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could you do me a quick favor if you're
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listening to this please hit the follow
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or subscribe button it helps more than
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you know and we invite subscribers in
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every month to watch the show in person
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i think society goes success is get this
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job get married get a house what does
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that do to you it just really makes your
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life feel small the founder of kloss
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boss monthly fitness program a billion
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dollar founder wild scanacchio when i
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would watch my parents not really fit in
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it sort of made me realize maybe i don't
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fit in and then be told i smelled or i
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didn't belong somewhere everyone wanted
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to box me into something and i just
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refused to be boxed we spent half a
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million dollars building a product that
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didn't work was i exhausted yes was i
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lonely yeah i missed family things i
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missed weddings i i was just not around
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i have learned at this point like time
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means more to me than money i want to
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make sure my priorities are more
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reflective of the human i want to be in
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my life
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if you go towards purpose i guarantee
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your life will be more fulfilling do you
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believe that everybody has a purpose
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beyond the nine to five i do how do you
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find it so
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first of all
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so without further ado
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i'm stephen bartlett and this is the
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diary of a ceo usa edition i hope
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nobody's listening but if you are
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then please keep this to yourself
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[Music]
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when i read someone's story one of the
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first questions i try and answer when
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i'm reading through that especially the
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early years is i'm trying to identify
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what it is that made them
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either an anomaly or
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hungry i have a kind of a thesis that
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much of people's drive and their
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ambition especially the people that i
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sit here with comes from kind of some
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kind of pain or trauma or early
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experience that molded them so my
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question to you
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is what made you hungry
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you know when i was younger i got to
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taste something that was so magical
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which was
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dance and
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it was this place in my life that it
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wasn't about the physicality of actually
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dancing it was
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the ability to make other people feel
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through something that i did and to be
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able to realize that as a human
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being you can have
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that type of influence power connection
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to other people and to feel that
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when you are
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four or five years old
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was just this magical experience for me
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that honestly nothing else in my life
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could compare to it and once i uncovered
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that i always wanted to feel that
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in anything i did and i strived in all
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the work i did and all
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of you know the different careers i've
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had in my life and the different you
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know art i've done
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i've strived always to go back to that
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intention of how
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do i give to others and make them feel
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something in their life and that's
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really been this anchor for me and its
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purpose at the end of the day
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and that started at five years old yeah
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when i was really young with a don't set
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a wedding yeah it was just a random
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dance performance that
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for some reason i started dancing and
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everyone started watching me and i it
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wasn't anything that was a
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structured performance by any means it
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was very much just this organic thing
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that came out of me
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and
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i really just loved it and i realized
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actually in a deeper way that the other
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part of the hunger came from
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when i danced and felt that feeling i
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felt like the most authentic version of
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me
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and i realized that i was in so many
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settings where i didn't always feel like
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i could be me
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whether that was you know being an
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indian girl in the middle of a town
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where no one looked like me or sometimes
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being with my indian community but being
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in a town that where i was a cheerleader
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and i didn't fit in there i realized
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that so many parts of me never felt
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whole and i was always showing up with
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one little strand of me one little
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strand of me there here
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and i felt when i performed and danced
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especially indian dance i felt like the
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most
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whole version of who i was
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the resistance you felt and the struggle
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you felt of bit trying to
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i guess conform to two different
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communities at the same time so tell me
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about trying to be an
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american in in a town where there's
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you know 300 people at your school and
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you're the only
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people of indian heritage how is that i
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think one of the most interesting parts
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of it is so much of this comes from the
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parents not really from the kids
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and when i would watch my parents not
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really fit in it sort of made me realize
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maybe i don't fit in it was sort of this
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interesting way
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to look at my parents and know that they
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felt uncomfortable and then look at
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myself and be in different settings and
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realize wait i don't look like everyone
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else and then be told i smelled or my
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food smelled or i didn't belong
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somewhere because
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my hair color was different
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was just a very interesting
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place to be kids said that she yeah i
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remember like i mean i talk about it in
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my book but there were some some really
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harsh moments you know and when you're
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young you're you're impressionable right
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things can scar you for a very long time
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and i think for me the the goodness was
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that i did have this place of dance that
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made me feel
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grounded and made me feel whole because
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if i didn't have that i think the trauma
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that i was probably going through by not
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fitting in would have just burned a hole
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so deep in me that i'm not sure how i
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would have been able to recover but i
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had this light right
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and i think that's you know going back
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to what you were asking
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it was the light
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that i saw that there is something
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beautiful out there for me to go and do
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for the world if i can just hang on to
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it and fight for it and it was a fight
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for me to even hang on to whatever my
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identity was right when we talk about
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our identities and in all these labels
00:06:04
which i really don't love like whether
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it's indian american ceo whatever all
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these labels are it was really just i
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think my whole journey in my life
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was a fight to be myself in any setting
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and not have people tell me what to do
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right i think we all struggle with that
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in our whole lives and probably why i
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had to be a ceo because i don't like
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anyone telling me what to do but it
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really stemmed because i think
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throughout my life everyone wanted to
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box me into something
00:06:32
and i just refused to be boxed did your
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parents want to box you into something
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of course i mean my parents you know
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they sacrificed everything to come to
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america they obviously wanted my sister
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and i
00:06:44
to have successful careers which you
00:06:46
know amounted to a few different
00:06:48
industries like be a doctor a lawyer
00:06:50
engineer or you know and then the other
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part of it was get married you know
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obviously at like a normal age where you
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could
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cook for your family and be a good wife
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right these were sort of the
00:07:01
these were the expectations that were
00:07:03
set in my life and i think that's really
00:07:06
the hardest part is when you are
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constantly
00:07:10
brought in your life in saying that you
00:07:12
need to
00:07:13
live by the expectations of others you
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end up either rebelling or you conform
00:07:19
and
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i always wanted to make my parents proud
00:07:22
so
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i knew i did what i felt was at the core
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part of the value so for example if it
00:07:28
was getting education i thought that was
00:07:30
important too i wasn't going to sit
00:07:32
there and rebel from getting education
00:07:34
but there came a point in my career
00:07:35
trajectory where i had to say okay like
00:07:38
i have checked every box in this now i
00:07:40
have to do it my way with the way i
00:07:42
really want to feel and not conform and
00:07:45
rebel and i think that's really the
00:07:47
whole formula of people knowing when to
00:07:49
rebel and when to conform
00:07:52
you referenced that um you were looking
00:07:54
for a different feeling
00:07:56
after checking those boxes what was the
00:07:58
feeling you had when you were doing that
00:07:59
job
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i had trained myself my entire life to
00:08:03
do well when people told me to
00:08:07
hit this mark in my life right and
00:08:09
that's like in a way that's like how i
00:08:10
developed the skills in my life to to
00:08:12
always propel myself and execute and
00:08:14
make sure that um i was able to you know
00:08:17
be responsible and move forward in
00:08:18
everything i did
00:08:20
but
00:08:20
i felt no deep
00:08:24
fire or passion or love towards it right
00:08:26
i wasn't jumping out of my bed
00:08:29
to go to my office to go and work for my
00:08:32
clients right i was doing what i had to
00:08:35
because you know i knew it was
00:08:38
once again expected of me when you you
00:08:40
must have friends that are living a life
00:08:42
that is
00:08:43
expected of them
00:08:45
and you can start to see as the the
00:08:46
years go on the consequence of living a
00:08:48
life that is expected of you
00:08:50
absolutely what would you say to those
00:08:51
people
00:08:52
and what lessons have you learned about
00:08:53
living a life expected of you i mean
00:08:56
that's not the way to have a fulfilled
00:08:58
life you can have a life and you can
00:09:00
probably
00:09:02
check all the boxes and make your people
00:09:04
proud in your life but you're going to
00:09:05
be on the other side of it and feel
00:09:07
empty
00:09:08
and that feeling of emptiness is the
00:09:10
worst feeling anyone can ever have and i
00:09:13
think people come to it at different
00:09:14
points in their life they either come to
00:09:15
it when they're 20 or they come to it
00:09:17
when they're 50.
