ArchivesLeading Below the Surface

on September 9, 2024 September 11, 2024

S2: Ep 16 – How to Make the Most of Your Personal Learning and Development Investments

In this insightful episode of the The Leading Below the Surface podcast, host LaTonya Wilkins chats with Loren Sanders, author of Empathy is Not a Weakness. Loren shares about her transformative work with empathy as well as providing tips and tricks as you approach conference season; how to strategize, maximize learnings, and the value of building your network.

Resources from today’s episode:

– Change Coaches Guide to Create Psychological Safe Conversations Across Differences

– Connect with Loren on LinkedIn

Transcript:

00:01:05 – LaTonya Wilkins

Hi, I’m LaTonya Wilkins, your host, and today I’m joined by a guest. Her name is Loren Sanders. So let me tell you a little bit about how I met Loren.

00:01:33 – LaTonya Wilkins

So we actually met in Champaign, Illinois, of all places. And what was so interesting is she had reached out to me because we were kind of doing similar things in our careers, and we had such a great relationship. I invited her to speak at one of my classes at the Gies College of business was a leadership class. Students really enjoyed it. And then our lives have evolved.

00:02:00 – LaTonya Wilkins

And over time, she has kind of moved on from champagne. She’s kind of doing some other things now. She wrote a book, empathy is not a weakness. So we’ve connected on that. One more little nugget about Loren.

00:02:15 – LaTonya Wilkins

Actually, her dad is in the same profession as my partner. And so it was so funny because he is like this well known person in that profession. So we had all these little nuggets of connection, and that’s one of the things that kind of brought us together. And what’s really neat is that we’ve stayed together as friends, as partners, as supporters. So, Loren, what did I miss?

00:02:36 – Loren Sanders

I think you missed the part where I want to be you when I grow up, and you think I’m kidding, but I’m actually serious about that.

00:02:45 – LaTonya Wilkins

Oh, I love that. Yeah. Thank you very much. Yeah, you just made my day with that. But I appreciate that.

00:02:53 – LaTonya Wilkins

But, yeah. So let’s dive right into this. So today, folks, we’re talking all about how to make the most of your learning investments. We’re going toa talk about other things, but personal learning investments. Like I said, Loren’s also written a book, and that’s kind of where I want to start.

00:03:11 – LaTonya Wilkins

But don’t worry, we will get into the learning stuff. I know it’s fall conference season, so we all want to get into that topic. But first, Loren, tell us a little bit about your book, why you wrote a book about empathy.

00:03:23 – Loren Sanders

I would tell you that I didn’t write a book about empathy, but I wrote the book on empathy. And the difference is there’s a lot of books out there about empathy and what it is, and people are always talking about what it is and how it’s different from sympathy and, and how everybody needs to do it, but nobody ever gave anyone a plan about how to get there. And my book is really a seven week reflection for people to be able to self reflect and determine whether or not they might have a problem with empathy. And the readers have interestingly told me that they read it twice, the first time for the content and then the second time to actually work through the process. And it just makes my heart happy when people say that it all stemmed from having been a toxic leader in my past and not actually recognizing that I was that person.

00:04:20 – Loren Sanders

And I tell a little bit of that story in the book, but self reflection is really the catalyst for change. Self awareness makes a difference, and if you don’t know that you really suck, then you’re never going to be able to change. And that is really, it’s, the book’s a little bit about my journey. It’s a little bit about other people’s stories who have ever been treated horribly at work or who have overcome being toxic leaders. And it blends all of that together with some framework around what you can do to continuously practice being empathetic.

00:05:00 – Loren Sanders

Because I will argue all day long, and if people want to contact me for this argument, they are more than welcome to do that. But it is a practice. It is not a skill.

00:05:12 – LaTonya Wilkins

So you shared a lot of vulnerability. That’s one of the things that I was listening for as you were talking, and one of the things I noticed. So is that what made you write this book? It sounds like maybe you were, you were kind of sick of people, maybe not being empathetic, or maybe was there something, a defining moment in your career that made you say, okay, we need to write a book. I need to write a book about empathyuse really, I need to write the book about empathyus. Really I really want people to see something different.

00:05:42 – Loren Sanders

For me, I love hearing other people’s stories and having taken the journey of being not empathetic at all to being a much more empathetic human, I started listening more to what people were saying and similar to you with leading below the surface. There is real impact in hearing other people’s stories, especially people who don’t look like you, maybe don’t act like you maybe are outside of whatever the box is that you’re used to being in, and hearing their experiences, especially in the workplace, and recognizing that we have a huge problem with toxic leadership. And it goes beyond the impact of people at work. It hurts them, not just at work, but it gets taken home, and it impacts families, and it impacts everybody that surrounds people who are in this space. And we really need to do a better job of creating opportunities for leaders like this to not be recognized for being great leaders because they make a lot of money for a company, but to leaders to be recognized when they actually help other people be better and drive business results that way.

00:07:09 – LaTonya Wilkins

Yeah, yeah. Those are all such important points of how this affects everyone. And really, one of the things I really heard you say, too, is that you are un empathetic at one time. And just admitting that and being able to say that because it can be hard to be empathetic. You know, it’s interesting, I was doing a keynote the other day, and after my keynote, someone came up to me and he asked, how do I do this?

00:07:35 – LaTonya Wilkins

How do I do this? And, you know, I gave him your book as a resource. But, you know, I was, you knowus. And that’s what I talk about. Like, how. How do you access them?

00:07:43 – LaTonya Wilkins

I mean, it’s hard. And, like, your stories are good because people can go into that and see themselves in those stories.

