Before a leader can make an impact, they must first know who they are impacting. And to know someone requires both the art of listening and the gift of storytelling.
Juliet Hahn is an entrepreneur, a podcast hostg, a performance coach, a consultant, a speaker, a mother, a wife, and a friend to many. Her impact is felt across industries and by thousands of listeners and fans. Juliet is the host of Your Next Stop Podcast and was voted #12 in the top 50 moms in podcasting and #27 in the Hot 50 podcasts by Podcasting Magazine.
Host Fran Racioppi traveled to Long Island for a conversation on the importance of listening in storytelling, the opportunities growing up with severe dyslexia provided her, Juliet’s tips on pursuing dreams, and how to go hard for five days then take two days to enjoy the beach or whatever makes you happy.
—
[podcast_subscribe id=”554078″]
Juliet started her coaching career as a virtual health and fitness coach. After gaining 65 lbs with each pregnancy and her body changing after 40, she made a conscious effort to exercise and eat a more balanced diet. The results truly changed her life, and it was her mission to share her formula with others. In 2015, she began a new adventure as a virtual health and fitness coach supporting women to lose weight, become stronger, and regain their confidence.
In 2021, Juliet decided to pivot away from health and fitness coaching and into helping people connect to their passions. She offers a workshop called “Your Next Stop” (YNS) that empowers people to find their creative passion and turn it into a business which she believes everyone has the ability to do; they just need the correct tools. In addition to her workshop, she uses her YNS Podcast and YNS Live to highlight people who have turned passions into careers. This platform shares inspiring stories from people all over the world.
Through these conversations, Juliet guides people to explore their past in order to connect the dots to their own story. Everyone has a story and it is through sharing, active listening (and sometimes laughing) that people connect and learn from one another.
Combining these two paths has led to a partnership with NFL Thread to create a series that explores the lives and stories of NFL spouses and partners. This series chips away at the perception of NFL women and showcases their talents, initiatives and missions.
Impact is defined as the effect on something or someone. Leaders impact people more often than they impact events. Before a leader can make an impact, they must first know who they are impacting. To know someone requires both the art of listening and the gift of storytelling. Juliet Hahn is an entrepreneur, podcast host, performance coach, consultant, speaker, mother, wife, and friend to many. Her impact is felt across industries by thousands of readers and fans.
Juliet is the host of the Your Next Stop podcast and was voted number 12 in the Top 50 Moms in Podcasting and number 27 in the Hot 50 Podcasts by Podcast Magazine. Her Your Next Stop Workshop has helped hundreds gain the courage to follow their passion. For this episode, I convinced my daughter to join me for a road trip to Westhampton and New York, Long Island where I got back to hosting and she filled in as our Marketing Coordinator.
We met Juliet in her friend’s design studio and talked about the importance of listening and storytelling, the opportunities growing up with severe dyslexia provided her and her leap of faith away from advertising to health and fitness coaching. Juliet also shared her top ten tips on starting a podcast or pursuing any dream you might have. Plus, she showed us the importance of going hard for five days and taking two days to enjoy the beach or whatever makes you happy.
—
Juliet, welcome to the Jedburgh Podcast.
I’m so excited to be here. Thank you for having me.
Thanks for inviting us to Westhampton Beach. We are way out here on Long Island.
It is a great place to live. Thank you for taking the trek to do it.
Impact is something I care very deeply about. Anyone who reads this, knows me, and works with me knows that impact is one of my driving factors. Impact is defined as the ability to have a strong effect on someone or something. As leaders, that effect or that impact that we have on other people is often more important than the result of the action that we are doing. We always talk about, “I achieve this in business.” Did you motivate people? Do they like you? Does everybody hate you? That is the lasting impact and what you leave with people.
I would argue that one of the best definitions of leadership is the ability to inspire others to do the things they would not otherwise do themselves. In essence, it is to impact them. Everyone is inspired differently. They are called to action in different ways. The best leaders find ways to form meaningful connections with their people and then direct those people to action to drive action.
You are a coach, mentor, consultant, podcast host, mother, wife, speaker, and storyteller. Always, you impact others in so many diverse and different domains. These mediums have allowed you to connect with people on such a meaningful level and push them to become the best versions of themselves. It is something that you started your quest on in your drive of self-identity to say, “I want to be a better version of myself.”
You have impacted thousands and created meaningful partnerships with organizations like NFL Thread and this show. I sincerely appreciate that. You have been recognized as a top podcast by Podcast Magazine. You have made both the Hot 50 list and the Top 50 Moms in Podcasting. That is a tremendous achievement in such a competitive space but it is so different also from your fourteen-year career living in Manhattan and working in advertising. We are going to get into all of it.
I’m glad that we connected. It was exciting. I was in the car when I received your email. I looked at my wife and my daughter was in the car who’s helping out filling in as a Marketing Coordinator. I showed it to my wife and was like, “Look who connected with me.” They want to come to the show. I was excited that you reached out and so thankful. I have been looking forward to this. I want to start with storytelling. We share a lot of similarities between what you are doing and what I’m doing in different ways.
Juliet Hahn: ”There is a story behind all of us and we can learn from every single person.”
Storytelling is our foundation, specifically telling other people’s stories. You started Your Next Stop podcast and I started the show with a solid grounding and foundation in bringing people in to do what you have called your mission in life. It is to share stories. You believe deeply that, “Everyone has a story. We can all learn from each other. We just need to listen,” which is often the hardest thing. Can you talk about storytelling? Why is that and also the importance of listening such a foundation and a value for you?
It is important when you hear someone’s story. When you are sitting across from someone or watching TV or you are around someone and they start talking about their story or journey, it is what connects us. When someone has a story that is similar to yours or even different but it intrigues you, you want to know more.
That human connection is sometimes what we are missing in the world. When you connect with someone and they start telling their story, if you listen to a different degree where it is not just passive listening and you are actively listening to what they are saying, a lot of times, you are going to catch little pieces of that story. Maybe they talk a little bit about it a couple of times or you hear them get excited. You hear their voice get excited.
You know it is something important to them. If it is something important to you, you are going to connect with them at a deeper level. That goes all the way from an individual to brands and businesses. When there is a story that impacts people, you are going to want to know more, test that product, and talk more to that person because you are going to want to learn more about what that person is doing and what makes their brain tick.
[bctt tweet=”You are one question away from a different life.” username=”talentwargroup”]
When I say everyone has a story, I truly believe from someone who is picking up garbage to a president of a company that there is a story behind all of us. We can learn from every single person. It doesn’t matter where they are in the world or society. Everyone has a story and you are going to learn from them.
That mindset about everyone having a story is too often lost on a lot of people because they think that someone doesn’t identify with them and shares the same value. Therefore, they discredit them. In Special Operations, a big part of what we did and still do is human intelligence that comes first and foremost from listening. Do you listen and hear? Hearing and listening are two different things. You have to make that distinction too. Do you hear what they are saying? Listen to it and then understand the value that they bring.