00:09:18
and
00:09:19
that's because they haven't done the
00:09:20
work to actually ask themselves
00:09:23
what are the expectations you want for
00:09:25
your own life and that's the problem i
00:09:27
think we're never taught that right no
00:09:29
one's ever
00:09:30
asked
00:09:31
us what we want for our own lives and i
00:09:33
think society goes and tells us okay
00:09:36
success is get this job successes get
00:09:38
married get a house have kids you know
00:09:40
and especially for women it's even i
00:09:42
think even a bit more of a closed road
00:09:46
and that what does that do to you it
00:09:47
just really
00:09:48
it makes your life feel small right
00:09:51
because it makes you feel like you can't
00:09:53
get past it to go and live for your
00:09:55
dreams and ultimately you know i've been
00:09:58
there in my life where i have felt like
00:10:00
the road has closed in
00:10:02
and it's left me feeling hopeless
00:10:05
and that's the worst place in the world
00:10:07
to be is feeling hopeless the best thing
00:10:10
you could do is feel like you can go and
00:10:12
do anything change the world and i think
00:10:14
the more you taste it the more you want
00:10:16
more of it in your life
00:10:18
at that phase in your life were you
00:10:20
battling somewhat with your
00:10:23
north star that light you referenced
00:10:24
earlier which was dancing
00:10:26
but also you're i guess you're nine to
00:10:28
five yeah and what tell me about that
00:10:30
battle in how
00:10:32
dance ultimately ended up winning i
00:10:34
remember always having this bounce in my
00:10:37
step like i would walk to work in the
00:10:39
middle of new york city choreographing
00:10:41
in my head listening to
00:10:42
the song i was performing like i in a
00:10:45
weird way was like embodying this life
00:10:47
that of what i wanted to be
00:10:50
and then i would get to the office and i
00:10:52
would do my work and you know once again
00:10:54
like i i love the steve martin quote be
00:10:56
so good they can't ignore you like
00:10:58
whatever work i do in my life i will do
00:11:00
150 if i say yes but
00:11:03
i knew that something was wrong i never
00:11:05
i didn't want to live like that i didn't
00:11:07
want to feel like i was hiding so much
00:11:10
of who i was and as my 95 which by the
00:11:13
way in consulting isn't a nine to five
00:11:15
you work like 80 hours a week i mean
00:11:18
that was my life and i as i realized
00:11:20
that if i wanted to commit to that
00:11:22
career path that that 80 was probably
00:11:25
going to go to 90 it was going to go to
00:11:26
100 was going to be traveling and i was
00:11:29
going to have to say
00:11:31
no more and more to the thing i loved i
00:11:35
just realized i wasn't willing to make
00:11:37
that trade-off and i think that's
00:11:39
sometimes the hardest thing people have
00:11:41
to think about is what are you
00:11:42
sacrificing what's the trade-off in your
00:11:44
life that you're making
00:11:46
and i just wasn't willing to make it at
00:11:48
that point and i i had
00:11:50
done so much in my life at that point
00:11:52
where um i felt like i had achieved
00:11:56
according to everyone else enough to
00:11:58
start taking
00:12:00
a little bit of a path to being
00:12:02
rebellious right and i think that's
00:12:04
really when
00:12:05
i started to do a lot of work to say
00:12:08
what can i do to bring all parts of me
00:12:10
to the table
00:12:11
when you make that decision to leave
00:12:13
bain and company yeah the managing
00:12:15
management consultant firm in new york
00:12:17
was there like a series of catalystic
00:12:19
sort of moments or pivotal moments near
00:12:21
the end of your time there that made you
00:12:23
think i [ __ ] this
00:12:24
you know like i i read about a meeting
00:12:26
you had yeah
00:12:28
yeah so it's literally the opening um of
00:12:32
my book but
00:12:33
you know a few a few things happen i
00:12:36
would say so
00:12:37
first of all most people stay in
00:12:39
consulting like at this this job for
00:12:41
about three years then you go off to
00:12:42
business school it's sort of the usual
00:12:44
route people take so i was in my third
00:12:47
year there and a few people can kind of
00:12:49
stay on and just continue there i really
00:12:52
wasn't interested in going to business
00:12:54
school at the time
00:12:56
i wanted to live i wanted to like be in
00:12:57
new york city and feel the energy of it
00:13:00
and so my third in my third year i had a
00:13:03
performance at um in the middle of times
00:13:05
square for the for this big uh
00:13:08
unveiling of ushuayarai's madame
00:13:10
tussauds statue which was an important
00:13:12
thing and australia rai is one of my
00:13:14
icons especially as a dancer she's a
00:13:16
huge bollywood actress
00:13:18
and the week before a client meeting
00:13:19
gets scheduled at the same time as my
00:13:21
performance
00:13:22
and i'm you know my clients are big
00:13:23
clients these aren't these are fortune
00:13:25
500 companies these aren't small clients
00:13:27
by any means and and we're meeting like
00:13:29
the ceos you know
00:13:31
cfos of the company and um i remember
00:13:34
talking to my boss saying hey you know
00:13:36
what i really want to go to the
00:13:37
performance i'm not like a big part of
00:13:38
this meeting is it okay if i miss it and
00:13:40
we talked about it really briefly it
00:13:42
wasn't a big deal i didn't feel bad
00:13:44
about it i went to the performance
00:13:47
it went well a few months later we're
00:13:49
sitting down talking about you know
00:13:50
review and she's like giving me feedback
00:13:53
and she says this thing to me which just
00:13:55
triggered me and it was
00:13:57
is this the job you really want like i
00:13:59
don't think that you want to be a
00:14:00
consultant and i took that in my heart
00:14:03
as
00:14:04
oh my gosh she doesn't think i'm good
00:14:05
enough right and i just kind of went
00:14:06
through how throughout my life
00:14:08
i've been taught to be type a everyone
00:14:10
tell me i've done a good job
00:14:12
and so my initial reaction to her saying
00:14:15
that to me was i'm going to prove to you
00:14:17
how good i am right that's like the
00:14:19
natural type a reaction is to say no
00:14:21
what do you mean like i love this job i
00:14:23
really want to be here
00:14:25
and
00:14:25
the more i started thinking about that
00:14:27
the more i realized she was right i
00:14:29
didn't want to be there it was not the
00:14:31
life i wanted it was not the career i
00:14:33
wanted and that's when i decided to
00:14:36
start looking at other jobs that
00:14:38
would give me a bit more of the
00:14:40
flexibility i wanted in my day to day
00:14:41
but still pay the bills and that's when
00:14:43
you move over to mtv i went to warner
00:14:45
music right now we warner right okay and
00:14:47
there's this really interesting balance
00:14:48
that i see in you like which clearly
00:14:50
shifts in your life where you you feel
00:14:53
like you're a um and correct me where
00:14:55
i'm wrong here but you're quite a good
00:14:57
like conformist in terms of expectation
00:14:59
and then slowly rebellion starts to
00:15:00
creep in and it was just just had me
00:15:02
thinking about like the probably if
00:15:04
there is a right balance of conformity
00:15:06
and rebellion in our life because
00:15:07
conformity makes sense
00:15:09
you know
00:15:10
in some regards you can't just be a
00:15:12
total robot right we'd all be living out
00:15:13
in the desert or something right but
00:15:15
just the interesting balance i see in
00:15:16
people like you that i meet of
00:15:19
i mean a lot of them start as kind of
00:15:20
conformist or a little bit more
