Rules Of Engagement

Good morning. Cadre. It is Betsy. It's 11 o' clock Eastern, 10 o' clock Central. It feels like I have been away for a month. I don't think it's been a month, but the last couple weeks I was at conferences for organizations. I'm on the board of. And so I was in Houston. I am on the board of the National Black MBA Association Masters of Business Administration. So an organization for professional black folks. And that was amazing. And then this past week I am on the board of an organization. Good morning.

Gen Venvirali maybe. Good morning. I am also on the board of the center for Good Food Purchasing, which is based out of LA National Black MBA is based out of Atlanta. And we had a power of procurement convening to talk about what the future looks like for food purchasing from anchor institutions. Not a lot I talk about here on Cadre, but both of those separately were very, very interesting spaces for me to be. And I'm really honored and proud to be on both of those boards. We're in October already and Harvest is the theme for October, which I everything about that theme.

I also love October. That's not actually true. I some pretty sketchy things happened to me in October when I was a young person. So I sometimes get a little activated in October. But I, you know, I love summer the most. But when the weather gets cooler and it's getting beautiful and the leaves and I live now in the south or you know, the Mid Atlantic, so it's slower to unfold and unfurl. That's nice too. So I'm eager to see what happens to this new view since we moved here. And I've never lived here in the fall before.

But Harvest is a great topic and this week in particular we're talking about personal growth. And if there is one skill I've cultivated, if there is one, one thing I have dedicated my life to, you could say local government, you could say enrolling white people in the work of racial equity. But in order to do either of those things, I have had to become a specialist and a generalist in personal growth. And so I laughed when I saw this as the topic because. Because I have had. Listen, I've had to devote myself to personal growth because I was on a trajectory to die or be institutionalized and not be able to take care of myself in any way, shape or form.

And so I have had to outgrow and outpace the polls and longings and temptations, my early hurts. I've had to heal them in order to outpace them. And that requires personal growth because I had to become bigger than they are. And for me, it means I also have a higher power who has to be bigger than my problems. Otherwise my problems become my higher power. I'm a person in recovery. So if you don't know, I got sober at 19 after, you know, a difficult home life. Not, I don't think, a standard deviation beyond the norm of anybody's home, but it was, you know, dysfunctional.

I think anybody, any of us who grew up in it or were part of it would say that, including my parents, who all did their own heal, both did their own healing journeys. But the way I responded to that dysfunction in the home allowed some abuse outside the home. So that's the only thing I'm going to say about that. But I meant by 19, I was drinking, smoking, weighed well over 200 pounds because I was eating sugar all the time and eating food all the time to anesthetize myself. So personal growth, a little bit of a hobby of mine, a little bit of my favorite sport.

So because my life has required it, not because I have some, because I have some level of discipline that other people don't have, not because, not because it's a competition or whatever, but just because it was that or die and I chose to grow instead of die. So what that means is a lot of my rules of engagement have to do with personal growth. That's my posted rules of engagement. The little shiny spots are the gold stickers I put on them because I love gold stickers. I love stickers. So I love stickers.

That whole chest there is full of stickers. As a matter of fact, believe it or not, I use them for lots of things. So. But I'll go over the rules of engagement. I'm vamping a little bit because I'm just so excited about the topic. So rule of engagement number two, I'm not going to spend a lot of time on because I talk about it so much. Rule of engagement number one is love what you love. And it's personal growth when you get to the moment where you can love what you love and then just pursue it.

And then many adventures in my life have attended to that. A few weeks ago I was invited. A friend of mine's in the Writers Guild of America. And sometimes they're invited to four year consideration screenings of films that they may consider voting for for various awards. And so I get this text from her and she says, hey, do you want to go see this? And this was a Wednesday and it was A mov was in New York on Sunday and the movie was the Bruce Springsteen biopic Deliver Me From Nowhere that is out in theaters October 24th.

You can buy tickets now and you should, because, reader, I went and it was amazing. And I am so biased because if you've known me two minutes, you know, I'm a Springsteen fan and I was so eager to see the film and I was so lucky to get to see it early. And it is really, really good. So go see it. I'm biased, but other people think so too. Anyway, Love what yout Love is the number one rule of engagement, and it's personal growth and then personal adventure to follow your heart, where it leads you.

My number two is really spot on about personal growth. Start from where you are, not from where you wish you were. Like, if you want to get, you know, you have to know where you want to go, right? If I want to go to Utah, I have to know that, right? So first of all, you have to know what your destination is, but you have to start from where you are to get to Utah. I'm in Maryland. I cannot get to Utah from Maine. I can't get there from Oregon. Like, I can't get to Utah from Oregon if I'm in Maryland.

