You’ve likely heard some of the benefits of gratitude and a calming/grounding practice like meditation – but I’m guessing you’ve mostly thought about their effects on your personal life, not necessarily how they might impact leadership or work. In this episode, Lori Saitz shares the practice of zen leadership, including some great tangible tips!
In this episode, leading authority on improving productivity and engagement through workplace well-being, Lori Saitz shares the practice of zen leadership.
You’ve likely heard some of the benefits of gratitude and a calming/grounding practice like meditation – but I’m guessing you’ve mostly thought about their effects on your personal life, not necessarily how they might impact leadership or work. Yet, Lori maintains there is no other investment that delivers as much.
Help yourself and your team or employees quiet distractions to focus better, boost creativity, reduce anxiety, increase happiness, strengthen relationships, improve physical health – and the list goes on!
Peace of mind is worth more than we give it credit for. This episode is a must-listen for the time we are in right now.
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Lori Saitz is the leading authority on improving productivity and engagement through workplace well-being. She is the founder of the Zen Leadership Program for Results Focused Professionals.
With a comprehensive background in wellness and communication strategies, Lori helps executives create focused, resilient, and collaborative teams that can move projects forward with less stress and drama.
Listen to Lori on her own podcast too, called Fine is a 4-Letter Word, where she engages guests in conversations about how they've grown from a time in their lives when things were decidedly NOT fine.
Lori is currently living a nomad life while cat-sitting in states across the southeast U.S. You can often find her in the weight room at the gym. She also loves cupcakes, Thai food, and classic rock music.
Learn more about Lori and her work at zenrabbit.com. You can also connect with her on social:
LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/lorisaitz/)
Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/LoriSaitz/)
Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/zen_rabbit/)
Twitter (https://twitter.com/zenrabbit)
YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/ZenRabbitVideo)
- I'm Celine Williams, and welcome to the, "Leading Through Crisis," podcast, a conversation series exploring resiliency and leadership in challenging times. My guest today is Lori Saitz, founder of Zen Rabbit, and a leading authority on improving productivity and engagement through workplace wellbeing. Welcome, Lori.
Thanks so much for having me.
I'm excited to chat with you today. Also, I love the name of your company, just as a sidebar for a second, but before we jump into any of that, I am curious if you have any thoughts on the name of the podcast, which is, "Leading Through Crisis." And I always like to ask my guests what comes up for you when you hear that phrase, leading through crisis.
It brings to mind the whole idea that, I mean, what is a crisis? Like a lot of people are living their entire lives as a crisis, so is there a specific thing that's a crisis or is it leading through crisis as in the entirety of our life as a crisis? And it's also interesting because yeah, because I talk about staying calm in chaos, and so crisis, chaos, they're synonymous for me.
Yeah, I think that's the one of the ongoing curiosities that I have for sure. And I have the benefit of talking to a lot of people about leading through crisis specifically, but it's the ongoing curiosity is how we all define crisis so differently. And for some people crisis is chaos. And for some people crisis is change, and it's not any change they would consider a crisis and big or small. And for some people it is like, no, no, it's this level of change or this level of chaos, but we all have our own place, spot, level, moment where it turns into crisis, right, where we're like, we're okay up until here, and then it's crisis or chaos. And when you talk about staying calm through chaos and calm through crisis, I'm gonna start with what does that mean to you? Like, what does that look like, where does that come from, and the why behind that passion for you, that awareness, commitment, whatever you wanna call it.
Yeah, I don't think that anybody really needs to live that way for one thing, and that anybody needs to get to a certain point where a situation escalates to become a crisis. I mean, very few. And so if you are using some tools and some practices to maintain a level of calm in your life, you're gonna approach what may have in the past been a crisis differently. And you're not gonna necessarily see it as a crisis or as complete chaos. It's just gonna be another situation that has come up and is something that needs to be managed, that's all. Like, it's not a big deal.
Yeah.
And so I think that's really my mission, is to teach the world to be calm and grounded no matter what's going on around them. Because imagine, first of all, what the world could look like if everybody could do that. And I think it's everybody's individual responsibility to get themself to a place where they can do that. It is possible. It's a matter of being willing and having the awareness of how to do it.