When I was a young officer and I first entered the Special Forces, I had an older warrant officer. We did a series of meetings and walked out. I said, “These people are useless. Everybody here is a waste of time.” He said that very thing to me. You have to stop and identify that every person has a story and can bring value to what you are doing, maybe not now but at some point. If you stop, don’t think about what you are going to say next and hear what they have to say. You are going to figure it out and be that much better at not only your job at that intelligence point but as a leader in general.
Juliet Hahn: “I believe we are all one question away from a different life.”
We are all so busy. Some people will listen but they do not hear because they assume, “This person is here in society and has this status.” They don’t take the time. I teach my kids this all the time to listen and pay attention to what people are saying because you can learn something from someone that you don’t even realize that you can learn something from because they could say just a tiny thing. It is also about the questions that other people ask. I believe that we are all one question away from a different life. If you listen to the questions that people ask and then actively engage in conversation, it is going to take you to a different level in your life.
When you talk about questions, one of your core themes is vulnerability. When you think about storytelling, you have to be vulnerable. You said, “I learned young that if you connect with people through storytelling, you are going to connect with them on a different level. They are going to see you on a different level. It is going to be a little bit more vulnerable.” Why does vulnerability become so important on both sides of that equation? As the answerer of the question or the interviewee, it is being open and honest. Also, as the interviewer, why do you have to get to that point of comfort with a guest, the person you are talking to, or your client to make them feel comfortable enough to open up?
You have done this one million times and had conversations with people, even in everyday life. You can tell when someone is being authentic and when someone is annoying you. When you are talking, you are like, “Is this how you always talk to someone?” You can feel it. When people are not vulnerable with each other, it doesn’t have to get deep.
You don’t have to sit and cry about what has happened to you in your life. When you are authentic, you can feel that. When you can feel someone is not authentic, you know it is not real. I will give you a little example. I’m supposed to have a guest on my podcast. She has a business. She and her husband run it together.
They ran into a little snag that they had to switch something. She said to me, “I can still do it but the snag is going to be in my head. I feel like I’m not going to be authentic. Your listeners are going to be able to hear that I’m not opening up and telling my true story. I’m going to try to be guarded because I can’t talk about this one thing.” I said, “I love that you said that. We can cancel. It happens all the time. Let’s do it when you feel open to being able to talk.”
You can feel when someone is holding back something, whether it is because they don’t like to get vulnerable or they have had trauma or tragedy in their life and they don’t want to get to that part. A lot of times, and this is where it brings it back to storytelling, it is all those little pieces in your life. Even when we are little, we need to think about those things that we remember. If I think back in my life, there will be little pieces that I remember from school or growing up.
Whether they were good or bad, those little pieces connect the story and to why I am who I am. When people are guarding that, it is because they are not true to who they are. They are also trying to hide something and not hiding it on purpose. Criminals do that, too, but we are talking about a regular podcast. It is normal people, not serial killers. It is a real person. If they are holding back, you are going to feel that.
You identify it when you talk to enough people and start to see through it. When you were talking, I thought about two of our core characteristics. We talk about the Special Operations’ characteristics of performance. Two of them are emotional strength and effective intelligence. Effective intelligence is this aggregate of all the experiences that you had in your life that give you a demeanor, mindset, and intelligence of like, “I can see through your crap because I have sat in enough of these conversations to know that you are not telling the truth. You are hiding something here.”
Those shape your personality, the way you make decisions, and your emotional strength. How do you respond in those situations? It comes up. I think about that when you are talking about this. I want to talk about you and your story. You grew up in Morristown, New Jersey near Pennsylvania. You went to college and played field hockey and lacrosse. You have studied radio and TV broadcasting. We have that bond there too. You spent fourteen years in New York City in advertising. Why advertising?
Juliet Hahn: “I’m Dyslexic. You struggle in school. School sucks.”
You know this. I’m dyslexic. For your readers that don’t know dyslexia, you struggle in school. School sucks. I grew up in a fairly affluent town. Everything was easy for all my friends. It was in the fourth grade that I realized, “I learn way differently than everyone else.” It is because my entire class, except for one other individual, all went to gifted and talented. There is this other young man who was the guy that always got in trouble in class. I did not get in trouble but we were brought to the special reading.
I remember all my friends being like, “Where are you going?” I was like, “I don’t know.” I was a very happy and confident kid, even though school was tough. Half of the time, I would be sitting there looking around and being like, “Does everyone else understand what is going on? I have no idea what the teacher is saying because I process differently.” They were teaching things that I did not understand because I was not being taught the way I learned.
As a kid, you grow up and think, “Maybe I’m not that smart.” I had great parents and friends. This was when you talked about the storytelling aspect. I realized when I spoke, talked, and explained things, I got the attention of a teacher. If I was telling a story, I would get the attention of a teacher. When I had to write down what was in my mind, it was when it didn’t equal. That is when it was apparent that I learned differently. My dad and my sister are dyslexic. I’m sure my grandparents were dyslexic. We come from a long line of dyslexia.
As I was going through school, I didn’t ask questions because there were times when I would ask a question and the teacher would think I was a jokester and tell me, “You need to go to the principal because you are being inappropriate.” I would be like, “I didn’t understand what that meant. I’m not trying to be a jokester.” I was a good kid. My mom was in education so I got the support. I was good at sports. I also knew these were my strengths. Early on, I learned my strengths and weaknesses.
We had a very in-depth conversation about being dyslexic with Travis Hollman. Travis Hollman was on a previous episode. It was Episode 43. He is the owner of a family business. He is the President and CEO of Hollman Lockers. They make the locker rooms for all the professional sports teams. He was severely dyslexic and wheelchair-bound in third grade. He told that he was the dumbest kid that the teachers had ever taught. Now, he is one of the top business figures in the world. Richard Branson, Elon Musk, and Warren Buffett are dyslexic.
There are amazing stories of people who have the adaptability and resiliency to identify with this learning disability, figure it out, and have gone on to change the world. A lot of it is credited to what you said there. You process things differently. The rest of the world and the rest of us want to put it into a box and say, “You have to be in this box. If you are not in this box, then we have to put you in this special program to teach you how to somewhat be in a box that looks like this one.” In actuality, what we have to do is to figure out how to harness what you have and make what you have special.
That is one of the whole things with public education that makes me crazy. My oldest is dyslexic as well. Fortunately enough, he was able to go to a school for dyslexia in Fairfield, which was amazing for him for those three years. It is one of those things that is hard as a kid and as you grow up. When you have supportive parents, have talents, and learn them early like, “This is how I need to navigate these situations,” it builds resilience and things in me. I was never afraid of failure.
When I had ideas like, “I want to do this and that,” I was not afraid of failing because I failed so many times in school that it was like, “Who cares? It is not a big deal.” When I went to college, I had a guidance counselor that told me I was not going to go to college. When I went to college, I went in for Corporate Fitness because I was good at fitness, and for corporate, I was like, “I’m good with people. I know that I can talk and have conversations.”