00:07:50 – Loren Sanders

I think out of all the stories in the book and all of them impacted me and all of the people who shared their stories, I cannot than enough. But there was one person who told me their story about how being overworked and burned out and in a toxic situation drove them to a psychological crisis that ended up putting them in the hospital. They were actually having delusions of things that weren’t true and realizing how much impact one person can have on your life. In some ways it’s harrowing, and other ways you kind of think, well, that’s ridiculous, but it’s real and it’s happening to people, and it’s not okay.

00:08:31 – LaTonya Wilkins

Right? Yeah. Yeah. Anything else you want to say about? We’renna, come back to this later. And I want to get into some of the other stuff that we’re goingna talk about because again, you wear so many hats and so you have so much great knowledge that I think people are looking forward to hearing.

00:08:50 – Loren Sanders

The last thing I’ll say about this is if you’re not practicing empathy, you’re getting worse.

00:08:55 – LaTonya Wilkins

Yeah, that is powerful. If you’re not practicing empathy, you’re getting worse. Yeah. And it’s like you don’t have to be right, folks.

00:09:06 – LaTonya Wilkins

You don’t have to completely understand. Right? You don’t have to agree. But we’re getting into fall and people are really starting to step into fall conference season. And so a lot of folks are also investing in new programs. A lot of folks are going back to school.

00:09:23 – LaTonya Wilkins

A lot of folks are going to be going to new conferences. They’going to be taking on some new learning experiences. So what’s some of the advice that you would give them to make the most out of these learning experiences? And the reason I ask is because I know I was recently at a conference that was probably one of the best conferences I’ve been at in a long time. It was the Institute of coaching at Harvard, and I just haven’t had time to kind of go back to everything. I mean, the connections were great, but what would be some, maybe a couple tips that you give people around how to navigate this conference season or a new learning and making sure they get the most out of their dollars?

00:10:04 – Loren Sanders

The first thing is, if you think the magical budget fairrry is going to come out of somewhere and give you the budget to go to these things, we’re doing the wrong thing. A lot of organizations are not even paying for conferences right now, so I would choose wisely. If it’s your own personal budget and knowing that you’ve made that investment, I want to ask the listeners, how many of you have notebooks full of notes that you’ve taken from conferences and never looked at again, it might be a good opportunity to go back through and read through those notes and figure out what am I going to do with this information? And if you’re headed to a conference, maybe have a reflection plan in mind at the front end, there’s the breaks in between the conference sessions, and we run around and some of us take everything we can from the vendors or run around and try to get that card filled out and then get all these little chotchkis that we end up getting rid of later because we don’t need all of those things. Maybe take that ten or 15 minutes to just sit, even for five of them, and think about what am I going to do with the information I just got? How am I going toa put this into practice in my work, in my life, in my ability to grow somebody else and just take a note on that and then compile those when you get back home, take the time, schedule the time so that you can intentionally go through what you learned and figure out how it fits for you and how you can use it to develop yourself more or develop your team more.

00:11:44 – LaTonya Wilkins

Yeah, I love that. So the reflection plan and making sure that you have that out and that you have that pretty much done before the conference, would you say yes?

00:11:57 – Loren Sanders

Definitely.

00:11:57 – LaTonya Wilkins

Okay. And maybe even setting up some time in between. Ye yeah. And then, like, I think the other question around that just to ask a follow up is, what do you think is enough to get from a conference? Because I find a lot of times people are beating themselves up or they’re thinking, oh, my gosh, I wasted money. But if they do one thing, or if they’re able to do one thing differently, what would you say that could be?

00:12:26 – LaTonya Wilkins

Or how should they think about that?

00:12:28 – Loren Sanders

I will say, again, I’m a super nerd. So prior to going to a conference, I will pour over the education sessions.

00:12:35 – Loren Sanders

And try to figure out what I.

00:12:37 – Loren Sanders

Want to get out of the conference before I even show up at, at the conference. Choosing my sessions very carefully because of what I’m trying to learn or what I’m trying to take away, and then creating the reflection plan around whatever that plan is and deciding you can’t boil the ocean, I think it’s important to know what I’m wanting to get out of this is x, and I want to implement maybe one to three things in the next. I would say six to twelve months, and maybe it’s longer than that. But understanding the why behind the choice of the sessions and what they can do for you, for your organization, for your own development, I think that becomes more important than the quantity, I think really choosing well and thinking about outcomes versus how many inputs can I get?

00:13:39 – LaTonya Wilkins

Yeah, I like that. You know, and it’s interesting when I brought the IOC conference, it’s interesting because I feel like I made a lot of connections, and there are a lot of people there that I’d read leading below the surface, or they’d been to other, they’ve been to webinars or workshops that I’ve run. And so that part was the part that was kind of intangible. And so let’s kind of talk about that? Like, what about how do, what’s the trade off? Or what’s the relationship with that? Because you might have a plan and then the entire plan goes down the tubes when you find out that someone you really want to meet is there. Or you get into this side conversation and it’s so deep that you decide just to stay with them instead of go to a session.

00:14:25 – LaTonya Wilkins

So would you say relationships are just as important?

00:14:29 – Loren Sanders

Oh, yes. I think relationships are fuel for helping us grow. And so if you meet that amazing person and you have a great conversation and you think about things that you can do together or how you can help each other, that’s as valuable as a conference session. And I wouldn’t throw that away. Most of the time you can get the notes from the session you were going to go to from another person.

00:14:54 – Loren Sanders

A lot of times they’re posted on websites. Sometimes they’re even recorded and you can listen to them, or that person has a site you can go to and learn a lot more about what they do. Chances are these days they probably have a podcast, too.

00:15:08 – LaTonya Wilkins

Yeah. Yeah. It’s funny. Yeah, I’m glad you were re saying. Cause it’s like I still have all these notes in a folder and I, I went back and I’m like, okay, I think I probably got more from that than I thought.