00:15:21
people-pleasing especially
00:15:22
first-generation immigrant families
00:15:24
right and then that fails them
00:15:27
yeah
00:15:28
in terms of fulfillment happiness mental
00:15:30
health
00:15:31
and then that's where the rebellion
00:15:32
starts to
00:15:33
i think that's the key it's it's
00:15:36
rebelling for the right reason if that
00:15:38
makes sense i always believe
00:15:40
that i was rebelling for purpose
00:15:43
right right and if you're rebelling for
00:15:45
purpose
00:15:47
i think it's exactly yeah it's
00:15:49
justifiable right dance wasn't
00:15:52
something that was just okay pile go and
00:15:54
do this because it's a hobby like it it
00:15:56
was this place for me to bring together
00:15:58
so much of my trauma actually from when
00:16:00
i was younger it was this place for me
00:16:02
and and you know my dance company was
00:16:03
this indian american dance experience
00:16:06
and
00:16:07
it was about me bringing together the
00:16:09
pile who got made fun of with the pile
00:16:11
who danced at her indian festivals and
00:16:14
bringing all of me together to say
00:16:17
when the world doesn't want to accept
00:16:20
the different parts of who i am i'm
00:16:21
going to show you what it can look like
00:16:23
right like that's really a big part of
00:16:25
what i've realized in my journey is when
00:16:27
people have told me parts don't fit
00:16:29
together i find a way to put them
00:16:30
together and show you even a more
00:16:32
beautiful experience right and i i
00:16:34
believe even class pass was really the
00:16:36
epitome of that too in my life is
00:16:38
bringing parts of me together that
00:16:40
i would never have been able to bring
00:16:42
together in any other way
00:16:44
and you know i think so much of when
00:16:46
we're rebelling it's about fighting for
00:16:49
something i wasn't i wasn't trying to
00:16:51
rebel i was fighting
00:16:53
for my passion i was fighting for my
00:16:56
purpose and
00:16:58
i mean isn't that what life should be
00:16:59
about is fighting for something like
00:17:01
that amen
00:17:03
when you leave bain and company though
00:17:04
is there a part of you because that
00:17:06
expectation is it's
00:17:08
never really yeah they really fully
00:17:09
shake it right is there a part of you
00:17:11
that whispers in your ear and goes you
00:17:13
failed
00:17:14
oh
00:17:15
i mean what was hard was all my
00:17:17
colleagues right that at that point who
00:17:20
had gone to harvard gone to stanford you
00:17:23
know
00:17:23
i was
00:17:24
comparing myself to them and i felt
00:17:27
like i was taking a step back compared
00:17:29
to what they were doing but one of the
00:17:31
other important things i learned during
00:17:33
this time and i think this is an
00:17:34
important part and for all of us at any
00:17:36
phase especially when we're going
00:17:37
through these transitional times
00:17:39
is i also embraced a new community right
00:17:41
so i obviously didn't just define myself
00:17:44
by my bain and mit friends i had this
00:17:47
huge artistic dance community that was
00:17:49
sort of like growing this indian
00:17:50
american community that was sort of
00:17:52
coming around me
00:17:54
and that made me feel whole in a
00:17:57
different way so instead of constantly
00:17:58
being around people i felt
00:18:01
less than i went and found a community i
00:18:03
belonged in even though it wasn't the
00:18:05
one that i would have you know naturally
00:18:08
feel felt inclined to go to and i think
00:18:10
that's another important thing
00:18:11
especially when we're exploring these
00:18:13
decisions and identities it's you know
00:18:15
back to the light thing it's sometimes
00:18:17
it's not the people we think are going
00:18:18
to give us the light who give us the
00:18:20
light so find that new community that
00:18:23
makes you shine it's such an appreciated
00:18:27
point of resistance for people that are
00:18:28
trying to make an adjustment in their
00:18:29
life i hear it so much people say i want
00:18:32
to levex situation but i'm scared of
00:18:34
losing the community that comes with
00:18:36
that situation that could be a city it
00:18:38
could be a job it could be a partner
00:18:40
sometimes your lives become so
00:18:41
intertwined that you think well if i
00:18:42
lose this partner if i lose this job or
00:18:44
whatever then i'm going to lose all of
00:18:45
these people
00:18:46
and that really keeps people trapped i
00:18:49
agree with that that's right that's a
00:18:50
really good point yeah i mean
00:18:53
and you can find new communities you
00:18:54
know and i think you have to remember
00:18:56
that the people you surround yourself
00:18:57
with are your choice yeah right and i've
00:19:00
had different communities show up for me
00:19:02
at different times in my life right for
00:19:04
me
00:19:05
it was the different communities that
00:19:07
made me the entrepreneur i was it was my
00:19:09
business community that helped me build
00:19:11
class bus but it was also this girl who
00:19:13
was going to ballet classes every single
00:19:15
day with my with my dancer friends who
00:19:18
also was thinking about
00:19:20
the classes that they people need to
00:19:21
take in their life and it was that
00:19:24
unique combination of my traits combined
00:19:26
with the different experiences i was
00:19:28
having that enabled me to build what i
00:19:30
did ultimately you talk about so you
00:19:32
managed to get a now a job you consider
00:19:34
to be more of a nine to five where
00:19:35
you've got time in the evenings to dance
00:19:37
and you end up setting up your own sort
00:19:39
of dance company um how did you get to
00:19:42
from there
00:19:43
to that pivotal trip to san francisco
00:19:45
that introduced you to the world of tech
00:19:47
yeah so in those two years when i was at
00:19:50
warner music group
00:19:51
i started tasting leadership and
00:19:53
entrepreneurship right i started tasting
00:19:55
this idea
00:19:56
of what life could look like when i was
00:19:59
living to my own drumbeat right and we
00:20:02
put on a few shows in new york city
00:20:03
during that time that honestly like just
00:20:05
were so well received from people the
00:20:08
the momentum of that the the feeling i
00:20:11
felt for of my community support it made
00:20:14
me just start feeling confidence and my
00:20:16
ability to go after my dreams right and
00:20:18
i think this is an important part of the
00:20:20
journey that we also forget is that
00:20:22
it's the confidence and the small stuff
00:20:24
that actually builds the confidence
00:20:26
towards the big stuff right because it's
00:20:29
not it wasn't okay pile just decided to
00:20:31
go quit her job one day and start a
00:20:33
company it was this series of small
00:20:35
steps right it was putting on a show for
00:20:37
150 people that went well then putting
00:20:39
on a show for a thousand people that
00:20:40
went well then saying oh wait let me
00:20:42
think about my life in a bigger way and
00:20:45
that's sort of where i was at that
00:20:46
moment so i wanted to explore new career
00:20:49
paths that i could take and that's why i
00:20:50
decided to go out to san francisco and
00:20:53
it changed my life
00:20:54
the point you made about
00:20:56
the way confidence is built i think is
00:20:57
so so important because i think a lot of
00:21:00
people think they see people like you
00:21:01
now sat here um after all this all
00:21:04
you've achieved and they think how do i
00:21:06
get from where i am sat on the sofa in
00:21:08
this job that i'm in that i hate to
00:21:11
being
00:21:12
her it seems like such a huge canyon i
00:21:15
have to cross that it feels like you
00:21:18