I have a lot of questions about that, but before I ask those questions, I'm going to take a step back and say, is there, how did you get interested in this? Like where does that, where does the desire to change those experiences for people? Where does that come from? Where did it come from?
Well, we were talking before we started recording about stories. My mom took my brother and me to a meditation course when I was 10 years old. And so I have had this as a foundation. Now that said, I did not use it for many, many years because 10 year olds turn into teenagers and they don't wanna know anything about anything. And so I didn't, it was there as a baseline foundation, but I wasn't using it. And then as I became an adult, I knew about the power of meditation to help stay calm and to help create situations to, well, I don't know, set goals and achieve goals and all of that. And I still wasn't using it. I would start, I would do a meditation maybe for a couple of days in a row, and then I would skip a few years and then I would come back to it. And then, you know, so I knew the power of it and I still wasn't using it. And it wasn't until my mom passed 10 years ago that I came back to it consistently. And it was really, I don't know exactly what the trigger moment was, but it was, I'm sure, you know, some dealing with the grief and everything. And I found a meditation, a guided meditation that I really liked. And so I started listening to it every day and it was helping me feel better. And so, I mean, there's tons of things that meditation can do, but if there's nothing more than helping you feel better, like, is that not even enough?
Yeah, that should be enough.
Yeah, yeah, and so then I had started my first business in 2003. I ran that for 11 years. Started a second business in, I don't know, 2018 or '19, somewhere around there. And then pandemic, then I had to pivot again. So I came back to this whole concept of how do I help people feel calmer? Not just feel calmer, become calmer, more grounded. Because a lot of people were asking me how I was doing it. Nothing seems to rattle me too badly. And people are like, "How do you do that?" And so that's how I kind of got into it because I was like, well, it's really not that hard. The techniques are really simple, which sometimes is a roadblock. People, I can't be that easy.
Yeah, yeah, it's so interesting 'cause it's a very astute observation that the sometimes the easy things, the simple things are the things that people are like, that can't be it. Especially if it's something easy that takes time. And I don't mean like hours of time, but it's like, if you do this for 15 or 20 minutes a day or whatever it is, people go, but that's 20 minutes. I could be doing something else because that's too easy. Doing that for 20 minutes, I can do something else.
I encounter that all the time. That's one of the biggest reasons why people are adverse to learning the practice of meditation. And there's not just one practice, by the way. There are many ways to do it. That's the second thing is like, I'm not good at it because people think there's only one way to do it. But that time piece, and the thing is, there's been research done that shows that three minutes, a few as three minutes has a profound effect on your wellbeing. People can't find three minutes. And essentially what you're doing is, it's like sharpening the ax. Stephen Covey had the sharpening the saw analogy. That's what you're doing when you are spending time in meditation or in any calming or grounding exercise. You are helping yourself to be more focused when you're outside of that time, so that projects take you less time to do and actually buy you more time.
Yeah.
I don't know any other investment that delivers as much.
I think that is a very profound statement to make, right? Like there's, it's so people are so results and ROI focused
Yeah.
Not only businesses, but individuals that just to be able to say like, this can change so much and is worth those. What else? How else are you gonna reap these kinds of benefits for three-ish minutes?
Yeah, I mean they become bigger as you spend more time. But like you said, I mean, really 15 to 20 minutes, you don't really need to spend any more than that. And for one thing, when you're finished, you feel better. But among other things, meditation decreases anxiety, which is rampant in our society right now, which decreasing anxiety improves resilience. A big buzzword, right? Everybody in business is talking about wanting to be more resilient. It does that. It enhances creativity and innovation. Other things that businesses are looking for these days. You get greater insights and bigger breakthroughs.
Yeah, yeah.
Brain imaging research shows that meditation helps regulate emotions, so it boosts emotional intelligence. So your relationships are better, your relationships with clients, with vendors, with coworkers, with people you live with, which a lot of times the conversations you're having at home are affecting your work, which is a whole other topic.
They always are.
Yeah, yeah.
They always are.