I went to Corporate Fitness and very quickly had to take Anatomy and Physiology. Being dyslexic and not being good in Science, right away, I was like, “There is no way I’m going to pass this.” I remember calling my mom and being like, “I’m done. I’m tired of fighting school. This is not where I’m supposed to be.” She said, “You need to stay. You will find your way.” I tweaked my back at the same time, which was crazy. I said, “Corporate Fitness is not lining up.”
I went into communications, radio, television, and film because I was strong at communications. No one knew when they talked to me that I struggled in school. No one had any idea. Teachers would be like, “You don’t struggle.” They always thought I wasn’t trying hard enough, which was frustrating as a kid. It is being like, “I am trying so hard. Something is not coming together.” I switched my major quickly. Growing up, some teacher or someone told me I was not creative because I figured creativity was I wasn’t drawing or good at drawing.
That is how I equivalated it, “I’m not creative because I can’t draw.” When I went to radio, television, and film, it was like, “I’m not going to go into the creative aspect.” As I was learning, I was like, “Where am I going to find my space?” I took a course in advertising sales. The teacher said, “There are going to be four advertising salespeople in this major. It always happens. The rest of you are going to go into the creative aspect.” Right when he said that, I was like, “This is what I’m going to do.”
As I learned about it, I became fascinated because I loved the whole relationship of sales and advertising with stories. That is where I connected my life. Stories are what have gotten me through a lot of different things. Even in early college, I didn’t know that that is what was happening but this is what was happening because this was my path. This is what I was meant to do. I went into advertising sales and quickly got a job even before I graduated college. I also was on the honor roll 5 or 6 times.
My mom sent the letter to my guidance counselor and was like, “Don’t tell someone they are not going to go to college because of Science, Anatomy, Physiology, Biology, Chemistry, and Algebra.” I don’t think we use any of that unless you are going to go into those fields. Why should they be required? They should not be required. One of my passions is public education. That is how I started and when I got into advertising. The thing that is interesting, though, in advertising sales is the Math component in it. I never was taught Math. I am terrible at Math because I don’t have that brain.
Even though I’m dyslexic and you would think English would be my weak point, it is not. It is Math and Science. My dyslexia is that way. Some dyslexics are strong in Math. We didn’t get that. They missed that with us. With Math, I would have to go and take these tests to get certain jobs. I would figure out every way to not do it but I interview, get out of doing that and get the job. When I was on the job, it was like, “You need to do the math part.”
[bctt tweet=”When you’re authentic, you can feel when someone is not.” username=”talentwargroup”]
I would find someone in the company and be like, “Can you calculate this?” I figured it out. I learned early on what my strengths and weaknesses were, which is important. Not everyone wants to talk about their weaknesses and say, “I’m not good at this,” but all of us have strengths and weaknesses. If we all learn to know, “This is a weakness of mine. I need help here but I don’t need help here,” we all are going to get to where we are supposed to be faster and more efficiently.
Juliet Hahn: ”Not everyone wants to talk about their weaknesses. Not everyone wants to say ‘no, I’m not good at this.’”
There is always an interesting conversation when you talk about strengths and weaknesses. How do you, as a leader, build your team? What do you think about even yourself? There is a camp that will say, “I have to identify my weaknesses and then I need to put all my energy into fixing my weaknesses.” There is another side that says, “I need to identify my strengths and weaknesses. Forget about my weaknesses and get somebody else who can do that. I will focus on my strengths.”
If I have a team or an organization that is built on everybody who leverages their strengths, you have a much more resilient and higher-performing organization. I’m from Boston. This is the Bill Belichick way. It works for us. That is what I identify with. It is interesting when you talk to people who have faced where you have to think about that in your way. How do you want to go about it?
That is the thing. Not to forget about our weaknesses but I do believe that even with public school and my son. I’m going to take it back there. At every IEP meeting, they would be like, “This is what he needs to work on.” This is what I would say to them. They would look at me and I’m like, “I’m going to give you an analogy. You have a track team and a sprinter. He is the fastest guy in the country. Instead of having him on sprint, you put him on the pole vault because you want him to get better at the pole vault. He can beat every single other person sprinting but you don’t do that because you want to work on his weaknesses.”
They look at me and I’m like, “You are doing the same thing with my son. He is not going to be a mathematician and a scientist. He can sit in your class and get A’s in English and history because that is what his strengths are. You constantly want to push those away and get him more support in these two things that, in life, he is not going to even need. I know you are going to give me your crap.” Every time I say this, they are always like, “Mrs. Hahn, you will get the one teacher that looks at you and gives you a wink,” and I get it.
It is hard to argue with. You are never going to do that on the sports team.
Why do you do it in the classroom? Why constantly do we still do that? We are in 2022. It is ridiculous.
In 2015, you started a new career as a virtual health and fitness coach, supporting women to lose weight, become stronger and regain their confidence. You gained 65 pounds with each pregnancy and had to make some important decisions about your health. Talk to me a bit about that. What prompted you to make this transition because that is a big switch?
I have good genes. I’m going to say that because readers will be like, “How did she get back?” You put weight on for a year and take it off in a year. People sometimes are very realistic when they have a baby. They think, “I want my body to go back to where it was.” Your body is going to change. You have to be realistic. It took you nine months that you grew a person in your body. You want to be able to nourish them. Gaining weight is essential to do. I did gain 65 pounds with each child.
I was a giant human being. I stopped playing sports and did not look back. I moved to New York City and had so much fun. I did not continue working out all the time. When I got pregnant with my first child, I always ate healthily. I’m a healthy person. I would take walks with the dog and crave sugar beyond. My cravings were sweets and pizza and I would have pizza on every corner. I lived in West Village.
Half of the time, I was not hungry but I was craving it. I was also like, “I have never eaten this way. This is insane.” Quickly, I realized, “I can put weight on.” My sister and I were pregnant at the same time. She is a very petite little person. We are the same height but she has got the tiniest little bones. She could not put on weight without her looking like her skin was going to rip open but I stretched.
I embraced it and loved it. After each, I knew I was going to have more kids. I didn’t go crazy, go to bootcamps and take it off. I nursed, took care of myself, got back, and then would pregnant again. My body was like, “This is what we do. We gain 65 pounds.” After the third and I was not as young, I kept on about 20 pounds and hit 40. My body changed. I was like, “This is not fun anymore.”
I was able to wear bikinis. I still looked good. I just wasn’t in the shape that I was prior. It was when my oldest. We were trying to figure out schools when we lived in Connecticut. Public school was not where he needed to be. He was not learning anymore. It was like, “We need to make a change.” One of my best friends was diagnosed with frontal lobe dementia at 39 years old. I did not handle it well.