00:15:19 – LaTonya Wilkins

So I did have one more question as we’re talking about this before we end, and this is probably a question that is on many of your minds, so, AI. So when I was at this conference and other conferences, but actually IOC specifically, Martin Siegelman had a chat bot assistant that he had rolled out and he was having a beta test during that time that basically you could ask questions about positive psychology or other items, and he had preloaded the answers. And so you were able to get these answers to these questions. And so I would love to hear your thoughts on AI and learning and development. I know for me, for myself, I use chat GPT, I have a couple other AI’s I use mainly for writing, sales purposes, marketing purposes.

00:16:15 – LaTonya Wilkins

But do you think, what are your thoughts around? Is AI going to be a big, is it going to make a big splash in learning and development? And maybe how can we use it? As we’re talking about these conferences and we’re talking about forgetting everything we’re learning, is it a viable tool today? And if not, how do you see that evolving in the future?

00:16:38 – Loren Sanders

I think AI is here to stay and it’s been here for a really long time. We just wasn’t in the form of.

00:16:44 – Loren Sanders

Chat GPT but we’ve used it for a lot of things where I think it’s helpful in learning and development is maybe you need to create a rubric on something and you’re not really sure how to put the phrasing into it, or you’re trying to create some sort of video script and you want to make sure that it flows. But the problem is you better know your content before you start to use AI because it lies. It’s not always accurate, 100% and nobody AI is not going to take your job. Somebody that knows how to use it is going to. And the more you can partner with it, the better off you’re going to be. I love to say never accept the first answer the AI gives you. There’s so much more impact in just continuing the back and forth. And please always check the research and the references that it gives you because a lot of times those aren’t right. It’s not perfect. It’s a partner.

It is not. It’s not doing your job for you.

00:17:52 – LaTonya Wilkins

Yeah, it’s very limited in. It’s interesting because the new version starts to have sources, but it’s like the same sources over and over, which it’s helpful to get started then. But I agree, and I think one thing I was really surprised about is I could dump in a description of something or ask it for a learning plan, and it’s pretty good with that. But you’re right, the facts. I probably wouldn’t trust it maybe just to get started, but it’s pretty good with anything.

00:18:23 – LaTonya Wilkins

Writing, planning. I found it to be pretty like does a better job than I would, but especially if it’s my content first and making it better.

00:18:32 – Loren Sanders

And I would tell you also, it’s not super innovative. Remember, everything that AI has and accesses are things that have already been done or things that have already been researched. So if you’re trying to be innovative and want to be future focused, forward, different, it can give you ideas. But that’s not the tool. Your brain is a better tool.

00:18:54 – Loren Sanders

Your collaboration with other people is a better tool.

00:18:58 – LaTonya Wilkins

Yeah, yeah, I agree with all that as well. So finally, how can people find you?

00:19:05 – Loren Sanders

Definitely find me on LinkedIn. That’s probably where I share the most impactful content that I have. I also have a coaching website and a book website. Loren three six five.com is my book website.

00:19:22 – Loren Sanders

Rocxaloccoaching.com is my coaching website. I will respond to anybody who reaches out to me through LinkedIn or any.

00:19:29 – Loren Sanders

Of those other ways.

00:19:32 – Loren Sanders

I don’t ever turn down a conversation with somebody unless they’re trying to sell me something weird, which happens a lot, but real, intentional conversations with people I love.

00:19:45 – LaTonya Wilkins

Thank you so much for joining us, Loren. And folks, have a wonderful conference season and we’ll see you next time.

Connect with us:

Email us at ⁠[email protected]⁠

Learn more about ⁠Change Coaches⁠

Follow LaTonya on ⁠LinkedIn⁠

Follow Change Coaches on ⁠LinkedIn⁠

on August 26, 2024 August 26, 2024

S2: Ep 15 – The Science of Joy and How to Get More of it in Your Life

In this episode, host LaTonya Wilkins takes a dive deep into the transformative concept of joy with Dr. Pamela Larde! Dr. Pamela Larde is a leading expert on the psychology of joy. She has dedicated her career to exploring the nuances of joy, contrasting it with happiness, and understanding its significance across diverse populations. Together, LaTonya and Dr. Larde explore the profound differences between joy and happiness, uncovering how joy serves as a vital state of being that transcends external circumstances.

Dr. Larde shares powerful anecdotes from her research, including the resilience of military veterans and college students in their pursuit of joy. The emergence of the #BlackJoy movement during the 2020 protests serves as a poignant example of how joy can flourish even in difficult times. Dr. Larde’s innovative concept of joy resilience highlights the ability to maintain joy as a survival strategy, making her insights invaluable for anyone looking to enhance their well-being.

Resources from today’s episode:

– Change Coaches Guide to Create Psychological Safe Conversations Across Differences

– Change Coaches Newsletter

– Dr. Pamela Larde LinkedIn

– Get the “Joyfully Single” book!

– Dr. Pamela Larde’s Instagram

Transcript:

00:00:00 – LaTonya Wilkins

Hello, everyone, and welcome to the leading below the Surface podcast. I’m your host, Latanya Wilkins. And today I am joined by a really fun guest, I should say a joyful guest because that’s today’s topic and there’s gonna be lots of laughter And Joy in this episode. And so I really hope all of you enjoy it. We have a big treat for you.

00:00:22 – LaTonya Wilkins

So my guest is Doctor Pamela Larde. And I met Dr. Larde. Let me tell you a little story like I do with all my guests. I think I met Dr. Larde through IOC and we became fast friends. Like, we really were vibing with each other and our research and all the things that we do, just having a lot of fun.

00:00:45 – LaTonya Wilkins

She’s someone that pushes me to have more fun. And so for those of you who know me, I’m like that Leo Virgo cusp. Sometimes I get into that virgoism a little too much. So Dr. Larde helps we get out of it a little bit about her. She does so much and I’m always surprised by how much she does.