must be from another planet so that when
00:21:21
people see you at the finish line it can
00:21:22
sometimes be quite demotivating
00:21:25
but what you've just said there is in
00:21:26
fact there's these small it's a
00:21:28
staircase small one tiny step at a time
00:21:31
building like subjective evidence in
00:21:33
yourself that you you can do a little
00:21:34
bit more than you thought
00:21:36
and i'm curious as to what makes people
00:21:38
like you take
00:21:40
take that small step and it sounds like
00:21:43
it's you're just driven this purpose is
00:21:45
dragging purpose 100
00:21:47
if if i wasn't driven
00:21:49
to make an impact in the world i
00:21:51
wouldn't do it i mean you know you know
00:21:52
yes like i could go and get a good job
00:21:54
and do all of that and live like the
00:21:57
expected life and
00:21:59
be fine but that's not
00:22:01
fire right that's not me
00:22:03
taking my hours of 5 to 10 pm after work
00:22:06
and
00:22:07
reserving studio space and getting girls
00:22:09
together or you know
00:22:11
working till two three in the morning to
00:22:13
make reservations for people to get to
00:22:15
class like that's a very different
00:22:18
why right and i think that's why i go
00:22:20
back always to
00:22:22
how do you find that why like what is
00:22:24
that light that your life is always
00:22:27
about and i think you know and i feel
00:22:29
very blessed that i found something that
00:22:31
made me feel a sense of service so young
00:22:34
because nothing compares to it you know
00:22:36
no amount of money no amount of like you
00:22:38
know whatever press or you know any of
00:22:42
that is ever going to compare
00:22:44
to the feeling of touching somebody's
00:22:47
life
00:22:47
so many people might like again my dm's
00:22:49
are like how do i find my why yeah and
00:22:51
it feels
00:22:52
almost like a privilege doesn't it for
00:22:54
people that have
00:22:55
figured that out and there's people i
00:22:57
don't know that will be listening to
00:22:58
this in the morning washing the dishes
00:22:59
driving up and down the country in a
00:23:01
delivery van whatever it is thinking
00:23:03
i know i'm capable and deserving of more
00:23:06
but i just don't know what it is do you
00:23:08
do you believe that everybody has a
00:23:10
oh
00:23:11
a purpose beyond the nine to five
00:23:14
i do yeah but how do we find it yeah i
00:23:16
think
00:23:17
at the end of the day
00:23:18
it's it's already inside you it's
00:23:21
usually ourselves that are
00:23:23
unwilling to listen to it right
00:23:26
to ask yourself what did you love when
00:23:28
you were younger right
00:23:29
what when did you
00:23:31
light up what it who are your role
00:23:33
models and inspirations what's that
00:23:35
what's that thing you look at for a
00:23:37
second longer right who's that person
00:23:39
you want to talk to for a few minutes
00:23:41
more and why there is something pulling
00:23:43
you
00:23:44
there
00:23:45
and
00:23:46
you have to be willing
00:23:48
to go down the path of exploring it and
00:23:51
trying trying it right and i think
00:23:53
that's really the hardest thing is we
00:23:55
put so many blocks on ourselves right
00:23:57
and and i get it i mean our society
00:23:59
tells us this is the way to live that it
00:24:01
does not tell you
00:24:02
to live purposefully and to go and chase
00:24:05
your dreams i mean that's not i mean yes
00:24:07
we do
00:24:09
in the instagram world of life and
00:24:10
quotes i get that
00:24:12
but the structure of our life is not
00:24:15
actually built that way right and and
00:24:16
like you just said i mean you compared
00:24:18
it to
00:24:19
the nine to five which is about making
00:24:21
money right and i think actually and i
00:24:23
have a whole chapter where i talk about
00:24:24
money because
00:24:26
money is the most trapping thing
00:24:29
that's the reason people are are aren't
00:24:31
willing to do it
00:24:33
usually you know it i and i always ask
00:24:34
people this when they're like i don't
00:24:35
know if you had all the money in the
00:24:37
world how would you spend your day
00:24:38
tomorrow that's like a very good way to
00:24:40
start exploring what would i do without
00:24:42
one of the biggest constraints right
00:24:43
that is probably on my mind what would
00:24:46
truly
00:24:47
make you light you up right and it's not
00:24:49
about like buying stuff right at the end
00:24:51
of the day like i mean anyone who wins
00:24:52
the lottery like you know that they can
00:24:54
go buy stuff but that's not fulfillment
00:24:56
at the end of the day it's it's a sense
00:24:57
of purpose right and i think people have
00:25:00
to just get themselves in a place where
00:25:02
they're trying new things and it does
00:25:04
honestly feel like a privilege and
00:25:05
that's part of also why i started class
00:25:07
pass was because i wanted people to
00:25:10
in a way live a life that i knew i was i
00:25:13
was sitting there when i was in my early
00:25:15
20s and i would spend my you know weeks
00:25:17
performing for a show i'd perform on
00:25:19
saturday night invite people to come and
00:25:20
watch me dance
00:25:22
and i remember i felt like i had like i
00:25:25
said like this pep to my life and my
00:25:27
step and all of that
00:25:28
and i want everyone to have that and i
00:25:30
remember thinking wait a second like you
00:25:33
used to be an athlete like you were
00:25:34
training for the olympics like you were
00:25:36
this amazing singer and would you now
00:25:39
just show up and go to work all day and
00:25:41
don't think about finding time to even
00:25:43
explore these things so my contribution
00:25:46
to that was honestly creating class that
00:25:48
was like part of my very big inspiration
00:25:50
for it was how can i
00:25:53
give some of that to other people to go
00:25:54
and try something and potentially have
00:25:56
that same enlightenment in their life so
00:25:58
you kind of get out of your
00:26:00
path and your routine
00:26:02
and meet a teacher right that will
00:26:04
inspire the growth in you and that
00:26:07
reflection in you because most of the
00:26:08
times the hardest thing to do is to ask
00:26:10
yourself what you love in your own life
00:26:13
and how did you when was the moment
00:26:15
because i i read in i read in your book
00:26:17
you know there's certain pain points we
00:26:18
encounter where we realize okay i can
00:26:19
solve this problem and the sort of my
00:26:22
manifestation of the solution is
00:26:25
um this app or this website what was the
00:26:28
problem that you encountered and when
00:26:30
that made you think class pass is the
00:26:32
solution yeah so i was once again
00:26:34
training in ballet at the time i you
00:26:36
know i had my nine to five but every day
00:26:38
after work i would go and train in
00:26:41
ballet and i'd have my ballet clothes
00:26:42
with me and i'd been going to the same
00:26:44
teacher for about six months at the time
00:26:46
and i wanted to try a new class it was
00:26:48
just like a very
00:26:49
simple
00:26:50
thing i wanted to do i get onto you know
00:26:53
my computer i start browsing for this
00:26:55
class
00:26:56
two hours go by it was just this
00:26:57
terrible experience from a information
00:27:00
standpoint from you know not knowing
00:27:02
what class to take if it was if it's you
00:27:05
know close enough to me what time it
00:27:06
starts how do i register
00:27:08
and that's when i started looking at
00:27:10
other models that existed so there were
00:27:11
things you know in the us like opentable
00:27:13
seamless web that just made this type of
00:27:16
information so accessible and so easy
00:27:18
and convenient for a customer