They're distractions, yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah, you just develop a greater patience with situations and people, you're less likely to react impulsively to get drawn into conflict. When you can maintain a peace of mind, you can make more logical decisions, logical and better decisions. Again, these are all directly related to business as well as outside of business and things that business people would do well to pay attention to. Yeah.
Go ahead.
No, I was gonna say, I say all the time that there's not a personal life, professional life that doesn't overlap, right? So if any of these things are going to, it's not about, it only helping or improving my personal relationships or my personal life, or my professional. It is one and the same. And the whole, we show up as ourselves everywhere we go, right?
Yes.
What is the saying that wherever I go there I am.
Yes.
This is an example of that. If you work on these things, if you are willing to spend, at least what I'm hearing, if you're willing to spend the time in meditation and in 15 to 20 minutes a day, three to 20 minutes a day, whatever that looks like.
Yeah.
It will affect everywhere you are.
Yes, absolutely. It changes everything. And the people that I've talked to who have also, I mean, a lot of people, it takes a long time to get to the place where you're like, all right, I'm ready to do it consistently.
Sure.
And once they do, it's incredible the stories that they have of how it has changed their lives. And it's not like their life was terrible before, it's just becomes exponentially better.
Yeah.
Calmer, just the peace of mind.
That is worth more than we give it credit for, I think.
A hundred percent. And a lot of times when you ask people what would you like your life to look like? Or what's the thing that you most want in your life? And what's something that you think that people, you know, what have you heard that people say they want from life?
Oh gosh. I mean, I think the default answer I hear the most is to be happy.
Yes, that's exactly what I was gonna say.
Which is also my least favorite answer, just as my own personal bias, 'cause it's like, have you defined that for yourself, 'cause if you haven't, that's a whole other conversation. But I think that's the one.
Yeah, that's the thing. That's what I was thinking too. And so what does that mean? But I just want to be happy. Okay, so to me, I think that translates a lot to, I want to feel peace in my life. This is gonna give you that.
Yeah, yeah. So I'm curious, I wanna talk about leadership a little bit and 'cause we've, which often happens is we've kind of transitioned through the crisis chaos into this. But leadership, whether it's self-leadership, whether it's leading other people, is obviously going to be impacted by these practices.
Yeah.
And I'm curious whether it's from your own experience or your own stories, or just related to leadership what stands out to you either about these practices and how they affect leadership or opportunities for leadership that are not maybe in the zeitgeist as much as they could be?
Yeah, I mean, leadership is first and foremost about leading yourself. You cannot, I was thinking about this a lot last night. You cannot be a good leader if you can't lead yourself. And I have a workshop called Zen Leadership, and it's about becoming a person that people want to support. Not just follow, like follow me because I'm the leader and I'm telling you what to do. Being a person that people want to support, that they're excited to support, that they admire. And so it's about becoming the best version of yourself. I don't think you can be a true good leader if you are living the best version of yourself.
Yeah, I was on a panel talking about this a few weeks ago, but one of the things that I heard recently, and it this reminds me of it is, so I don't love the concept of best version of yourself because best feels, it's a very weighted term, right? Like, there is a best version that is somehow defined, which there isn't and there never will be. So I heard someone say, and I've been using it and we were talking about this on this panel, is I wanna be the favorite, my favorite version of myself.
Oh, I like that.
And that to me is what you're talking about is like, how do you become your favorite version of yourself? And that is going to change and it should, 'cause hopefully we're all growing and changing.
Yeah.
But how do you become that and own that and use that as your guidepost?
Hmm, I like that. Yeah, yeah. And it comes down to, or back to how are you being, how are you being, and who are you being?
Yeah, so I know a little bit about your story and how you are living your life these days, but I'm curious 'cause that is so tied into this idea of leadership. I'm curious if you can share a bit about that with our audience. I'm not gonna spoiler alert this because you're gonna step into it and the tie into leadership, 'cause we talked about that before we hit record.
Yeah, absolutely. I gave up my apartment in northern Virginia, right outside of Washington, DC, in October of last year. So it's been almost an entire year. And I decided that I didn't know where I wanted to go, but I didn't wanna stay there. So I have been house and mostly cat sitting. Some dogs. I love all animals, but mostly cats because I'm a cat person.