00:01:07 – LaTonya Wilkins

But she is a professor, she’s a coach. She has her own coach training firm. She also does work with IOC. I’m leaving out more. She’s a mother, she’s a friend, she’s all these things.

00:01:20 – LaTonya Wilkins

And she’s just a very joyful person and fun person to be around. So what did I miss? Pamela?

00:01:27 – Dr. Pamela Larde

Maybe social scientists. That’s probably the only other know, do a lot of research. That’s where the joy work is rooted. So that’s probably it.

00:01:37 – LaTonya Wilkins

Social scientist. Yeah. So that’s really, let’s dive right in because that kind of takes us to where I was thinking we could go first. So you call yourself a social scientist, but I picked up your book all about joy recently and I really loved it. Joyfully single and just tell me a little bit about how you got into joy.

00:02:04 – LaTonya Wilkins

Like, you went from social scientists to joy scientists. If it’s okay if I call you that.

00:02:09 – Dr. Pamela Larde

Yeah, yeah. And I’ve heard Joy researcher, joy Scientist. You know, I’ve really, from the time that I finished my doctoral work back in 2009, I’ve always studied people and the barriers and how they overcome challenges. And I realized that when people are overcoming their challenges, they are actually seeking joy. I was looking at different populations of people, people who have divorced, people who are the first in their families to go to college, military professional when they return home, and their families and how they help their family member reintegrate after combat.

00:02:48 – Dr. Pamela Larde

And I often got the question, what are the commonalities between all these populations. Another one was college students who had experienced trauma. And I actually had to take some time and look at it like, what is the commonality? I mean, everybody’s experiencing trouble or challenge, but what is it they have in common? And it was very clear to me that they’re all seeking joy in some capacity. They’re all finding their own ways to secure joy in their lives. And this happened right before the pandemic, December 2019, when I.

00:03:23 – Dr. Pamela Larde

It became very clear to me that joy is the direction to take this research now. And so I spent the pandemic examining joy, and it was an interesting lens because I’m looking at how people find joy in some of the scariest times, you know, that we’ve had in our lifetime.

00:03:43 – LaTonya Wilkins

That is so interesting. So now we’re gonna get a little coachy here, folks. So sorry, but would you say that was your intuition that was telling you what’s joy? Was that a science based realization or where did that come from?

00:03:58 – Dr. Pamela Larde

Yeah, I mean, that’s a really good question because I have a feeling that part of it comes from my own disposition of joy that made me want to dive into it more. Because as I’m looking at all of the populations and the commonalities I could have landed at, they’re all striving for a goal, you know, or I could have said that they’re all experiencing change and transition in their lives. But for some reason, the joy is what really stood out for me, and that is what made me dive into the literature on joy. And when I dove into literature, I realized there’s not a lot of literature on joy out there. And.

00:04:40 – Dr. Pamela Larde

And the literature that’s out there, nobody agrees on a definition. And so I really wanted to dive into it more, help with the language around it, and help to understand and help other people understand what joy actually is, deciphering it from happiness, and creating that academic conversation around it that I wasn’t really seeing happening.

00:05:08 – LaTonya Wilkins

That’s so interesting. Cause there’s so many places that we could take this. But I can’t help myself but ask you about defining joy and how no one agrees on a definition. So how would you define joy?

00:05:24 – Dr. Pamela Larde

Well, so part of my definition of joy, I’ve integrated the American Psychological Association’s definition of joy. And what the American Psychological association says is that it’s this experience of, what is it? Euphoria. And it’s not necessarily what’s happening on the outside, but it’s something that’s sort of rooted. It grows out of the spirit. So one of the things that I add to it is that it exists regardless of whether or not we’re having good times or bad times.

00:06:01 – Dr. Pamela Larde

It’s not about it’s a good moment. It’s a happy moment. So now I feel joy. It actually can live in some of the most difficult and challenging seasons of our lives. It’s something that we pull from within to experience.

00:06:16 – Dr. Pamela Larde

So the addition of the American Psychological Association’s definition, I add to it that it exists regardless of what is going on in our environments.

00:06:30 – LaTonya Wilkins

So it exists. It’s a feeling of euphoria, number one. And number two, it exists whether or not we opt into it or plug into it. Is that what you’d say? It’s just naturally something that’s there?

00:06:43 – Dr. Pamela Larde

Well, it’s something that we. It happens with intention. So we have to opt in. We have to choose to live out that joy. Now, there are some people who we may think, you know, oh, they’re just naturally joyful.

00:06:57 – Dr. Pamela Larde

It just happens for them. For some people, that might just be a product of their personality or the way they were raised. For other people, they had to work really hard to make that happen, and it became a part of, you know, who they are.

00:07:13 – LaTonya Wilkins

So this is interesting. Cause is it possible because I see people in the world that the world we talk about the world worlding, and there’s so many things going on, and some people are even guilty, feeling guilty to experience joy. And is that maybe one of the reasons why a lot of people are depriving themselves from it or a lot of people aren’t experiencing it?

00:07:41 – Dr. Pamela Larde

Well, there is a lot of that. There’s a lot of. And it’s one of the five barriers to joy that I talk about in the book is guilt. And there is a combination of us guilting ourselves and thinking, you know, I interviewed a guy one time, and he was talking about, and he’s particularly a black male. And the reason and his identity is so important in this because he was experiencing joy sort of in solitude, because he was having, you know, he had friends and family members who were also black men who were struggling, particularly around the time that George Floyd was murdered.

00:08:22 – Dr. Pamela Larde

And it was kind of like, how dare I show or express any kind of joy? I think he had just gotten a promotion, and some good things had been happening in his life, but he also just had a pract practice of living joyfully. But his guilt kept him sort of experiencing joy in isolation. I’m not going to do that in front of the guys. I’m not going to do that in front of because they’re struggling. I don’t want to do that in front of them.