00:27:20
that i started thinking what if i could
00:27:22
do this for classes and therefore get
00:27:24
people to get an hour out of their life
00:27:26
that was out of their routine to go and
00:27:28
do something fun and exciting so that
00:27:30
was really where it started
00:27:32
even that you kind of glossed over that
00:27:34
but that's pretty extraordinary because
00:27:36
a lot of people encounter a problem the
00:27:38
issue you encounter trying to book that
00:27:39
class and they go [ __ ] the world is not
00:27:42
not good enough or they think they'll
00:27:43
just think uh this is broken and then
00:27:45
they'll carry on with it oh let me
00:27:46
caveat that so i had come back from san
00:27:48
francisco 36 hours before that and when
00:27:51
i was in san francisco i had met a bunch
00:27:53
of entrepreneurs and this was my first
00:27:54
time ever meeting entrepreneurs right so
00:27:56
going back to even the whole trying new
00:27:58
things conversation
00:28:00
it was really important for me to take
00:28:01
that trip to sf i had been sort of stuck
00:28:03
in new york city i had been living this
00:28:05
the crazy dance life the crazy you know
00:28:07
nine-to-five life and i had no time for
00:28:10
anything else so i was not trying new
00:28:12
things and i needed an epiphany i needed
00:28:14
something to change because the two
00:28:16
roads i was on like they were going to
00:28:17
crash at some point and it wasn't going
00:28:19
to work
00:28:20
and i decided to go on this trip and
00:28:22
meet a bunch of entrepreneurs and i come
00:28:24
back thinking what if i could be an
00:28:26
entrepreneur let me give myself two
00:28:28
weeks to think of an idea that's
00:28:30
literally the mindset i was in
00:28:32
when i encountered that so 36 hours
00:28:34
later
00:28:35
i happened to be searching for this
00:28:37
ballet class and that's it was just like
00:28:39
during this perfect period in my life
00:28:41
and honestly like this is when i
00:28:43
sometimes think like does the universe
00:28:45
make us do these things because what are
00:28:47
the chances of all that happening at the
00:28:49
same time but it did and
00:28:51
i really remember in that moment
00:28:53
thinking i know i'm the right person to
00:28:55
build this because of
00:28:57
this background i have the communities
00:28:59
i've been around the experiences i have
00:29:01
there's probably no one else who cares
00:29:03
as much about dance who then also went
00:29:05
to mit and payne mit which is an amazing
00:29:07
college for those that don't know right
00:29:09
and it was sort of this perfect
00:29:11
combination of things that
00:29:13
made me say i got to do this and i went
00:29:15
for it but that is extraordinary because
00:29:17
a lot of people will encounter things
00:29:18
i'll encounter things today i might sit
00:29:20
on a chair and be like this chair could
00:29:21
be better but then i'll carry on with my
00:29:22
day you know what i mean and then i'll
00:29:24
open the fridge and go this fridge could
00:29:25
be yeah that's true i know that yeah
00:29:28
that's that feels like the pivotal
00:29:30
moment which a lot of people listening
00:29:31
to this they'll all they'll notice
00:29:32
things maybe they don't even notice them
00:29:34
because there's something in when you
00:29:35
start looking you know in your case
00:29:37
you're actually kind of looking for a
00:29:39
problem to solve yeah yeah
00:29:40
but it takes a certain character makeup
00:29:43
to say i
00:29:45
can be the one to solve this
00:29:47
also a little bit of delusion if you
00:29:48
look at the stats it's fair that's a
00:29:49
very good point um i was definitely
00:29:51
delusional at the time in thinking that
00:29:54
but you know what it was it was more of
00:29:56
i want to try
00:29:57
to solve this problem regardless yeah
00:30:00
because
00:30:01
it felt so tied to everything i had done
00:30:04
in my life i had literally fought to
00:30:05
dance up and ever for every year of my
00:30:07
life up until that point why not bring
00:30:09
the fight to everyone else right like
00:30:10
that's how i felt i was like i've
00:30:12
already been doing this
00:30:14
let's just go and you know make this
00:30:16
happen and and by the way like i'm also
00:30:18
used my you know my left brain which is
00:30:21
you know my analytical side to go and do
00:30:22
the market research and i was able to
00:30:24
raise money like i i definitely did this
00:30:27
in the practical way too and i was
00:30:29
making sure that it wasn't just some
00:30:31
crazy dream i there was there was
00:30:33
substance to it for sure i mean i
00:30:35
wouldn't have been able to raise the
00:30:37
capital i did i got into an incubator it
00:30:39
was a good idea right in the way and it
00:30:41
was once again it stemmed from a really
00:30:44
deep why in me and that was the most
00:30:46
important thing i think that's you know
00:30:47
when you know we can talk a little bit
00:30:49
about
00:30:50
the failures and the points where the
00:30:52
product didn't work but
00:30:53
i was never obsessed with getting a
00:30:55
product to work i was obsessed with
00:30:56
solving a problem from day one it's how
00:30:59
do i get people to class and not make it
00:31:00
so hard for people to get to class why
00:31:03
is it important for people to go to
00:31:04
class because then they can feel what i
00:31:06
have in dance in their life it was just
00:31:07
such a like an important
00:31:10
mission for me that i could just never
00:31:12
stop on it and every day it fueled me
00:31:15
because it was just so real for me to
00:31:17
say
00:31:18
i gave this to someone and even today
00:31:20
like you know and we've booked
00:31:22
like 100 million hours of workouts at
00:31:24
this point you know and when someone
00:31:26
comes to me and is and says to me like i
00:31:29
just went and worked out because of
00:31:30
class past it brings me joy because
00:31:32
that's an hour of their life that
00:31:35
was like what dances to me right that i
00:31:37
gave them out of their
00:31:39
routine or expectations or the way
00:31:41
society wants them to live that they did
00:31:43
for themselves and that is such a gift
00:31:45
and i think in my life i knew
00:31:48
fighting for that
00:31:49
was always a win whether it worked or
00:31:51
not right but what if it didn't work
00:31:54
if it didn't work i had a back-up plan i
00:31:55
mean when i say i had a back-up plan i
00:31:57
mean i went through my finances and my
00:31:59
dad and i were very clear about
00:32:01
how much money i had received at that
00:32:04
point to say i had three years to build
00:32:06
this i had three years before i ran out
00:32:07
of my own cash
00:32:09
and you've because you've been a saver
00:32:10
as it says in the business
00:32:12
and so that's the other thing is
00:32:14
you know because money can be the
00:32:16
biggest hurdle in going after our dreams
00:32:19
and if you know you're a dreamer and i
00:32:21
think i always knew i was a dreamer
00:32:22
whether i was going to spend my money to
00:32:24
build a company or built or put on a dan
00:32:26
show i knew i was always dreamer and so
00:32:29
i didn't care to spend money on the
00:32:32
smaller things in my life right like i
00:32:34
just didn't i didn't like i said i
00:32:35
didn't travel i barely went shopping and
00:32:37
by the way these are decisions i made
00:32:38
right i think it's so important i'm not
00:32:40
saying that because i want other people
00:32:42
to do the same it's it's about you
00:32:43
knowing and thinking about it in a very
00:32:46
deliberate way of how you're spending
00:32:48
your money
00:32:49
right and i was building up a savings i
00:32:51