I stressed and did not take care of myself the way I should have taken care of myself. I gained 20 pounds. It was right before when I already had kept on 8 pounds from the pregnancy. It was more than I ever was not being pregnant. We were coming to the beach. I remember I tried my bikini, looked at my husband, and said, “My butt got so big.” He is like, “You gained some weight.” I was like, “I don’t know what happened.”
Fran and Juliet discuss…
I was not in a good space. I was stressed and wasn’t handling it well. I was like, “I need to change it.” I am an all-or-nothing person. I was like, “I’m changing it now.” We were getting ready to come for the summer and go for Memorial Day. I found a workout that I could do at home. I can get up before the kids and work out. That is what I did. I lost that before Memorial Day because I had put it on and got ripped. I was like, “I can help other people do this.”
I’m not perfect. I still have my tequila and my pizza on the weekends. Whole Foods is my favorite place. I eat a lot of salads and vegetables. I’m healthy and balanced. I’m not where it is like, “I can’t do any of this.” I knew I could teach people. That is a long way. Long story short, that is how I got into coaching people. I started teaching classes because my son was going to go to a private school.
I said, “I’m staying home. I’m done being the environmental liaison for the town and doing all this volunteer stuff.” Even though I enjoy it, I want something more. I want to be able to say to my husband, “I got this. I’m going to start building a business because it is time. The kids are older and I can start doing it.” I did turn that into a business. I had fun with it for about five years.
Entrepreneurism and building a business are something that you talk a lot about. I listened to several podcasts and your podcast. You have had some impactful people who have come on and told their stories and the challenges about building their business. Starting a podcast is one of the loneliest businesses you can build. I honestly believe that. There are the highest highs and the lowest lows. We have talked about it in a couple of different episodes where I brought it up and said that I would wake up in the morning and be like, “I’m the worst podcast host ever. Everybody hates me.”
You check back later on and you are like, “I’m the best. We are killing it and doing all these things. Everybody loves it.” By the time you go to bed again, it is like, “We are terrible. We should shut it down.” You started in 2019 the Your Next Stop podcast. The focus has been, like this show, a lot on how to think as somebody who wants to better themselves and their organization, build something, and not so much what to do. I always like to make this differentiation when I think about building organizations that sustain over time.
In the Army, we call this Standard Operating Procedure and businesses call it SOP. You have this SOP book and it is a 4-inch binder. It sits on a shelf and nobody ever goes there. That is what-to-do but what-to-do never works and doesn’t evolve. When you teach someone how to think and you have this checklist, then you can create an environment where people listen to other stories, take 1 or 2 things away and say, “I can apply this.” That is what becomes impactful. You have done over 145 episodes.
I’m almost at 200 because I have my live ones that don’t have numbers.
I was trying to add them up and I’m like, “There are so many here.” The note I have here is 145 for Your Next Stop. I put many more on the live ones. Can you talk about starting the podcast? What was the driver behind it? What was that call to action?
I’m going to go back again when I was talking about me thinking I was not creative. When I started in health and fitness, I was doing tons of stuff in social media and being creative but I did not see it as being creative because I can’t draw. My kids would come to me after school or when they were younger, “Can we do this craft?” “Nope. Mom is not crafty. Find someone else. I don’t like that. That is not me. I’m not creative.”
In 2019, my kids were older. We had moved out to Westhampton Beach full-time. I needed a creative outlet but I didn’t know that is what I needed. I talk about this on my podcast all the time. We all need to find that place where we can daydream and create in our minds what we want out of life. I have a great life but something was missing.
You said daydreaming is okay.
That is how you can create your life. Everyone needs to find their space where they can do it. I do it when I walk the dogs. You can say daydream and also call it meditation. To me, it is interchangeable. When I walk my dogs is when I daydream. I create and come up with things. I was listening to a book. It was about writing books. All of a sudden, a light bulb went off. I was like, “I am so creative. This is insane that I have thought that I’m not creative.”
[bctt tweet=”You don’t have to be this perfect person all the time. You’ll only be miserable because you’re trying to be. Just live life. ” username=”talentwargroup”]
I went to my husband and my kids and said, “I’m going to start a podcast.” I love telling stories. I have so many stories. It was the end of my health and fitness. A lot of my clients were women that had big careers but then decided to stay home. They were not happy people. They weren’t happy with things about their bodies that I was like, “You have everything. This is so interesting. I need to dig deeper because I’m curious and I want to ask questions. I don’t understand why you are not happy.”
I realized it was because they didn’t have a creative outlet. Half of them were like, “I have had this idea. I wanted to start this business. I have always wanted to write a book, start a blog or start a fashion line but who wants to buy from me?” That made me sad that so many of these women would come to me. They were so insecure. I couldn’t understand it because I’ve always been positive. Even when I was getting yelled at by teachers that I wasn’t smart, I was still like, “I’m smart. You are not smart. You don’t think I’m smart. What is wrong with you?”
There was always something innate in me that knew I was built for more. When I decided to start the podcast, I went to Dan and my kids and said, “I’m going to start a podcast.” They said, “Do you know how to start a podcast? What are you going to talk about?” I am someone that talks a lot and often. My husband is a big podcast listener and he is like, “You need to have form.” I could see on his face that he was a little concerned.
I’m like, “I’m going to Google it and figure this out.” From idea to launch, it was four months. We even went on a European vacation because my son was playing soccer in Europe. We rented the house out. In the middle, he is like, “Are you launching now?” My husband is my anchor when I have these big ideas. He goes with them most of the time but he always will be the practical guy like, “Did you think of this? I didn’t think of that.” He is that anchor for me.
I did pause for a month because I was like, “I’m not going to put any out because we are going to be in Europe. I’m going to want to engage and grow this.” I started it as a passion project. It was nothing more for me to talk to these women and think about the other women that I could help. I’m thinking, “There are women out there that are insecure but it seems that they have everything. How is this possible? I don’t understand this.” It was talking about crazy stories in my life.
People were gaining 65 pounds. A lot of these women would never have thought that. They are very type-A and controlled. They gained 22 pounds. Their doctor told them. I wanted to talk to them about how it is okay to step out on the lines. You don’t have to be this perfect person all the time because you are not. You are miserable because you are trying to be. Live life. That is what my podcast was about. Quarantine happened and I was like, “I’m done with my stories.”
I was happy. With quarantine from the outside world, I was not happy but I adored my family. We do all get along. My husband was out of the house pretty much 4 or 5 days a week. I was driving everywhere for sports. All of a sudden, we all were under the same roof with nothing to do. I was in heaven for a period and then it was like, “Enough with this.” I was so happy to have all my people and all of us be together. It was a time that also my husband would never have had with the kids.
I was still doing my podcast. I was like, “I’m going to start talking to people around the world about what their quarantine looks like.” When you said the podcast thing is lonely, I don’t feel that way. I love it because I am interacting with people that I would never interact with. You are very active outside. I stayed home with the kids. This was a way that all of a sudden, I was having conversations that I would never have had with people. For me, it has been amazing, not lonely. I know it has been amazing for you too.
It is the best thing I have done.