I have to know that I'm in Maryland and plot a chart that will get me to Utah. I cannot be in Maryland and plot a chart from Oregon to Utah and then wonder why I'm not on the path to Utah, right? And I think a lot of us actually do that. We start from where we think we should be. We start from where we wish we were. We do not start from where we are. And then we wonder why we're not getting where we choose to go. Start from where you are, not from where you wish you were. I've told this story a million times.

I wonder if I have a better example of when I started exercising and I got on a treadmill and I could walk for five minutes at 0% incline at 2 miles an hour. But that's when I came up with this because I was like, well, I'm gonna have to start from where I am. And this is where I'm at. And my calves were started burning and cramping a little bit. And it was like, all right, well, that's where I'm start. And I am going to tell you that I have. I ran for 45 minutes on the treadmill yesterday, right?

I have been running because that happened when I was 19. I have been running since I was 25. So I have been running for 31 years, which is hard to imagine. I love to run, so I ran yesterday. So start from where you are, not from where you wish you were. If you want to harvest, you know, if you want to harvest cantaloupe, you cannot plant pumpkin seeds. You have to plant cantaloupe seeds. If you want to harvest peppers, you have got to plant pepper seeds. You cannot plant corn seeds, especially if you treat the corn seeds like pepper seeds.

Corn just needs different stuff. Hi, Speak wonder. Glad you're popping in. We're talking about start from where you are, not from where you wish you were as part of harvest. If you want to harvest corn, then don't plant pepper seeds and vice versa, right? They need different things. They require different soil, different water, different situations all together, right? You got to start from where you are, not from where you wish you were. Number 13. Don't accept criticism from someone whose advice you would not seek.

If I would not ask that person on the Internet for their advice about my business, I should not accept their criticism about my business. Whether my business is actually my, you know, my work, or, like, my business is my how I have fun. Whatever it is. Whatever it is. Do not accept criticism from someone whose advice you would not seek. That includes your parents. If you wouldn't ask your parents for advice, you don't have to take their criticism either. They installed your vulnerability to their criticism.

So it's understandable that you pay. That we all pay a little more attention to it than other people's. My mother. I love my mother. I am not speaking ill of the dead. I had no unfinished business with my mother when she died. She was an extraordinary person, but she grew up a tomboy. And I know some of the messages she heard from my grandmother because I heard them from her. And she would say to me, because I have curly hair. And my mother didn't realize she had curly hair until she was in her 50s.

And I have my mother's hair. And she was so startled. And it was clear to me that she was told to straighten it or make it wavy or whatever her whole life. And it was such a struggle for her. So she would say to me when I started wearing my hair curly, she would say to me, you look like you've been dragged through a hedge backwards. And I'd be like, thanks, Mom. Thanks, mom. I have great hair. But I knew where it was coming from, right? But I wasn't. I would never ask my mother for hair advice or makeup advice.

My mother knew nothing about Hair and makeup. She was a tomboy with no interest in those things. Who. You know, she taught herself later in life and did things that pleased her. But I learned from other people. I asked advice from other people about how to do hair and makeup because my mother did not teach me those things when I was young, because she couldn't. She taught me way more important things than that, to be honest. Like, feelings are not a great guide to decision making, that you can't change how you feel.

You can change what you do about how you feel. That was a pretty good lesson. There's a. There's some corollaries to that, and there's some things I would add to that. But what I do about how I feel sometimes is think a different thought, which means I then feel a different way. But I took her point. My mom was great, but don't accept criticism from someone whose advice you would not seek. That's a hard one, because we are so wired to hear the criticism. But don't accept criticism from someone whose advice you would not seek.

That's number 13. Number 16. This is from Gretchen Rubin. Choose the bigger life. When I think about personal growth and harvest, I think about choose the bigger life. Right? What is gonna make your life bigger? I'm telling you, drinking alone in my room was not making my life bigger. And I knew it. What's something, like happening to me right now? I am teaching online classes for white women about our pull to stay quiet in moments when our leadership is needed most. And it's a little bit of a tough going because I have to learn all these skills.

Like, the curriculum is great. The material is great. I know what I'm talking about. Lol. That would be funny if it weren't so hurtful, the being dragged through a hedge backwards. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I laugh about it now because I did a lot of healing work around it, you know, and because my mother has passed away and because I just do have this perspective on where it was coming from for her. But for her, I know how painful it was because she was confused about her hair her whole life and because she would not say that to me if she were thinking clearly.

And she. If she couldn't think clearly about it, it means she was in pain about it. Yeah, yeah, that. Right. My mother had a lot of feelings about her own curly hair, is what that comes down to. It is not choosing the bigger. Like, I just applied for a fellowship that I'm very excited about, but in the past, I would have not. I would have hung back on Giving it my all for the application because I was nervous or I didn't want to fully show myself or because I didn't think I could do it. Like that.