didn't know what i was going to spend it
00:32:52
on but then when this idea came and i
00:32:54
got to sit down i had three years to go
00:32:57
after
00:32:58
running towards something were you
00:32:59
scared
00:33:01
um i was excited i i mean it was an
00:33:04
adrenaline rush you know i mean there
00:33:06
were times where it was terrible and
00:33:08
challenging and sucked and
00:33:10
um but i wasn't scared if i was scared i
00:33:13
wouldn't have done it you know i think
00:33:14
if my
00:33:16
fear trumped my
00:33:20
my
00:33:20
my confidence i wouldn't have i don't
00:33:22
think i would have been able to to uh
00:33:25
quit my job and go for it when you quit
00:33:27
your job and go for it at warner right
00:33:29
you have a meeting with the cham and the
00:33:30
chairman you're 28 years old
00:33:32
he says something interesting to you
00:33:34
right and i think this is this is
00:33:35
actually a people said people will say
00:33:36
to your other luck but actually it's
00:33:39
very much the opposite because he said
00:33:41
that he would invest in yeah so i mean
00:33:44
this goes perfectly with what we were
00:33:45
talking about is it's really
00:33:47
the reason i didn't get scared is
00:33:49
because more and more opportunities and
00:33:51
doors just kept opening for me it was
00:33:53
almost like the universe just started
00:33:55
guiding me in the most beautiful way
00:33:57
towards towards the mission towards the
00:33:59
purpose towards the answer in a way that
00:34:01
i felt before i was blocking it right so
00:34:03
the second i decided to go after
00:34:05
building this company one of the biggest
00:34:07
things i had to do was quit my job and
00:34:09
on the day i quit i decided to write an
00:34:10
email to people i had worked with my
00:34:12
company some executives and the vice
00:34:14
chairman of warner music group says hey
00:34:16
come to my office i'd love to hear what
00:34:17
you're building
00:34:19
go up to his office
00:34:20
probably the second or third time i've
00:34:22
ever met him in the two three years i
00:34:23
was there
00:34:24
tell him about my idea he says great i
00:34:26
want to invest literally writes me a
00:34:28
check for ten thousand dollars and gives
00:34:30
me an introduction into a big incubator
00:34:32
that was in new york city and i just
00:34:34
remember thinking in my head
00:34:36
this is this was the scariest
00:34:38
door i'd ever closed my life quitting my
00:34:40
job
00:34:41
but i'm literally walking out out of
00:34:43
here with a ten thousand dollar check
00:34:45
towards my next thing why did why did he
00:34:48
give you that check in your opinion
00:34:51
a few things
00:34:52
one
00:34:53
so he was a former bani so once again
00:34:56
reputation does follow you right like
00:34:58
this goes back to like everything i was
00:35:00
talking about in the sense of it's
00:35:02
always important to do good work because
00:35:04
if he had ever heard you know pyle is
00:35:05
not good i mean he knew that i was a
00:35:07
good worker no matter what i did even
00:35:09
though i didn't once again love my job i
00:35:11
always did good good work and i know
00:35:12
that i i that reputation followed me and
00:35:15
he knew that and we call that invisible
00:35:18
peel around here yeah there you go right
00:35:20
it's so important it shows up it shows
00:35:22
up yeah right exactly and i think that
00:35:24
was one of the big things and then i
00:35:26
mean two this was also like an ecosystem
00:35:29
where entrepreneurship was the thing but
00:35:31
i mean at the end of the day he believed
00:35:32
in me right and it was also because
00:35:35
you know actually this is one of my
00:35:37
favorite things that happened on the day
00:35:38
i quit is i would go and tell people
00:35:40
right especially people i had worked
00:35:42
with who were much older than me that i
00:35:43
was quitting my job and here i was
00:35:45
10 15 years younger than most of them
00:35:47
and i remember everyone looking at me
00:35:49
almost
00:35:51
thinking to themselves like i wish i had
00:35:53
the courage to do that so i think you
00:35:56
forget like me quitting that day was
00:35:59
such a sign of courage in my capability
00:36:02
and i didn't even realize it at the
00:36:03
moment but being able to make such a
00:36:06
bold decision at that age 28 yeah it was
00:36:09
a huge thing for even my vice terminacy
00:36:12
to say wow like
00:36:13
this girl is gonna go for it right and i
00:36:15
mean that was probably one of the first
00:36:17
hard decisions i had to make in my life
00:36:19
i had to make so many more but to
00:36:22
sort of have that control over your life
00:36:24
your thoughts your dreams
00:36:26
is such an important way to live and
00:36:28
honestly at the end of the day to be a
00:36:29
good leader a good ceo like you need to
00:36:32
be in control of your ship and in
00:36:34
control of your life i asked that
00:36:36
question about why he invested because
00:36:38
in my time in my company probably had
00:36:40
just over a thousand employees and there
00:36:42
was two occasions where someone said
00:36:44
they were quitting and they were leaving
00:36:46
to start a business and i went i'm gonna
00:36:48
invest in your business and it was
00:36:50
purely based on one thing which is
00:36:51
exactly what you've described which was
00:36:54
in their invisible pr they might not
00:36:56
even have known that i knew right but
00:36:58
they were great right they always did
00:37:00
great work that's why you have to always
00:37:02
do good work and yeah like i mean it's
00:37:04
it's such a
00:37:05
i and i think in this day and age people
00:37:07
don't feel it as much yeah even though
00:37:11
it might be a job you don't love we all
00:37:13
have to kind of in a way like you have
00:37:14
to earn your
00:37:15
or your
00:37:16
what does it call like earn your marks
00:37:18
your own strengths
00:37:20
earn your stripes you know and i think i
00:37:22
remember earning my stripes to to take
00:37:24
the leap for my dreams whether that was
00:37:27
in money or skills or and i don't regret
00:37:30
any of that you know and i think when
00:37:31
people ask me how did you do it i spent
00:37:34
i mean it goes back to the whole
00:37:36
conformity rebellious thing i was
00:37:38
earning my stripes so then when i felt
00:37:40
like i could leap i had built the
00:37:42
parachute in the plane you know like i i
00:37:44
wasn't taking a leap without anything
00:37:46
around me like i had built a great
00:37:48
structure
00:37:49
that was going to then let me take the
00:37:51
most rebellious of leaps
00:37:54
what that came towards the mission right
00:37:56
i didn't have to like rebuild all the
00:37:57
stuff that was about my life and like
00:38:00
worrying about money and this is also an
00:38:02
important thing is like when you are
00:38:03
starting a company if i'm worrying about
00:38:04
paying my bills right and if i'm
00:38:06
worrying about like do i have the skills
00:38:08
then i'm not worried or i'm not worrying
00:38:10
about the most important thing which is
00:38:11
can i get someone to class right like
00:38:12
the number one thing for me to focus on
00:38:14
was my business not anything that was
00:38:17
going on outside of that and that's why
00:38:18
i think it's setting ourselves up to
00:38:20
succeed when we are leaders when we are
00:38:22
entrepreneurs to be in a place where
00:38:25
we're not worried about the peripheral
00:38:28
constraints in our life we're able to
00:38:29
focus on the most important thing at
00:38:31
hand is so important for us to do it's
00:38:33
what's going to make us more impactful
00:38:36
in being able to actually solve the most
00:38:38
important thing i had a few words to say