00:08:47 – Dr. Pamela Larde

But there’s also people who shame us for experiencing joy. And so you can sweep the Internet and you can find people who are all about a particular social cause and, like, how dare you celebrate x, Y and z or make a big deal about these trivial things when people are dying or when people are oppressed or people are in prison. Pick your issue that you want to focus on. And so it’s almost like I’m not allowed to enjoy life while other people are struggling and suffering in life. And that just creates this other dynamic of guilt and shame.

00:09:29 – LaTonya Wilkins

Yeah, it’s so interesting that you say that. I even want to double click on that because it’s like even you and me. Don’t you sometimes feel bad to share? I mean, I know I could feel bad to share happy things, but I had to get over that through my own mental health journey and my own growth journey where I don’t feel guilty anymore. Or sometimes I still do feel guilty. And I’ll write a disclaimer of, like, hey, I know all these things are going on in the world, but we have to be able to celebrate our successes.

00:10:01 – LaTonya Wilkins

Like, when we look at coaching science, I mean, that’s vital to growth. And so how would you respond to that?

00:10:11 – Dr. Pamela Larde

So sometimes feeling like you have to give a disclaimer or, I’m not gonna share this over here, or. I think part of that, what’s really important is for us to have our, our community of people that we know we can just be ourselves, be our joyful selves around. I have a coach colleague. Her name is Dawn Taylor, and she has created this concept or this idea called brag buddies. And these are people that we know.

00:10:41 – Dr. Pamela Larde

If something great happens, I can call them up and I can do my little bragging about myself, oh, my gosh, this has happened. And. And they’re not going to look at you like, okay, so you think you’re all that, oh, okay, so it’s all about you now. And, like, you don’t get that from them because they are a trusted group of people. One person, two people.

00:11:00 – Dr. Pamela Larde

However, you know, whatever works for you, who, you know, you can trust with your. And it’s funny, we talk about trusting with your vulnerability, you know, mostly the negative things and the hard things and the traumatic things. We need people we can trust with our joy as well because people can stifle it, people can block it and be the barrier to our joy.

00:11:26 – LaTonya Wilkins

Yeah, I love that. Brag buddies. That’s such a nice framework to kind of hold on to. And it’s got that alliteration in it. And it’s like, once you reach a certain level, it’s like, what do you think?

00:11:39 – LaTonya Wilkins

All your friends have to be brag buddies, right. I think it’s impossible because it’s. It’s like the worst thing. I mean, you have only so much time in the world, and so you have to be able to hang around with people that can celebrate you, and you can celebrate them. Right.

00:11:55 – Dr. Pamela Larde

Otherwise, I mean, so people go through their things, you know, people things. And they have seasons where they can’t stomach your joy. Like, I don’t wanna hear anything else about your freaking joy, you know? And so there are seasons where people struggle with your joy. And I’ve had this happen with some people in my life who are really close to me, and I’ve realized, yeah, this is not a season where they can take that in. And so I’m more there for them in the ways that they need me to be.

00:12:25 – Dr. Pamela Larde

And then I take my joy celebrations elsewhere. Not that I withhold my joy from them, but I’m also respectful of what they’re able to take in at any particular season. So it could be people you’ve rolled with for years and decades that they might hit a season in their life where it is just really difficult for them to swallow that joy.

00:12:48 – LaTonya Wilkins

Yeah, I love that idea of seasons, right? Where there might be a lot of joy in one season and the next season maybe not. And I. This takes me into our next question. In our next topic, I’d love to chat about is, are there differences in joy across demographics? Because you brought up George Floyd, you brought up 2020, and I know in 2020, it was like, if you look at any black, I mean, it was really hard for any of us to see any joy or to. To intentionally participate in joyful experiences.

00:13:24 – LaTonya Wilkins

So in your research, I’m curious, have you seen any discrepancies in or any imbalances of how people experience joy by demographics? And what does that look like?

00:13:37 – Dr. Pamela Larde

Well, so I first want to just address black people experiencing joy in 2020. It’s interesting because that is when we were having the hardest time. We were pushing for changes in law enforcement here and actually, globally, there were protests about things need to change. And guess what grew out of that black joy movement? Hashtag Blackjoy. Black men frolicking.

00:14:06 – Dr. Pamela Larde

I don’t know if you all seen it. If anybody hasn’t seen black men frolicking, type in hashtag black Menf frolicking on Instagram or any of the social media, and you’re going to see all these videos of black men who are like, what is this frolicking thing? Okay, let me try it. And they’re out in fields and they’re running, and they are wherever they are, and they. They are experiencing this thing called frolicking. So this grew out of that time that was really difficult for us as we are experiencing pushback and all of the negative, I guess, responses to protesting and pushing for change.

00:14:47 – Dr. Pamela Larde

That’s when it happened. But culturally speaking, I have seen some differences in how joy is expressed. So one of the things, when I was researching language around joy in Swahili, for example, their joy was very similar to family. So in trying to look at the translation of joy and Swahili, family is what came up, which is really interesting because it speaks to the value of community. That’s not necessarily a big thing in the western world.

00:15:28 – Dr. Pamela Larde

And on, you know, it is more about individual, you know, individualism and what can I do to seek out my joy and do my healing and do my therapy and what needs to be done? Which is not knocking it, but it’s a very different take on. On how to find our well being and how to find joy.

00:15:50 – LaTonya Wilkins

Yeah, it’s. It takes me back to when we were in London together. So we went to a black coaching conference in London. Was that what, July. Gosh, summer has flown by?

00:16:05 – LaTonya Wilkins

June.

00:16:05 – Dr. Pamela Larde

June, yes, that.

