clark  59:00

right

Marie Hale  59:03

could be an accelerator for the patient that you’re working with.

Heather Clark  59:09

Well, and and that works great when you’re in a position that you can make some of those choices. There’s a lot of people in, in the biz, they’re called ancillary professionals, but people who are professional have gone to school for a lot of years to do all the stuff they’re doing. And it’s a very rigid model.

Marie Hale  59:27

Right?

Heather Clark  59:27

And they find they have very little control over their time. And many people when they establish the boundary, find themselves in a meeting with HR. And it can be a very difficult line to walk to the point where, you know, perhaps unionization is the way to go. It’s very difficult to move through it.

Marie Hale  59:52

And there’s there’s not a business class that comes with your medical degree. But there are there are opportunities out there and there are groups that are just thought incubators for this particular challenge. If you would like connections to those, I’m happy to provide them I do a ton of work in this space.

Heather Clark  1:00:12

Yes, please. Because there’s a lot of listeners that are healthcare professionals. And like, really, there’s resources. We want to hear about all of them. Yes, please. It’ll be in the show notes.

Marie Hale  1:00:25

Yeah. And because it’s still a business, operationalize, know what your KPIs are, understand what the parameters of your contracts are. And if it’s time for you to branch out on your own, so that you can create the kind of change that you want to see in your world and possibly the world of others. Find a way to do it. But you got to get out there and shake it up.

Heather Clark  1:00:59

Well, and it’s it’s taking the responsibility that’s yours, looking at your choices, and not pushing through them, but moving through them and fully choosing.

Heather Clark  1:01:09

I love it. Thank you.

Heather Clark  1:01:12

So what’s it mean to you to be unshakable?

Marie Hale  1:01:20

To be unshakable is to be able to stand in your high heels knowing exactly who you are, and wiggle with the shake, and keep smiling. It’s just your dance.

Heather Clark  1:01:37

For me, where can we find you?

Marie Hale  1:01:40

You can find us at FWD revolution.com and Marie Hale all over Facebook. You can also find us at@revenue.com

Heather Clark  1:01:55

beautiful.

Heather Clark  1:01:57

Thank you so much for coming on the show. I’ve enjoyed this immensely.

Marie Hale  1:02:01

This is a good time with Dr. Clark. I like it

Heather Clark  1:02:07

 thank you

Heather Clark  1:02:10

Thanks so much for listening. I’d love to hear from you. Go to unshakablebeing.com and submit your question, comment, or topic request. May you be unshakable, unstoppable, and vibrant again. Until next time.