No bias against the animals here.
No, no, no, I just discovered that. Well, I just reinforced that I am really a cat person.
Yeah.
So I have been cat sitting across mostly the southeast part of the United States for the past year. And so I have been living in all different cities, different states, and for a week to two weeks at a time. Right now, I'm somewhere that I will be for six weeks, so that's exciting. Yeah, and it's been a challenge in a lot of ways. And it's also been very interesting because I look at life as an adventure and an experiment. And at any point, and people have constantly asked me throughout the year, so when are you gonna stop doing this? When are you gonna be finished? I don't know when. I'll be finished when I'm finished. That's the answer. At this point though I am truly, this may be the last stop on what my friend Tracy calls the kitty cat tour. It may be because it has been a lot. And not having a place to park myself and to go home and we had talked about a personal situation that happened and I just, after that, just wanted to go home and sleep in my own bed and I don't have one. But along the journey, going back to leadership. There have been a lot of situations that have come up that could have been seen as chaos.
Yeah.
That could have been crisis. And having to manage through them without having all of like familiar bearings, for example. It can be very unnerving. And at the same time, given the tools and the techniques that I have used, including meditation, I have been able to stay grounded. Nothing has really blown up. I mean, it could have for a lot of other people, but I'm just like, "Okay, where do we go from here?" And I think that's part of the leadership lesson is to not let situations become like so overwhelming that now you're running around like your hair's on fire because that energy extends to your team. And now they're running around like, "Ah," and nobody's accomplishing anything good. It's just super high levels of stress. That's not to say that you're ignoring the situation. It's just that you're managing it from a grounded place. Like, okay, this is what's happened. It's a sense of acceptance. I'm not happy that my car broke down in six lanes of traffic at 7:30 at night. And I'm in a city I don't know anybody.
Understandable that you're not happy about that, yep.
And at the same time, I could immediately go to gratitude for the fact that I have a car, what do you call it?
Like that AAA or-
Yeah, yeah. Like a service that is coming, a tow truck coming to get me. I happened to only be a mile away from my Airbnb. A bunch of people stopped to see if I needed help. It wasn't raining. I can be grateful for all of these things instead of being so stressed out about it.
Yeah.
That's not to say it wasn't a stressful situation, it's just how did I manage it differently? And it's the same when you're working in with the a team and with projects and leading a team.
Yeah, so one of the topics that has come up or the concepts. Maybe not topic overall that, but concepts that has come up multiple times. Maybe because I bring it up. Not gonna lie to you. I'll fully own that. I might be the reason.
Okay.
But it relates very it is hand in hand in this, which is, and it's one of the, for me, most important aspects of leadership, which is recognizing what you can and can't control.
Yes.
Right, and so if you can take a step back and have perspective on the, you can't control that your car broke down. You can't. Like this, it has happened. You can't control that. You couldn't control when it was gonna happen. There's all of these things, but then what can you control and grounding yourself in that? And sometimes the only thing you can control is your breath. And like, something small to get, that's fine. But focusing on what you can instead of what you can't. And I think my experience has been, when you're talking about those situations that leaders are in, where they're running around, like their hair's on fire and then everyone else. It's 'cause everyone is trying to control what they can't control.
Yes. Right, that's exactly it. And when you practice things like calming and grounding exercises and meditation and the concept of gratitude is another big one that I talk about. It helps you be more capable of recognizing what you can and can't control and accepting it and moving on from there.
Yeah, I wanna ask you about gratitude specifically. And I will share for myself just for context. That is in good moments, I'm really great at being grateful and I truly, I am like, I'm really, I'm grateful for whatever, my cats, like all of the great things. And when something happens and I am activated in some way, while I am really good at grounding myself quickly or like breathing through and I know it will pass and it's temporary. I never go to gratitude like it is. I am never like, "What am I grateful for right now?" It's just not my go-to. So I'm owning that, 'cause that's where this question is coming from because I am positive. I'm not the only person who is like that. Really good at moving myself through that. But gratitude is just never the thing that's on my mind in those moments. So how do you, or how have you, I don't know if it's a how do you or how have you, but how has that been incorporated into those moments for you? Like when you talk, you said you're really big on gratitude. Tell me about that journey for you and like how you use that, especially in the tough moments, 'cause again, I think most of us are probably okay at it, if not good at it when we don't need to be good at it. When it's like, yeah, cool, everything's great. My love life.