00:16:08 – LaTonya Wilkins

That was. It was an amazing experience. But Doctor Gifford, I think you missed his talk. But it was interesting because he was talking about black joy, and he. He did a talk about whiteness and how all that kind of disappeared because joy was like a.

00:16:27 – LaTonya Wilkins

Like a natural part of the black experience until we all got socialized into whiteness. It was a really interesting presentation, and. Yeah. Yeah. So that kind of tracks with that.

00:16:38 – LaTonya Wilkins

And I think it also, at that time, I think there was also a movement where mental health was being stressed more and more for activists. And I’m seeing that, like, I’m still seeing people have a hard time with that. But good activism involves that and involves joy. Right. It involves being able to laugh and being able to have community.

00:17:01 – LaTonya Wilkins

And so does that also all that stuff kind of relate to that time as well?

00:17:05 – Dr. Pamela Larde

Absolutely. And if you look at any social movement, there are moments of joy embedded in those social movements. We can look at the one that’s most referenced in the United States, which is the civil rights movement. And if we were to do a study on joy, which I’ve done small examinations of joy. You find it.

00:17:27 – Dr. Pamela Larde

You find it in Martin Luther King shooting pool in couples and moments of love and different things that are happening that demonstrate that people are maintaining their joy. If we take it to the women’s rights movement, you. There was this whole, let’s burn our bras. Like, there’s some joy in burning a bra. So even the means of communicating here is what we’re trying to say and what we’re trying to do had levels of joy that was infused into it, and that’s how our movements tend to go.

00:18:03 – LaTonya Wilkins

Yeah. Yeah. You just made me think about. When you said Martin Luther King playing pool, you made me think about Obama playing basketball.

00:18:10 – Dr. Pamela Larde

Yes.

00:18:13 – LaTonya Wilkins

And I. He was actually pretty good. Yeah.

00:18:16 – Dr. Pamela Larde

Yeah, he’s pretty good. And as president, I can’t imagine the level of stress, and especially being the first black president, the level of stress that you’ve got to have. And if, again, I can see doing a study on the ways in which the Obamas sought out joy during the time in the White House because they needed it, how else were they going to survive and then preserve the integrity and the. And the beauty of their family without having joy being a part of the journey? And they can’t. It’s.

00:18:49 – Dr. Pamela Larde

It’s intentional. It wasn’t.

00:18:51 – LaTonya Wilkins

Joy was.

00:18:51 – Dr. Pamela Larde

It wasn’t going to just come to them. They had to literally create it.

00:18:55 – LaTonya Wilkins

Right, right, right. It’s like, you know, I was having a conversation, and this is interesting, and this kind of takes us into misconceptions, but with one of my asian coaching colleagues, and she said, like, there’s been, you know, she lives in Seattle. And we were talking about some of the tensions between black, black people in Asians and Seattle. I didn’t know about that history. But she was just like, yeah, she really filled me in.

00:19:22 – LaTonya Wilkins

I mean, I think I heard. I heard surface pieces of it, but nothing deeper. And she was telling. We were talking about the big thing that her asian friends don’t understand about black people. And it’s like, why do they laugh?

00:19:37 – LaTonya Wilkins

Why are they so happy all the time when the world is so evil? Like, hard to them, hard on them. And, you know. Cause I think the asian cult. I mean, this, folks, this might be a stereotype. And this was.

00:19:47 – LaTonya Wilkins

I’m just telling you about my conversation. I’m not endorsing what my asian colleague told me, and I’m also not stereotyping, just so folks know. Inna put that disclaimer out there, but it’just, I could see why people would think that, but we’ve been doing that here. I mean, I’m a descendant of slaves and my great great grandma whether was a slave, but we still had a lot of fun in my family. Like, that was.

00:20:09 – LaTonya Wilkins

The thing is, like, my grandma just, made us laugh and we. Yeah, there was some tough love and there was some strictness, but I just can’t imagine growing up, you know, in black culture without that joy, without that laughter. Right. I mean, it’s. But it’s so interesting because I think that was our way to cope, right?

00:20:27 – Dr. Pamela Larde

I mean, what is. What would that life be with the absence of joy? Who would want to keep living? Who would want to keep going or fighting for anything if joy didn’t exist in, you know, at all? I mean, the term or the phrase I gotta laugh to keep from crying is. That’s embedded in black culture because it is a strategy, it is a survival strategy. And that’s one of the reasons why. Part of the research around joy, I’ve coined the term joy resilience because it is a type of resilience that’s rooted in our pursuit of.

00:21:05 – Dr. Pamela Larde

It’s what we need to survive.

00:21:07 – LaTonya Wilkins

Yeah, now’re joy resilience, folks. Write that down. I got get my own notebook out over here. Wr this down here. Yeah, that is, that’s.

00:21:20 – LaTonya Wilkins

That is such a timely phrase. Right. Especially with everything going on in the world. I mean, it looks like every time you look up, something’s changing or something’s different. And, you know, I coach CEO’s and it’s like it’s all over the place, you know?

00:21:35 – LaTonya Wilkins

And, yeah, so the joy resilience, that’s another way to give your clients permission or your colleague permission to experience joy. But what other misconceptions are out there about joy?

00:21:48 – Dr. Pamela Larde

You know, I think that a lot of people think that joy is this easy, feel good, fluffy word when it is actually, it is very. It’s tough. It’s not an easy thing to embody. It takes practice and intention and it’s not something that just fades, you know, quickly. It’s not.

00:22:12 – Dr. Pamela Larde

There’s a lot of, you know, conflating of happiness and joy and using the words interchangeably. I think it’s important to remember that, that happiness is just like it sounds. It’s based on what’s happening. It’s environmental, it’s. It’s our response, our natural response to the stimuli that’s happening in the world.

00:22:28 – Dr. Pamela Larde

So I’m feeling happy. I’m doing things that. That give me a happy life, which is very different than joy, which is a state of be being. It is a combination of our ethos, like who we are as people. It is a combination of emotions and the experiences we create and the physiological responses that we have, you know, to.