I would skip down the stairs. The kids would be like, “Who did you interview?” They roll their eyes. They are like, “That is great.” This woman in England can’t even step out of their house without a guard walking by their house being like, “You’ve been out of your house already.” They would have to go back. They only were allowed out of their garden, which is their yard, for a certain amount of time. It was once to walk your dog and once to go to the grocery store.
If you forgot something at the grocery store, you were not allowed to do it. Every time I would tell one of these stories, we would all be like, “Thank God.” We would appreciate more where we were, what we had and what was going on. I also realized I’m good at interviewing. Even though I talk, it is so fun. I talk but I’m good at listening, not talking and stopping. I was learning about myself. I also decided, “This is something. I have something here. This is the path that I’m supposed to do.”
You have listened to the podcast and you know I believe in God. Whether you believe in God or the universe, I truly believe we all have a path. We just don’t all find it because a lot of times, we don’t let ourselves daydream and listen to our gut. We don’t listen to those little things in our head that are like, “What about this?” It is because you think, “Who am I? I shouldn’t do that.” I don’t do that.
I want this podcast to be where people are like, “I keep hearing you should write a book. You keep talking about that idea. You should do something with it.” When you hear that 4 or 5 times, you need to do something with it because that is God or the universe being like, “Here is your path. You have got to run with it.” That is what this podcast has been for me.
Juliet Hahn: “Some people will listen but they’re not really hearing.”
During quarantine is also when Clubhouse came about. I was meeting all these people. It was like, “I am so good at doing what I’m doing.” I started creating a business as I was doing it. I do everything backward. That is a little bit of dyslexia. As I was creating the podcast, which was a passion project, a business formed. I started interviewing people that were already doing what I was doing and maybe a little bit ahead of me but now I’m there with them.
I don’t think I have said it to anybody but it is very similar to how we started. I was having a conversation about writing a book. It is the same thing. I’m like, “I want to tell my story. I don’t know what it would be about. I have these things.” I called up a friend of mine from high school. He said, “Before you write a book, you could think about having a podcast until you develop the content.” I started putting thought into it and said, “What would I talk about?” I realized, “I have been fortunate to meet some amazing people in my life. I could bring them on. We could tell their story.” The whole Jedburgh concept came because I’m like, “What would I call it?”
I thought about the lineage of the Special Forces to the Jedburgh. I was like, “We might have something here.” I did the same thing. We set it all up, started running, and then turned around. It was like, “We might want to have a business. We have a business. We could get sponsors and scale this thing.” I, like you, started to identify that I do these other things and they are impactful. I love them. I’m passionate about them. When I walk out of the room with a smile on my face and my family, daughter, wife, and everybody are looking at me, it is for that same reason, “I talked to this person. I’m better because I had that conversation and shared that story than I was when I walked into there.”
That is why we connected so much when we first met because we had the same story on how we started our shows, even though we have had different lives. It is a cool thing that we have the ability and the talents that God or the universe gave us or whoever you want to thank it for. We know this is what we are good at. We can share it and help other people become better people.
I think every once in a while, too, about all the things that had to happen to get to the point when I was like, “I’m going to start this show.” If any one of them had changed, you think, “I would not be doing this.” I thought about that a lot because we hit our first year in 2022. We released the one year episode. It was number 50. It was a big one for us. We brought back Cleo Stiller, who is the author of Modern Manhood. She had been on Episode 7.
I get to say way back on episodes even though it feels like yesterday. She has been our number one episode from the day it was downloaded. I said in the episode, “We have had 43 episodes since.” Hers just keeps going up, which is a testament to her story in her book. It is because she was a journalist that we brought her back. I said, “I always wanted to bring back the number one episode but I always had this vision that we would rehash that episode and some of the others.” I realized, “You are a good storyteller too. Maybe you asked me my story and we tell this story on Episode 50 about where I come from and my drivers.”
That was cool, but it was more of an opportunity, much more than I thought it was going to be introspective and think about the path that got us here. That has been not as impactful but it is impactful to me. I don’t know if others have appreciated it, but certainly, for me, it was cool to look back and say, “We have come a long way. Let’s start thinking about where do we go from here in a year or two.” You are a couple of years into this.
It is exciting. For my 100th episode, I had Ryan Holtz, who’s a huge podcaster in Canada. I met him at Clubhouse. He came on my podcast and interviewed me. He was the first guy on Your Next Stop. Originally, I was interviewing women that were on the same path. It was my story that was intertwined with my guests’ stories. I have had a few guys on too. It has been cool to see it evolve. It is amazing to think about. This is what I say to the kids all the time.
Juliet Hahn: “You can create things in your brain, but if you don’t take action it’s not going to go anywhere.”
They laugh at me but I’m like, “I created this in my brain.” I was at the Super Bowl because of my podcast. I was doing live events because I created this and took action. That is the thing. You can create things in your brain but if you don’t take action, it is not going to go anywhere. You are going to fail. A lot of times, it is not a failure. I look at it as, “That door closed because it is not my path. It is not where I’m supposed to be.” Another door opens and you are like, “That is the door I’m supposed to go through.” It makes life so much better.
Colin Beavan talked about it in episode 15 and called it limiting beliefs. He said, “If you let these limiting beliefs stand in your way and all the reasons why you can’t do something, then you will never take action. You will never do anything because there will always be a reason.” He is a social activist. The number one most important thing to driving change, even if you don’t have an effect on society but you have an effect on yourself, is the decision to take that first step to take action and overcome that limiting belief. You do that regardless of the impact that you have. Maybe you don’t change society. He is an environmentalist.
Maybe you don’t get everybody to go carbon neutral in New York City like he did but he did it. That, to him, changed his life. That is so important. It is not hard either. You have created these ten things that you have learned about starting a podcast. I thought it would be cool to share some of these. The first one was, “Do it. Don’t hesitate.” The second one I want to ask you about is, “Know your target audience.” How do you define your target audience? How do you look at it? We have looked at this certainly on the show and thought, “You can’t boil the ocean and be everybody. It can’t be too small because then you have a cap.”
Sometimes it happens when you start creating something or you have in your mind who you want to impact but it turns out to be someone different. When I was doing this because of my health and fitness background, it was those women or that group of women that I would talk to time and time again. I was like, “That is the group that I want to impact.” I want to impact those women. I want them to listen to an episode and be like, “If that person can do it, what’s stopping me?” I wanted that to impact them. Mine was women of all different ages. Also, some of my episodes are 30% male but it is mostly a female audience.
The third one is, “When you are coming up with content, always talk to your target audience.”
[bctt tweet=”You can create things in your brain, but you will not get anywhere if you don’t take action.” username=”talentwargroup”]
If you and I are doing this and you keep talking about something different than what your audience keeps coming back to listen to, you are missing it. A lot of people do that. They have this idea and the target audience that they are talking to. They want to rebrand but they don’t just rebrand. They start going in a different direction. There is nothing wrong with that but you are missing the boat.