Yes, there are two techniques I can share with you. One, and I'll start with the story 'cause I know you're into stories.
Please.
So when I started my first business, I was making a product called the Gratitude Cookie. It was based on a family recipe and it was kind of a cross between a butter and a sugar cookie.
Okay.
It was packaging in them as a way for businesses to say thank you to their clients and people who supported their success. The irony of this situation is that at the time I was not an extremely grateful person. And my mentor and friend Paul said to me, "Hey, I'm gonna give you a challenge and this is going to, I think you could stand to do this challenge." He said, "I'm challenging you to read chapter seven in the book, 'The Science of Getting Rich.'" Are you familiar?
Yep.
The Wallace D. Wattles.
Yep.
It was written in like the 1930s. So chapter seven is on gratitude. And all of the chapters in this book are really short, like three, four pages. He said, "I challenge you to read chapter seven on gratitude for 30 days. Once in the morning and once at night. Are you up for this challenge?" And I said, "All right, Paul, sure, I'll do it." And at the end of 30 days, absolutely nothing happened. Nothing happened. Like I typically tell that story when I'm doing presentations. I'm like, at the end of 30 days, the editor from Oprah's, "Favorite Things," magazine, from her magazine and the favorite things section called me and wanted to put the gratitude cookies in Oprah's favorite. Can you believe it? And people are like, "Oh my God, that's awesome." Yeah, that didn't happen. And then they laugh at me. But really nothing happened. And it wasn't until months later I was, again, it was another car freaking issue. I was driving home from a friend's house Thanksgiving evening and smoke started pouring out of the front of my car and I managed to get off the highway and into a gas station on the side and call the tow service. And instead of going all into a rant of, I can't believe this is happening, this sucks, da da da. I immediately went to gratitude. And thank goodness somebody, you know, we were able to get off the highway safely. Thank goodness this gas station was open. Thank goodness the tow truck driver's coming to get us at 11:30 at night. Thank goodness we're only five miles from home. That's when I noticed the power of having done that exercise that changed the brain. What gratitude does is it actually rewires your brain. And so the neural pathways in my brain, instead of going to this is horrible, went to, oh, I only saw the parts I was grateful for. And so there's that exercise. And then there's another one that I love sharing with people that's called, but I'm grateful for. And that is when you catch yourself. And it's when not if, I mean, because we're human and we're just gonna catch ourselves complaining and criticizing, but when you do to go, but I'm grateful for what, and it doesn't even have to be related to the situation. Like I'm all, I don't know, gimme some example of the cat's clawed up the carpet and now I'm gonna have to replace the carpet and this is terrible but I'm grateful that it's sunny outside and I'm gonna get to go for a walk with some friends later. Like, it doesn't even have to be related to the situation. Catching yourself and immediately going, but I'm grateful for. And the more you do that exercise, the more naturally grateful you'll become. And when situations happen that you are not happy about, you'll more quickly go to gratitude instead of staying in the situation.
I love that. I love both of those exercises. I think they're really practical and doable. But I'm grateful for, I imagine is an interesting challenge to start to incorporate for people, so I love that suggestion. I actually also think there's an opportunity for people to do it with each other, like if you work on teams or you work with other people.
A hundred percent. I get calls from friends all the time who have some kind of rant they need to be on and they're calling me 'cause they know I'll listen and then I go, "Okay, and what are you grateful for?" And they're like, "Oh, I knew you were gonna ask me that." Yeah, because, so call people out on it. If you're listening and people are coming to you with things, you're shifting their mindset. They might be angry at you for a second. Like, "I don't wanna talk about that." What are you grateful for?
Yeah.
Keep doing it.
And this would be my caveat is I think there are people who, my fear is that there are people who would jump into that so quickly that it falls over into toxic positivity.
Yes.