00:22:54 – Dr. Pamela Larde

To experiences and how we’re living our lives. So I think one of the big misconceptions is that joy is just this. This fluffy woo kind of thing when it’s actually. It’s just so much deeper than that. After one of my presentations, somebody asked me, and I save all the questions because they’re all such great questions, why study this like, we know what joy means?

00:23:20 – Dr. Pamela Larde

We look it up in the dictionary, and it means that, you know, X, Y, and z. What’s the value in actually creating research around this? And I think because people struggle so much to grasp it, to claim it, to talk about it, it’s taboo in certain environments. And so I think it’s important to research so that it becomes more palatable. And we have strategies. Believe it or not, people need strategies in order to integrate joy in their lives.

00:23:52 – Dr. Pamela Larde

And one of those strategies I going bring in is play. And so when we were in London and having that experience of play.

00:24:03 – LaTonya Wilkins

We’Ll get to that. We’ll get to that. No, but that’s made me fall off a bicycle. Was that whatever that thing was? Nothing was. But, okay, before we move on to the strategies and the tips, so let’s just use an example of someone getting us.

00:24:22 – LaTonya Wilkins

I’m kind of fascinated by his concept of happiness versus joy in single man and when he talks about it, but, okay, so let’s pretend someone gets a new job, and they’re really excited about it, so they’re happy about getting the new job. Like, the new job brings them happiness, but the joy would be the actual things that they do in that job to remain joyful. Is that what you’re saying, or is it different?

00:24:48 – Dr. Pamela Larde

Well, so Joy can also be responsive to what’s going on in the environment. It’s not that it can’t be. It’s just that that’s pretty much according to what I’ve read, in my opinion. And I’m sure some of the happiness researchers would disagree. But happiness is more about the environment and doesn’t necessarily.

00:25:13 – Dr. Pamela Larde

It’s not something that it grows from within. It’s not necessarily a part of your personality and your system, whereas joy is a part of your value system, your character, your beliefs. And so getting that job, the joy comes in. Now I get to live out another, you know, facet of who I am now. I get to embody my purpose in a way that I have been, you know, that feels in alignment with who I am.

00:25:41 – Dr. Pamela Larde

That’s where the joy comes in, because it’s. And I’m not going toa lie, there’s also. I can pay my bills, and being able to pay my bills is another asset or aspect of fulfillment and purpose and those kinds of things. So that’s where the joy comes in. It’s that part of you that is doing the being.

00:26:05 – Dr. Pamela Larde

It’s the being, you know, part of who you are.

00:26:07 – LaTonya Wilkins

The being. Yes. Yes. Not just the environmental stuff that you’re experiencing. Yeah.

00:26:13 – Dr. Pamela Larde

Right. I mean, we could be happy about a great new, amazing salary, but we can also be joyful about how that is going to allow us to sustain the kind of life that, you know, we. That’s in alignment with who we are.

00:26:29 – LaTonya Wilkins

Yes, I think. Yeah, that’s helpful. That’s a, that’s a helpful example. So how many of you folks listening want more joy in your life? Well, you’re gonna want to stay on for this last segment. So what are some of the tips?

00:26:44 – LaTonya Wilkins

Maybe you can give us a few tips around ways to create more joy in our lives, because I know for me, like, it’s hard. I mean, you have to schedule in things and then sometimes you feel guilty, and sometimes those are the things that you cancel first. I mean, I do. I don’t know if you’ve read the book the artist’s way. I’m really into that.

00:27:02 – LaTonya Wilkins

I’m really into the whole philosophy. And so I try to schedule this stuff in based on that. But what are some other ways that people, some strategies you have that people can create joy in their lives?

00:27:15 – Dr. Pamela Larde

Well, I agree with the scheduling it in, but also making sure that it is just as important as anything else that you have scheduled in so that it doesn’t get canceled first. And it that, and I also recommend scheduling in just gaps so that it doesn’t. There are moments where you don’t need to be doing anything. And to your question about misconceptions of joy, a lot of people think you’ve got to be doing something. You’ve got to be outwardly expressive about it.

00:27:45 – Dr. Pamela Larde

It’s got to be loud. It’s gotta be visual. It could be just you sitting down quietly with your eyes closed for a half hour in between meetings to just take in life, to release whatever has been, you know, overwhelming. Those are the kinds of things that also bring joy, is quiet moments, peacefulness. And it’s not always in the doing.

00:28:10 – Dr. Pamela Larde

Remember, it’s in the being. And so who are you allowed allowing yourself to be in those particular moments? But I would also say I’m going to come back to the idea of play. Like, we don’t necessarily. We abandon that in a lot of ways after childhood. And I want us to reintroduce ourselves to play.

00:28:32 – Dr. Pamela Larde

I am in. Even though I wrote joyfully single, I’m now in a pretty serious relationship. And one of the first things that he discovered about me was, oh, she likes to play. She likes to go out and, you know, and walk or run in the woods or, you know, play in a water fountain that might have, you know, we might be walking by and just random things. And that’s contagious because he is a very straight laced cool and collect guy.

00:28:58 – Dr. Pamela Larde

But I’ve noted he jumped in a water fountain once, you know, and so things like that, your play isn’t going to look like somebody else’s. So I think it’s important to define what that is and what that looks like and do it and create those moments. One more thing I will say is probably the most important way to create and sustain joy is with the people that you are surrounded by. Allowing the people who are nurturers of your joy to be the ones that are closest and have the greatest influence on you, and the ones who are hinderers of your joy that they’re a little bit further out, that you can’t get rid of all of them. We can’t just cancel everybody.