Imposter syndrome of like, I'm not. I don't, I won't. If I give it my all and I don't get it, then there'll be proof that my all is not good enough or something. And I did not do that this time. I gave it my all. All I did. Personal growth. I never used to ask for help. Like, I don't think I saw a guidance counselor at any point. Between the time I entered kindergarten and between and the time I graduated from graduates, got my master's degree. I didn't leave college. I consulted no one about my post college careers.

Career, right. It turned out okay. But this time I consulted the people I could consult with. The program manager for the fellowship, the person who nominated me for the fellowship. I asked for their help. And then I asked two people to read it and give me feedback. And they gave me great feedback that I incorporated. Like I really did. And then I started worrying, am I over engineering this? And in my meditation, in my meditation, I heard, submit this by the end of the day. This was last Thursday.

That was personal growth for me, was choosing the bigger life. The bigger life was going all out, just really going for it. Doing my best to get this fellowship. We'll see what happens. I'll keep you updated. Choose the bigger life. Number 24. I've already mentioned feelings are an important data point, but they're not a great guide for decision making. Like it matters how I feel. It matters if I'm sad about something or mad about something or happy about something, or if something feels good, good.

Or I feel pulled to something. You know, intuition and feeling are related, but they're different. But my feelings really matter. But they're not a great gu for decision making. Like if I just love, love, love something, this one's hard for me. Because if I love, love, love something, I'm just going to do it. And it's like the question doesn't make sense. I love it. Does it make sense to do it? I'm afraid of it. Does it still make sense to do it? You know, it might make sense to do it anyway. Even though I'm afraid, nine times out of ten for me, fear.

Like if you're scared, like, I don't know, 22 hours a day, then fear is not a great guide to whether or not I should do something. If I'm scared a lot which, you know, I have anxiety. Lots of things scare me, but it doesn't. It's on the driver's seat. 27. There are a thousand ways to get it right. I know I'm going over but there was just so many and I was so excited. And also I'll just say these. 27. There are a thousand ways to get it right. There are a thousand paths from. You know that example I used earlier to get from Maryland to Utah.

You could chart like 17 different paths to get to Utah. There's a thousand ways, thousand roads I could take, a thousand stops I could make along the way. Just depends. There's a thousand ways to get it right. And finally 31. Enjoy the intrinsic reward. What do I mean by intrinsic reward? I. You know I lost 10 pounds earlier this year by choice by eating food that had more nutrition in it. Practicing being hungry. Eating a salad every day at lunch. I'm scared of being. I don't like being hungry, which is so I sometimes eat not be just to stop being hungry.

Even though it makes sense to be hungry for a little while. It wasn't self deprivation anyway. The intrinsic reward for that was, oh my gosh, I love when my clothes fit better. I just loved that my clothes fit better. And there were some clothes I hadn't been able to wear that I can now wear again. I had gained some weight over the last couple years. Enjoy the intrinsic reward. I didn't have to go out and buy new clothes to enjoy the fact that I lost weight. I could. It's fun to reward yourself or whatever, but they aren't as motivating as noticing in personal growth.

You know, waking up not being hungover is great. Oh, I'm so glad you have a pen and notebook nearby when I'm on here. Thank you so much. I have a pen and notebook nearby always. Because I hear so much in the world and I have. Maybe we could talk about this sometime on my phone. Every month I have an ideas thing in my Evernotes. Whatever you use on your phone to keep track of things, I have that. But I also have a notebook. I mean I just. Everywhere. So enjoy the intrinsic reward. You know, sometimes that means enjoy the path along the way.

What is it that I enjoy about running? I enjoy how I feel afterward. I enjoy the music I listen to while I'm doing it. I enjoy how badass I feel when I go a little further than I went the week before. My PR days running are behind me. But the great news is I've always been slow. I've always been a slow runner. It has never stopped me from running. So maybe we'll end with personal growth. On that note, you don't Growth doesn't always mean being good at something. It might mean enjoying the intrinsic reward of doing the thing you're not that great at.

You know, I'm not a great singer. I'm not like Kelly Clarkson or something. I'm not like Jennifer Hudson. But I still take voice lessons now every other week. Used to be every week. I still take voice lessons every other week and I still sing almost every day because I just love singing and it's so good for your nervous system and it sounds so good, pretty and then it's so fun. The intrinsic rewards of singing, I literally will not perform. It's not that like I do not take voice lessons in order to perform publicly.

I take voice lessons because I love to sing and it's so fun to be a better singer in the car, in the shower. So, okay, I've gone five minutes over which I I don't know how am I going to get in trouble for that? I don't know. But I am five minutes over. So I will see you next week. I am back from all this travel. I don't have a ton more trouble travel scheduled for the rest of the year. One or two things possibly, but I just love being here. Cadre and I missed you all. So have great good week. Remember, personal growth harvest what you have sown.