Where they're not, they're, so I love that. And let's, you know, for anyone listening or watching, don't let it spill over and become, you don't hear what the complaint is or what's going on, 'cause you wanna get to the positive because that there's too much toxic positivity as it is where it's not about reality.
I completely agree with you and thank you for mentioning that because emotions are valid. Like, I'm not saying don't feel the pain, don't feel the anger, whatever it is. Feel it.
Yes.
'Cause that's the only way you're gonna get through it. Acknowledge it, feel it. And I don't just cut my friends off when they're talking. I wait until they're let and then I go to like, "What are you doing?"
Yes.
But yeah, that is all valid. And then wheres the gratitude?
Yes, yes. And that's, and I appreciate you clarifying that, 'cause I fully understood what you were saying and what I didn't want people to hear was, "Oh, we just jump into what we're grateful for," 'cause we know some people wanna short, no offense to anyone, but we know some people who are going to wanna shortcut to that to get to the easier to talk about positive things which invalidates the feelings of the person.
Correct. And yeah, and that's just a distraction. And yeah, that's a whole other conversation.
So there's, this is the fun of conversations like this is you're like, oh, we could go so many different ways inside of this.
Yes. So I'm curious with the work that you do, as I mentioned, I love the name of your company, Zen Rabbit. I actually, I'm gonna change my question. How did you come up with that name before I asked what I was gonna ask?
I mentioned the gratitude cookies. So Zen Rabbit was established as Zen Rabbit Baking Company originally.
Oh.
And there's a whole story on my website under the about page. But the short story of it is, it was when I started making those cookies and people would taste them, they would say, "Oh my gosh, this reminds me of something my grandma used to bake." And it brings them back to that zen blissful place of baking in the kitchen with grandma. And then there was some mythology or about rabbits bringing prosperity to businesses. And so that's how it became the Zen Rabbit. But also, as you will learn on the website, when I was a baby, my mom bought a stuffed rabbit and put it, like a plush toy rabbit.
Yep.
And put it in the crib. And she could take all the other animals out, but the rabbit had to be in the crib or I was not sleeping. And as I got older, I would rub her ears for comfort. There's a picture on the website.
I love that.
Of me at my grandparents' house. I'm about two years old. And I am rubbing her ears and I'm in a zen blissful place. And so she was my zen rabbit, even though I didn't actually call her that at the time. And from a marketing standpoint, which I have many, many years of marketing background, nobody ever forgets the name Zen Rabbit.
For sure, how could they?
No, they don't remember my name, but they remember Zen Rabbit. And that's actually why when I started the next business, I actually named it something different. But I had to come back to calling it Zen Rabbit because everybody knew me as Zen Rabbit.
Yeah.
It's my license plate. If you see me driving around, it's Zen Rabbit.
Note to self, if you see license plate, that is Lori.
Yes.
So as part of, so thank you for sharing that. I appreciate that. And as part of the work that you are doing now with Zen Rabbit and with productivity and engagement and wellbeing and you know, this meditation, mindfulness, gratitude.
Yeah.
What are, if you had to kind of leave anyone listening with like, here are the three most important things to remember or five, I don't care. Pick your own number. I always say three 'cause that's my brain.
Yeah.
But like, what are the things that you're like, Don't forget these three things. Keep these. If you do these three things, it'll change everything.
Yeah, practicing gratitude will change everything. It changes you, how you show up in the world and how you see the world. The other thing about gratitude is that I wanna emphasize that this is not just about, it's nice, it's good manners. My mom made me write thank you notes when I was a kid growing up after holidays and birthdays, right? You're giving me a face that you probably had to do too.
Thank you notes were the bane of my existence because my parents were also like, "You need to do this. It's the proper thing." And I was like, "But why?" Like, "Thank you for the gift. It was great. Celine."
Yeah.
Like, it's not gratitude.