00:29:43 – Dr. Pamela Larde

We’ve got parents and siblings and relatives that we’ve got to have around, whether we like it or not, but knowing where they’re supposed to be relative to you, in proximity, so that they’re not stifling your joy. So the people that are around you, I think, and it’s not even. I think it has been evident in my research and the research of others have the strongest influence on and how we live out our well being and how we live out our joy. And I don’t know that we understand enough how impactful our surroundings, our surrounding people can be to us.

00:30:19 – LaTonya Wilkins

So just maybe even do an audit on that to see, like, I did a. I think I tell people this, I know I tell my MBA students this, but I did a friend diary a couple years ago, and I never thought I would do that. But it’s kind of the same thing. It tells you so much about who your friends are, who you wanna get closer to. But I love that even taking that a step further and rating the amount of joy that people bring you.

00:30:45 – LaTonya Wilkins

And then you might need to shift to another season, right?

00:30:49 – Dr. Pamela Larde

Absolutely. Yes.

00:30:51 – LaTonya Wilkins

You know what kind? Season’s a different composition. Right.

00:30:54 – Dr. Pamela Larde

Move people around and it’s. Again, it’s not about canceling people who. Or making big explorations that. Okay, I’m moving you out of this range because you’re, you know, it is just knowing for yourself what’s working for you and what’s not. There’s people that I’ve had to kind of just tiptoe a little backwards from for a little while because they’re stifling the joy.

00:31:16 – LaTonya Wilkins

Right.

00:31:17 – Dr. Pamela Larde

But it’s also not about. I’m only going toa surround myself with people who are joyful. Joy is contagious. And so you do have the opportunity and the power, too, influence other people. It’s just so important.

00:31:32 – Dr. Pamela Larde

I love that. Aware of the extent to which that is diminishing you. If it is, you know, just awareness is key.

00:31:41 – LaTonya Wilkins

Yeah, I love that. I love that it’s contagious and that, you know, it. It’s so interesting, I know we’re gonna wrap up here in a minute, folks, but just a couple more things on play. For those of you that think about play and you think of it as, you know, when I hear that word, I’m like, oh, my God, it sounds so privileged. Know?

00:32:01 – LaTonya Wilkins

And it doesn’t. It’s not so bougie, but it’s interesting because I had a really unexpected visitor last week, and it’s one of my favorite college friends. And we always joke about how we’re gonna get old together and we just laugh. Like, just laugh so hard. Like, the hardest I’ve laughed all year when we’re together.

00:32:23 – LaTonya Wilkins

And, you know, I think that it’s things like that. Like, if any of you are having a hard time with that word, it’s just things like that, like finding those people that make you laugh. Or sometimes I’ll even turn on a Netflix comedy special and I’ll just laugh. Or I’ll, like, go, I live in Chicago, so I’ll walk to the lake and I’ll people watch and I’ll just laugh. Some of the left with some of the people and just some of the funny things they’re doing and.

00:32:52 – LaTonya Wilkins

Yeah, but I think it’s. Right. I mean, it.

00:32:55 – Dr. Pamela Larde

Well, yeah. And the thing is that, so we do, I think probably the word might throw people off, like, oh, play. You know? But if you think about it, it’s. You can find play happening across so many different demographics, so many different socioeconomic statuses. Sometimes, you know, the play is very serious, like chess, you know what I mean?

00:33:21 – Dr. Pamela Larde

But it’s something that still functionally allows for you to just to release and be yourself and exercise in your. Your zone. And that’s really what I think play is. And this. This can happen at work.

00:33:36 – Dr. Pamela Larde

This can happen with a client that you are talking to. This can happen on this podcast. It’s just, you know, are you in a place where you’re in your zone and you are not having to be on and you’re just allowed to just be who you are? I think play when, if we can think about it that way, it might change the way that we do it, because it could be just walking to the lake and people watching, because that allows. I love doing that. That’s the most authentic side of me that there is, is people watching.

00:34:08 – Dr. Pamela Larde

What are they doing? I know that’s funny or that’s, you know, romantic or whatever it is, you know?

00:34:14 – LaTonya Wilkins

Right. It’s getting into a. I always end up talking to people. Like, they just want to talk to me. So I end up in this deep conversation that’s playful and, yeah, it’s fun, but.

00:34:23 – LaTonya Wilkins

So, one more question. So where could people find you, number one? Well, actually, it’s two. Where can people find you? And then what other resources do you have that we can leave in our show notes around joy?

00:34:37 – Dr. Pamela Larde

Yeah, so I have an epic joy retreat coming up. So I’ve gotta say that. Cause that’s one of the things that is a manifestation of the science and the research, and it’s a practical application. How do we infuse joy into our lives, our personal and professional lives, on an everyday basis? So that is. So the one that’s coming up is November 27 through December 2.

00:35:02 – Dr. Pamela Larde

But we’re looking at doing fall and spring retreats. So, because everybody’s not going to be able to do the holiday season, so there’s also the fall. So that is huge. And I’m super excited about that. And then I am on.

00:35:18 – Dr. Pamela Larde

I think LinkedIn is probably the way people contact me, you know, most commonly in Instagram. So I’m Joy researcher on Instagram. And then just my name, Pamela. Pamela Larde, know to say my name. Anna on Lin story, folks.

00:35:35 – Dr. Pamela Larde

Right, right. So. Or you might be able to find me somewhere at a local hotel lobby or really cute wine restaurant, writing at the bar by myself, and so come say hi. That’s my form of play, is to be able to just sit somewhere publicly, write, and then engage in conversation with whoever’s next to me.

00:35:57 – LaTonya Wilkins

Yeah. And she won’t be shy, so don’t be afraid to speak to her. And so this has been, this has been a joy today, Pamela. So thank you so much for coming on our show, folks. We will leave all the resources mentioned and our show notes and thanks for joining us, and we’ll see you next time.