00:38:40
about one of my sponsors on this podcast
00:38:42
we're now playing in a world where the
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digital landscape is changing every
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single day and to succeed as a small
00:38:48
business the most important thing you
00:38:50
can do is stay informed with the latest
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trends and that's why i've partnered
00:38:54
with vodafone business they genuinely
00:38:57
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00:38:59
navigate this fast moving space they've
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with what's going on and you can even
00:39:08
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00:39:13
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00:39:14
business if you haven't checked out the
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v-hub i'd highly recommend you do so as
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it will help your business navigate the
00:39:20
changing landscape and keep you on the
00:39:22
front foot so go to vhub by vodafone you
00:39:25
can search that anywhere on google and
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check it out now
00:39:28
we are all looking for ways to live a
00:39:30
little bit more sustainably and to make
00:39:32
more conscious choices in our day-to-day
00:39:34
routines so when a brand like my energy
00:39:36
who i've spoken about before offered to
00:39:38
sponsor this podcast i felt like and i
00:39:40
knew deep down inside that i had to help
00:39:43
them share their mission to create an
00:39:44
even greener world it feels like there's
00:39:46
not much more fulfilling than that and
00:39:48
their products provide an easy and
00:39:50
cost-effective way to make a sustainable
00:39:52
switch in your life and they've got some
00:39:54
existing new products coming out that i
00:39:56
can't wait to use myself and i'll let
00:39:58
you know as i use those products how i
00:40:00
get on so if you're a my energy customer
00:40:02
at the moment let me know your favorite
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products down below in the comments
00:40:05
section and if you haven't checked them
00:40:07
out yet go to myenergy.com and find out
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a lot more about who they are and what
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they're doing if you're one of those
00:40:13
people that wants to make a sustainable
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switch
00:40:15
my energy.com is the place for you
00:40:18
let's go to the start then of this the
00:40:20
class pass journey because i'm really
00:40:21
compelled by
00:40:23
you know much of the reason i started
00:40:24
this podcast was because
00:40:25
i wanted to
00:40:27
shine a light on the tough times in
00:40:29
business and i know when you're starting
00:40:31
a business especially a business and
00:40:32
tech
00:40:34
it can be
00:40:35
really really difficult because you're
00:40:36
sort of jockeying and pivoting to find
00:40:38
product market fit and to figure out
00:40:40
like what your customers want
00:40:41
how to deliver it and i read that when i
00:40:43
was reading about your journey when you
00:40:45
started um you quit your job in 2011 and
00:40:48
then you go through a long phase of
00:40:51
trying to figure out how to get people
00:40:52
to use this thing how to market it and
00:40:54
all that
00:40:55
nightmare talk to me about that
00:40:56
nightmare
00:40:58
so
00:40:59
we
00:40:59
went
00:41:01
into the market with a very clear
00:41:02
product idea and it was a replica of
00:41:05
what had worked in another industry so
00:41:07
opentable which allows you to book
00:41:10
restaurant reservations it seemed like
00:41:12
the right parallel to what we were doing
00:41:15
go on search for classes
00:41:17
but what i didn't realize was that there
00:41:20
was a very big missing part in it and i
00:41:22
mean i'll spare everyone like the little
00:41:23
details of it but everyone has to eat
00:41:25
everyone does not have to work out right
00:41:27
it was and working out usually is
00:41:29
something scary for people and it's more
00:41:32
of an aspirational thing it's not
00:41:34
something that you have to do every
00:41:35
single day so they were sort of on
00:41:37
different planes of people's psychology
00:41:39
which really became the biggest
00:41:40
bottleneck to what ended up happening
00:41:42
because we spent a year we spent
00:41:46
half a million dollars
00:41:47
building a product that didn't work and
00:41:50
um even though i had all this momentum
00:41:52
like i was saying all these beautiful
00:41:53
doors were opening for me and they were
00:41:55
and i had a lot of great you know what i
00:41:58
now call false signals of success like
00:42:00
followers press we ended up on the cover
00:42:02
of ink magazine without launching a
00:42:04
product
00:42:05
and all these things made me feel like i
00:42:07
was succeeding right because this is
00:42:08
what success looked like to everyone
00:42:11
else
00:42:12
and then i launched my product
00:42:14
and no one went to class it was like it
00:42:16
was and no one bought a class no one
00:42:18
was transacting it was crickets it was
00:42:21
just a really
00:42:22
it was this was the hardest probably a
00:42:25
few months of the entire trajectory
00:42:27
because
00:42:28
i i had never really faced
00:42:32
failure in my life i mean going back to
00:42:33
everything i just told you i had i'd
00:42:35
sort of done things well and i
00:42:38
tried to make sure that this would go
00:42:39
well right by doing everything that i
00:42:41
knew how how to which was let's get the
00:42:43
press let's build a beautiful product
00:42:44
let's you know get as many email
00:42:46
addresses as possible those are like the
00:42:48
obvious things that seem you know you
00:42:50
would do when you're building a company
00:42:52
but i forgot to really
00:42:54
ask myself if i was solving the problem
00:42:56
i set out to and
00:42:58
i
00:43:00
really think back to that moment and
00:43:02
even though it was
00:43:04
the hardest
00:43:05
that moment
00:43:06
is the reason
00:43:08
i became a real entrepreneur like i
00:43:10
don't think i was an entrepreneur before
00:43:11
that day i was
00:43:12
excited about solving something but the
00:43:14
day i failed was the day i became an
00:43:15
entrepreneur because that was the day i
00:43:17
really had to think
00:43:19
deeper about creating something in the
00:43:21
world that didn't exist
00:43:22
and i think it's so easy
00:43:24
to follow the blueprints of everyone
00:43:25
else and realize that entrepreneurship
00:43:27
is actually about having no plan and
00:43:29
having you know not following anyone
00:43:32
else's
00:43:33
ideas of what success is it's about
00:43:35
figuring out what you know what is it to
00:43:36
solve your mission or your you know your
00:43:38
business model that you're going after
00:43:41
and that woke me up and it was a a month
00:43:44
or two period where we were
00:43:46
trying to be comfortable like it was
00:43:48
this comfortable place we were in
00:43:50
because we had raised money we had just
00:43:51
come out of techstars
00:43:53
but
00:43:53
i mean it was not going well and i knew
00:43:56
we were going to run out of cash if like
00:43:57
we didn't you know figure out something
00:43:59
in the next few months and
00:44:01
um we just i remember like after a few
00:44:04
few weeks of it we sent this email
00:44:07
literally telling people to go to class
00:44:08
for free
00:44:10
thinking you know okay like this is
00:44:11