No, no, that was forced gratitude. But so yes, it is a very nice thing to do and it makes people feel good and it makes them feel valued. At the same time, recognize, realize that there are tangible benefits to gratitude. There have been studies that people will stay longer. Productivity is boosted by 50%. People who practice gratitude are more productive. And some of the studies have shown by 50, 50%, that when people feel appreciated, they have higher job satisfaction, they have higher quality of life and they will stay longer at a company if their boss appreciates them. So it is directly tied to retention, engagement and workplace wellbeing. And then the third thing that we talked about was like, take freaking five minutes to use some calming grounding exercises that can be as simple as deep breathing. Can you focus on breathing all the way down to your abdomen and feeling that air coming in and then just letting it go. And feeling your shoulders relax, your neck relax, your arms. Like spend three to five minutes breathing. And you can do that when you wake up in the morning. You can do that in between meetings. You can do that when you're sitting in a tense meeting and you just wanna bring things down. When you are calm. We already talked about this too. People around you. Energetically. It's not a theory. This actually happens. Energetically the people around you calm down. Their energy, it grounds.
Yeah, there was, and I'm going to, someone is gonna fact check me on this 'cause I do not remember this, but I remember reading about a study a few years ago that was talking about how if, like in a meeting room, if one person started breathing deeply and slowly, everyone's breath started to slow down if they were being intentional about it. And if someone started breathing really quickly and like it, then everyone's breathing and heart rate would elevate.
Yep.
So it, you know, again, someone will fact check me and be like, this is the, but we know this works.
It is. Yeah, I've heard of, I was recently reintroduced to that information.
Yeah.
It's real, yeah.
Yeah, it's a great reminder. And before I ask, I do have kind of a wrap up question for you, but before I ask that, I wanted to just note that what you were talking about, the importance of appreciation, I do not think can be overestimated. I have worked with an organization that when I first started working with them, many of the conversations I was having and when I was coaching people primarily, but many of them would end, you know, they would say, you know, thanks so much for the time, whatever version of it was and be like, you know, until we chat again, I really appreciate you. And I was like, okay, that's a really weird thing to say it every time. And it felt great. But I was like, what an odd thing to say. And then I realized it was really part of their culture to intentionally, in especially in one-on-one conversations just acknowledge like, I really appreciate you and the time and oftentimes people would say a specific thing that they appreciated.
Yes, yes.
And it became part of my vernacular as well over the years. And I have to say, it's one of the things that I think is so important and unspoken and has always stood out to me about working with that organization is just how, in a positive way, entrenched things like that can be and moments can be. And we need more of those in organizations, not less. And more of those in teams and more of those in relationships.
Absolutely, and it costs you nothing.
Nothing. So before we wrap this up, is there anything that we didn't get to that you wanna make sure we talk about or something that you wanna emphasize inside of our conversation today? 'Cause I know we talked about many things.
Yeah, no, I mean we covered a lot and I think it's, I would, the only thing I would say is that I invite people listening to do, take one of the exercises. Don't try to do all of them at one time. Maybe that's overwhelming. Take one of the things that we talked about today and implement it for the next seven days. Be consistent for the next, just the next seven days. And then after the seven days, evaluate how do you feel? Do you feel better or do you not feel any difference at all? Which I would be surprised by, but also maybe you don't. And then you have two choices. One, you can do it for another seven days and reevaluate again. Or you can abandon it and say, it didn't work for me.
Yeah, I like that, I love that. And I also love the take one thing, don't do all the things.
I mean we can hear all of these things and they are all effective and it can be overwhelming to start with all of them at one time.
Yeah, absolutely. So for anyone listening, per usual we will have all of links to find Lori and Zen Rabbit in the show notes. But the website is, zenrabbit.com. If you wanna learn more about Lori and Zen Rabbit. And, Lori, thank you so much for spending time with me today. I appreciate, see I told you I was gonna, it's so part of my vernacular as I'm doing this, I'm like, "I literally just talked about this."
It's okay.
But I appreciate your willingness to share some of your personal stories and experiences inside of it. It's always the most valuable part of these conversations. So thank you for taking the time with me today.
Thanks for having me.
[Celine] Thanks for joining me today on the, "Leading Through Crisis," podcast. If you enjoyed this conversation, please take a minute to rate and review us on your podcast app. If you're interested in learning more about any of our guests, you can find us online at www.leadingthroughcrisis.ca.