Mine is women. If I constantly bring on men that are in a different world than at the stay-at-home mom, the mom that is going back to work, the mom that is in a career or the new mom and keep bringing men that are presidents of companies, it is not going to do anything for them. You have to think about who you are talking to and when you have your guest on. You can pepper it. I have someone that has a cool story.
I’m going to give you an instance. Paul Veneto is the guy that walked from Boston, Logan down to 9/11. He was on Flight 175. He was a flight attendant and he was not on that flight. He became a drug addict. The story was so impactful. I wanted to do a live show with him but he didn’t have an Apple product. I was like, “I’m going to put him on Your Next Stop because that story is going to touch everyone.”
That is not just a man or a woman. It doesn’t matter where you were in the world to hear what he went through because of the dark demons because he was not on that flight and what he has done. He has to be a guest for you because he is insane. He is amazing. He is such a special man. He does 5Ks all over the country, raising money for organizations. He did this for himself. That story is one of mine. That is very split. It is man and woman. I knew that it was going to pull everyone.
You don’t need expensive gear.
When you talk to people all the time, they think, “I need to buy this huge mixer board.” I laugh because I’m like, “If I had to buy a mixer board, I would never be where I am because I would have stopped myself with too much fancy stuff.” There was an app called Backpack and I could use it from my iPhone. When I first started, these were personal journal stories. They were not interviews. I would go in my closet with my iPhone and headphones. That is how I first started recording.
I didn’t know that about you until you said it. I have used that as an example when I talk to people about the spectrum of podcasting. When I make the intro for who we are, I will often explain where we are on the spectrum and say, “There are people who grab an iPhone, hide in their closet, record their podcast in there, and self-syndicated it on everything.” There is Joe Rogan, Tim Ferriss, and multimillion-dollar productions. I’m like, “I like to think we are somewhere in the middle of that.”
I am somewhere in the middle but in the beginning, I wasn’t.
You can’t be. You have to be where you were.
I use Zoom because I already have a Zoom account. That is where I did my coaching stuff on. Quickly, I was like, “I don’t love the microphone I have. I’m going to upgrade my microphone.” It is in the $100 range. It is not an expensive one but I’m not in my closet anymore. It is still in my room where I have my little podcast area. I have my boom arm and my Mac.
I will disclose this to everybody. I learned that you could even do it on GarageBand. That was an embarrassing moment when I was like, “I have spent so much time on working and trying to figure out these different internet platforms to do it. I could have been recording on GarageBand for free.”
That is the thing. Some podcasters will tell you that you need all this stuff but you don’t. When you are sitting there and thinking, “I want to start a podcast,” all I tell people is to get your phone, voice recorder, and headphones and see if you even like it. A lot of times, people will like the concept but once they start, they realize, “This is a lot of work.”
I took my daughter’s microphone. That is how we started. I was getting yelled at by her to give it back. I’m like, “I’m recording a show. Get out of here.” You covered, “Find a space in your house that has the least amount of echo.” You got to find that good space. You have to like, “Decide what you love about podcasting and then outsource the rest.”
Juliet Hahn’s Top 10 Tips for Podcasting
I have 2 Boxers and 3 kids. We live in a house that used to be primarily a summerhouse. It has a lot of bedrooms but there is no space. I was like, “Where am I going to do this?” There are no walk-in closets. We didn’t need walk-in closets because it was summer. We are full-time so I wish I had the walk-in closet I had in Connecticut because that would be my podcast studio. You make things work and adjust. You have to find that space to record my podcast.
My two Boxers are in my room because my husband works at home and he can’t have them barking and doing things. They know this is my routine. You can create a routine that is going to work for you. At first, it might feel off. If it feels too off, then you adjust but you don’t need to put so much thought into it. My two Boxers lay there and stared at me. They know, “Mom is doing it.” They don’t bark. They just lay there. They are active dogs.
Can you talk a little bit about the schedule and the importance of needing to stay organized?
I’m dyslexic. If my mom is reading, she is going to laugh because I have my organization. One of the things that I found so important was I needed to have a calendar and send a calendar to potential guests. There are a couple of different things I do before I have a guest because I’m a mom and my kids sometimes finish school at 2:00. I have from 9:00 to 2:00 but I usually walk my dog so it is from 11:00 to 2:00. I don’t have a huge window but what I do is I will do a little vetting to make sure our energies match and that the story match.
A lot of times, I have them send me a one-minute voice text, whether it is on my phone or social media. That is a lot of times how I can be like, “I know a little bit.” I don’t like to know too much because I’m curious. I want to hear. It is more of a conversation than an interview. That is how my podcasts are run. I need to know a little bit about the person to make sure they match my podcast because I have my target audience that is listening. They know this is a person that has followed a passion and turned it into a business. I need to know that but I need to know that our energies match.
If someone is a very slow talker, I cannot interview them. It is nothing against them. I’m sure they are a lovely person. I have high energy and the conversation doesn’t match. A lot of times, I will have to say, “I’m going to have to pass.” Sometimes I say, “Our energies don’t match.” What I do is I schedule in the calendar. After I record, it goes into Google Drive. I’m going to touch on that because I don’t think I touched on that. Editing is not something I enjoy. When I first started it, I was like, “I’m going to do this all. I’m not going to spend a lot of money on the backend.”
With editing, I was like, “This is not something I’m going to enjoy. I’m not going to keep podcasting if I have to edit.” Quickly, I was like, “I’m going to use my health and fitness money to put back into the editing.” That is what I did first. I have a Google Drive and my recordings go into Google Drive. My admin is my executive producer because she has moved up. She is amazing. She knows that we schedule Monday and Thursday. Whatever is in the drive, the editor goes and edits the stuff. The executive producer, Julian, then puts them out and gets the graphics and stuff together.
It is a very well-oiled machine but you switched. When I first started, I was doing two podcasts a day. I had so much content that by the time I started coming up on my year, I had about four months of backup. I had to adjust that because it wasn’t fair. If I had someone on the podcast and they are like, “My book is coming out,” I was like, “It is going to be four months.” I had to switch things. Now I don’t do that. I do two days a week for my prerecorded and then one live show or sometimes two live shows a week. I’m only recording four times.
There is one on this list that honestly is the most important one. It is, “Make a commitment and do not stop.”
When I started the podcast, that is what I said. Even when times get hard and I question, “Should I still be doing this?” I’m going to work through that until there is a sign that is like, “You ran this to the course.” When I was doing the personal journal stories, there were times when I had good 5 or 6 episodes prerecorded. There were times when I was like, “I can’t go because I need to record something. I forgot that I didn’t record. I have to get this out.”
There was a very short time, though, that I realized, “I need for myself to have batch-recording.” That is why I would record every week. That works for me. I knew there was a non-negotiable that I was going to give this at least a year. I was not going to stop because there are so many podcasters that do 2, 4, or 5 episodes and then stop. Seven is the average.
There is a statistic. It is 50% stop after 5 or 7. Another 50% are at 20. It is 1% or something of all that has started to do more than 50 episodes.
I was like, “I’m giving it a year. I will do everything in my power to finish this year and see where this goes, whether it was going to go into a business and how I was going to keep enjoying it.” Even if I wasn’t enjoying it, I was going to do it for that year. That was my non-negotiable. It is what I was meant to do but I’m still doing it.
[bctt tweet=”Move your body, get up before the house gets up, and create a passion that will excite you. Move your brain in a way that makes you excited to get out of bed.” username=”talentwargroup”]
I want to talk a little bit about the Super Bowl and your partnership with NFL Thread.
I interviewed Cynthia Zordich. This is a funny story. Not everyone knows but I have been telling the story more. I babysat the Zordich when they lived in Philadelphia. Michael played for the Eagles for a period. I was the town babysitter. My sister and I had a group of friends. We babysat and that was our gig. She moved into town. Her sister was someone that I babysat. My mom happened to be a kindergarten teacher at the time. I would get a lot of people because my mom would say, “My daughter babysits.”
The Zordich moved into town. I was 16 to 17 years old. I remember vividly being like, “They are cool.” Cindy had started taking pictures for the Eagles. She was a photographer. Every time Michael got traded, she had to give up her business and fall in. I didn’t know this at that time but when I was sitting is when she had reinvented herself. There was a period where she was struggling like, “What am I supposed to do? I keep moving around. I have ambitions but I didn’t know this.”
I was a 16 and 17-year-old girl watching their dynamic where he was so supportive. The kids were awesome. She would be in the darkroom taking these pictures and then bringing them. The Eagles hired her because she had been taking pictures on the sideline. Her husband said to her and she talks about this in the episode, “Your happiness is not my responsibility.” She is like, “I first got pissed.” I was like, “What?”
She said, “I stopped because you are right. That has never been our relationship.” They met in college at Penn State. She is super creative and always had her hands in one million different things at the time as a mom. That is what was the most important for her but then she was losing who she was. When I interviewed her and started diving into it, I said, “This is so cool for me to think about. When I was babysitting, I didn’t realize that this all had evolved behind the scenes. It is to see where you are.”
She started NFL Thread. She had written a book called When the Clock Runs Out when Michael was getting ready to retire. She is a super curious person as well. She was like, “I need to talk about people. What is this going to look like for us?” He has been in the League for a long time. He played flag football. Football was his life. He coaches on the college level and for professionals too.
She was trying to prepare herself how to support her husband when the clock ran out. She wrote a book but it was also the time when she was raising her kids. She was supposed to go on tour. I forget the man that said it to her. It was like, “This will come again. You need to be home with your kids.” She was like, “You are right. That was the best advice I ever did.” She picked up photography and then started Thread, which is the LinkedIn for women of the NFL. It connects keeps everyone connected.
The thread of the football is on the inside. It is what keeps everyone connected. That is what the spouses of the NFL are. They keep the families connected and threaded together. It is a huge sisterhood. She wanted to be like, “After we are out of the League, let’s all support each other.” It is because, for a lot of the women, it is their turn to be the sole breadwinner. Their husbands take a step back. However, they are healing. They have been out of the League or whatever it is.
She wanted to keep where they could all support each other. That is where Thread came about. That is when I said to her, “I would love to share more of these stories. This is so fascinating to me.” When my kids come, they are like, “This person got traded,” I’m never going to be like, “Yes.” I’m going to think about the wife and kids at home that has to pick up and change everything. You moved.
It is like in the military. It is more abrupt for professional athletes. They show up at the stadium one day and you are on a different team.
I started thinking about that. I got curious and was like, “I want to start doing a series.” She and I partnered. What people don’t realize is at the Super Bowl, her tagline is, “There is a lot for a girl to do at the Super Bowl.” It is because they have done all these events before. She has a networking luncheon the Thursday before the Super Bowl and Off the Field, which is the 501(c)(3) of the NFL. People don’t realize it is the wives and their charity.
They do a fashion show. They have been doing it for years. None of us know they raise millions of dollars for a charity in that city. Whatever city the Super Bowl is on, they pick a charity and do this amazing fashion show with tons of well-known people, but no one talks about it. I was like, “I need to get this out.” I was asked to come and join live. Cynthia, who’s my partner, was like, “We want to do this. You are very safe. You ask great questions.” We were doing a series with the women as well. We had Cookie Johnson on who I know is NBA but she was being honored.
We had Holly Robinson Peete and Kristel David. We had a lot of great women talk about all the work that they do behind the scenes that society doesn’t know about. Sometimes they get a bad rap. It is like, “Who cares? Your husband is in the NFL. You make a good living.” They are women too. They have hearts. They go through depression and postpartum. They lose themselves because of getting picked up all the time. I wanted to give a voice to that.
Your interviews were great. I watched a bunch of them. I was so excited to watch that opportunity for you and what you are building. It was great to see.
I appreciate it. I didn’t know who I was going to be interviewing. I’m not very good with names. That is part of dyslexia. I’m good with faces. It can be a famous person and I would be like, “I don’t know her name.” I would say to Cynthia, “Do you have a list so I can at least put names?” She is like, “We are going to figure it out.” When I sat in the chair or when I was on the red carpet, I had not one nerve. I knew, “This is what it is all about. What I’m meant to be doing is giving this voice to these people that are making such a difference.” I don’t wonder if it was crazy.
I wanted to ask you about your routine. You have put your routine at the center of everything you do. You have called it a fulfilled life. I call it habits. I’m going to ask you about your habits in my special way. You said, “You need to find out how you work best. For me, I go for five days straight and then take two days off to slow down.” What does that look like in practice? Do you stick to it?
I do. Monday through Friday, I’m balls to the walls. I wake up at 5:20, work out, get the kids ready for school, take my dogs for a walk and start work. I do all my recordings. I have meetings. My Friday is all my meetings of people that either I’m vetting, talking to, or networking because networking is so important in this world. Saturday and Sunday are about kids and sports. On Saturday, with the snow and rain, I sat on the couch and watched movies. I was like, “I’m done.” I answered some emails because I am a very much all-or-nothing person. If an email comes about that needs an answer, I’m not someone that is like, “Oh.” My husband is so good. He would be like, “I can deal with it on Monday.” If I open it, it is out of my mind. If I shut it, I have to answer it.
I’m like you. My wife is like your husband. She will say, “I will deal with it on Monday.” I’m like, “I can’t. I’m shaking. That is all I’m thinking about. I can’t do anything else.”
I typically try not to open stuff that I know I’m going to have to deal with because I need to do it then. My husband always would joke and say something like, “Can you send me X, Y and Z?” We would be in the middle of a conversation and I would be like, “Yeah.” He was like, “Why do you have to do it now?” I’m like, “It is because, in ten minutes, I’m going to forget about it. It is not important to me but I want to make sure I do it because it is important to you.” That is how I go.
You have a formula. Anyone who reads this knows I like formulas and lists. We put them out there all the time. I want to go down here real quick. Wake up early before everyone else. Why?
It is huge because that is the time that is for me. I need to wake up. I don’t drink coffee. I wake up like this, which is annoying to most people in my house. Everyone says, “You have a lot to say this morning.” For me, it is when I unwind. I will do work before, put the laundry in and make sure that the dishes are in there. It is time for me to unwind. It is also when I do my workout. When I’m with the kids, I try to be with the kids. When I’m doing work, I try to do work. That is not always perfect.
The second one, plan your day and write it down.
I teach this. I don’t always follow it but I do have my schedule. I know in my calendar what I have scheduled and what the kids have scheduled. This is where people need to know their strengths and weaknesses. If I wrote things down, you would not be able to read them. My spelling is terrible. I have to type it or voice text it. It is a way to know what you are supposed to be doing that day and try to stay on that task. Life happens, especially when you have families. Half of the time, there is some Z-path there as well. It is important to know what you are supposed to be doing so you can stay on task. Moving your body is so important.
Drink a glass of water first thing in the morning.
This is the thing that my kids get so annoyed about. If you are not a morning person and you chug a glass of water, you wake up. For me, I hydrate when I first wake up. I’m not a coffee drinker. I do drink tea but it is decaffeinated. I always start with a glass of water.
Eat clean five days a week.
[bctt tweet=”Life is much better when you realize that failures are just closed doors you’re not supposed to take because it’s not your path.” username=”talentwargroup”]
I’m very healthy. That is because when we are doing what we are doing, I know when my brain is not on point. It is if I did not get enough sleep and ate crappy. As I have gotten older, I know, “Maintain. Don’t be too crazy.” On the weekends, I stay up late, have cocktails and eat pizza. That works best for me. Usually, on Sunday night, I clean it up because when I wake up on Monday, I have stuff to do. If I don’t, I know my brain is not going to be working at its best.
It helps with that mindset of, “Go for the five days. You get the two off.” It is holistic, “I can buckle down these five days in all aspects of what I’m doing. I got these two other days where I could chill.”
You need to find out what works best for you. I am an all-or-nothing person. If I did Monday and I was good or focused, but on Tuesday, I wasn’t. That is going to be hard for me to then get refocused on Wednesday. If I do five days of focus and then two days where it is whatever, it works.
Be productive. Do something.
Juliet’s Formula for a Fulfilled Life
This goes back to when I was coaching women. There was a group that played tennis and had lunch. They would go and pick their kids up. They were not the happiest bunch because they were not doing anything for themselves. They were not using their brain and what they were meant to be doing. If you have a day where you can be productive in some way, you are going to feel better about yourself, whether it is cleaning out a closet if that is what you want to do.
Don’t let days go where you are wasteful. I have days where I do nothing. It is important to do that because that is good for me. If I had 5 or 6 days where I was doing nothing, you become a sloth and then get into a bad habit of not being motivated. Even if you don’t tend to have mental health issues, if you are doing nothing for too long, you have more of the tendency of having mental health.
Devote time for your loved ones.
When you are building a business and when you have teens, they always don’t want, “It is time for us.” They are like, “That is great.” Balance is hard. This is something that I’ve asked a lot of entrepreneurs on my podcast. I’m the type of person who if I open something, I need to do it at that moment. My kids know. I will say to them, “We are having family time or doing this. I need to answer this one thing. I have to put my phone or my computer away.” There are times when I’m better at this than others. When I go on vacation is when I unplug.
I have to do a couple of different things but they know, “Mom is going to do it before we wake up. It is time for us.” It was when my kids were little. It was more important for them to see that I could put things away. They are older so they understand. I say, “I’m trying to build this business. I’m here. It is because I have been able to devote a certain time to it. I appreciate your understanding. If you need me to pay attention to you, you need to say, ‘Mom, please. I need you.'” They know I will put everything away.
The last one is chill and relax.
Some people need more time to decompress than others. That is where it is so important to know your strengths and weaknesses, how you tick and where you work. For me, I need to chill and relax for a period. If it goes too long, it is not productive for anyone.
We went through 8 of these but I’m going to put you on the spot to narrow this down to 3 foundational ones. The reason is that as we close out, the Jedburghs had to do three things every day as core foundational tasks to be successful. They had to shoot, move and communicate. If they did these three things with the utmost precision, it didn’t matter what other challenges came their way. Their attention could be placed on those other things. What are the three things that you do every day or non-negotiable core foundational tasks for success in your world?
It is moving my body, whether it is walking the dogs or lifting weights. I have to move my body. That is for my brain. My husband will say, “The squirrel was running there. You need to go walk.” It is because I have a lot of energy. There are times when my energy is positive, fun energy or sometimes, it is a little bit of stressor energy for others. It is moving my body and getting up before the kids. Even on the weekends, I get up before the kids. I do sleep in but my sleeping in is a little different than the average person because I am an early morning person. It is 7:00 or 8:00. I’m good. It is getting up a little bit before and have that a little bit of alone time.
I don’t need a lot of alone time but if I get that twenty minutes before the house wakes up where it is for me, that is non-negotiable. I do that seven days a week. I say this to a lot of people when they feel like they are getting up when their kids get up and they never have time for themselves. I’m like, “Get twenty minutes. It is going to change your day. You can’t even believe it.” It is moving your body, getting up before the house gets up and then following a creative passion. It is doing something that is going to excite you, whether it is a business or something that is creatively moving your brain in a way that you are excited. You want to get out of bed to do that thing that day.
Juliet Hahn shares her Three Foundations for Success.
Move your body, get up early before the house gets up and follow a creative passion. The nine characteristics of performance as defined by Special Operations Forces are the driving force of the show. It is drive, resiliency, adaptability, humility, integrity, curiosity, team ability, effective intelligence and emotional strength. During this conversation, we covered almost all of these.
I could be a Jedburgh.
You are. We are welcoming you to our Jedburgh team. We have covered all of these at some point. All high performers exhibit these nine in various degrees, depending on the situation that they are in. What I do at the end of these is I take one and say after our conversation, “This is the one when I think about you and what we talked about.” I would almost assign and say, “Is it exhibiting?” For me and you in this conversation, it is curiosity because it drives creativity and the ability to look for more, search for better, find solutions to problems that exist, and challenge the status quo.
When I think about what you have built, where you have come from, how you have transitioned your career into a variety of different things and how you have an impact across so many different mediums for people, it all comes down to curiosity and how you get yourself and others to achieve the best version of themselves in their way and provide the venue and platform for them to do that. It is so inspiring and impactful to learn from you and watch you as we have been planning this and the growth of you in the podcast and your business. Thank you so much for having us here at Westhampton, New York. It has truly been an honor. I look forward to continuing the partnership.
Thank you so much. Curiosity is my number one. I love being curious.
We nailed it.
Thank you so much. This was awesome.
Thank you.