gonna work
00:44:12
we're literally paying for the classes
00:44:14
people have to go
00:44:15
and still no one went and that's when i
00:44:17
realized we had just gone the wrong
00:44:18
direction
00:44:20
and i needed to like circle back up i
00:44:22
needed to break what we had built
00:44:24
just think a whole new way
00:44:26
re-energize my team around going up
00:44:28
about solving this problem
00:44:30
in a completely new way not worrying
00:44:32
about what we had done
00:44:34
but worrying about where we're going to
00:44:35
go and that flipped everything and i
00:44:37
have been there now so many times where
00:44:40
i've been okay with throwing away our
00:44:41
past i mean people don't know this um
00:44:44
but class pass has changed its name
00:44:46
three times
00:44:47
it wasn't called class pass i mean even
00:44:49
with this time i'm talking about it was
00:44:50
called something else and i've thrown
00:44:52
away names like i've thrown away product
00:44:54
ideas like we've thrown we've thrown
00:44:55
away a lot of stuff we've changed our
00:44:57
pricing our plans
00:44:59
and it's because it's not about that
00:45:02
right it's about solving
00:45:04
the problem in the world and moving
00:45:06
towards that and your mission so many
00:45:08
entrepreneurs though and this is
00:45:09
probably the mistake i made when i was
00:45:10
18 and started my first little tech
00:45:12
company was um they get romantic about
00:45:15
that initial hypothesis being correct
00:45:17
exactly so it's like you've got this
00:45:19
square shape thing and you're just
00:45:20
trying to force it into this triangle
00:45:22
because like your ego
00:45:24
and there's so much relying on it and
00:45:25
you know the runway you know you're
00:45:27
running out of cash and you just maybe i
00:45:29
just push harder
00:45:30
and then all these vanity metrics can be
00:45:32
kind of confusing oh we've got some
00:45:33
false signals of success yes no one's
00:45:36
buying anything but we've got traffic
00:45:37
absolutely and as you just said like i'm
00:45:38
on a magazine
00:45:40
but then certain entrepreneurs i think
00:45:41
that have the humility to say in fact
00:45:44
it's not about being
00:45:45
me my hypothesis being right it's about
00:45:48
creating a product market fit yeah you
00:45:50
know and what was the moment when you
00:45:51
started to get closer to that product
00:45:53
market yeah and and to you know one of
00:45:55
the things i love saying about that is
00:45:57
to be uh mission obsessed not product
00:46:00
obsessed and i learned that through that
00:46:01
journey but um you know we started then
00:46:04
putting this discovery pass out there so
00:46:06
what we did learn is that you know we
00:46:08
started finally actually going and
00:46:09
talking to a lot of the studio owners
00:46:10
and talking to customers i think one of
00:46:12
the things that happens in tech
00:46:14
sometimes is you sit behind the tech
00:46:16
that you
00:46:17
you don't like go and
00:46:20
talk to real people right and it was
00:46:22
funny because i was in a tech incubator
00:46:23
so we showed up we were working from
00:46:25
like 6 a.m to 10 p.m every night but
00:46:28
sitting in an office we weren't actually
00:46:30
going to class and talking to studio
00:46:31
owners and all of that so once we
00:46:33
started flipping that we started
00:46:35
realizing that you know a lot of the
00:46:36
studio owners they were offering a free
00:46:38
class for people who were new they
00:46:40
wanted new people in the door and then
00:46:42
customers you know knew about all these
00:46:44
places but they had fears we were like
00:46:46
how do we break the fear and so we
00:46:48
started building this product our second
00:46:49
product which also doesn't exist anymore
00:46:51
it was called the passport and it was a
00:46:53
discovery pass where you could go and
00:46:55
try uh 10 different classes for 30 days
00:46:58
so you could go to like a spin class
00:46:59
monday pole dance class tuesday dance
00:47:01
class wednesday you can kind of you know
00:47:03
it was like sort of this way for people
00:47:05
for 50 to go and explore this is sort of
00:47:08
when we started realizing the whole love
00:47:10
of variety that people had when it came
00:47:12
to working out in classes which was the
00:47:14
magic of what we actually discovered in
00:47:16
our second mistake of a product is that
00:47:18
people loved variety they wanted to
00:47:21
really go and try new things it's what
00:47:22
motivated them they didn't want to do
00:47:24
the same workout every single day how
00:47:25
did you learn that the variety point
00:47:27
well people started going and like they
00:47:29
started loving this past right they
00:47:31
started loving the 30-day pass and then
00:47:33
they start they try to actually buy it
00:47:35
over and over again for the next month
00:47:38
and you weren't allowed to because it
00:47:39
was like a one-month product
00:47:41
and we had literally gotten these
00:47:42
classes for no money it was very much uh
00:47:45
do this for a month and then you're
00:47:46
gonna go find your favorite studio and
00:47:48
buy a pass there we thought it was
00:47:50
legion for the studio owners but it
00:47:52
ended up not being that at all people
00:47:54
literally were
00:47:55
obsessed with the variety wanted to do
00:47:56
it every single month and not stop and
00:47:59
that's when we started thinking about
00:48:01
what if we become a subscription we
00:48:02
weren't a subscription at the time it
00:48:03
was just this one month product and we
00:48:06
then started
00:48:08
experimenting with this idea of a class
00:48:10
past it wasn't even class past at the
00:48:12
time it was a class pass and
00:48:15
we launched it to about 50 customers in
00:48:17
june of 2013
00:48:19
and um they loved it the next month it
00:48:21
just kind of kept doubling and then it
00:48:23
was exponential growth and it just i
00:48:25
mean the sales of that took over our
00:48:27
other products and we just knew that the
00:48:29
monthly subscription was the way to go
00:48:31
and that that was the way that this
00:48:32
model was going to work and that's two
00:48:34
years in right three years three isn't
00:48:37
three years of stumbling around i mean i
00:48:39
went to san francisco in uh in july of
00:48:42
2010 and this is june of 2013. so three
00:48:46
years
00:48:46
wow one of the quotes from your book is
00:48:49
that um about failure being a data point
00:48:51
not an endpoint and i really think that
00:48:53
is i wish someone said that to me when i
00:48:54
was 18 because
00:48:56
um i saw failure as a testament of my
00:48:59
inadequacy or something as opposed to
00:49:00
something i should be listening to right
00:49:02
and that's a sort of testament to your
00:49:04
journey and then you know throughout
00:49:05
throughout that period though i think
00:49:06
we've
00:49:07
how was your as a founder something
00:49:09
again founders don't talk about like how
00:49:10
is your mental health
00:49:13
because i know there's sacrifice there
00:49:15
um let's see
00:49:16
a few things i would say um
00:49:19
i mean i sacrificed a lot especially in
00:49:21
those three years where we were trying
00:49:23
to get the product right and it wasn't
00:49:24
working
00:49:26
i mean i missed
00:49:27
i missed family things i missed weddings
00:49:29
i i was just not around right i mean i
00:49:31
was
00:49:33
literally at work all day long and if
00:49:36
someone on my team needed me i i gave my
00:49:38
150 percent to my company so
00:49:42
i felt fulfilled because i was doing
00:49:44
something i loved was i exhausted yes
00:49:47
was i
00:49:48
lonely yeah i mean i thankfully like
00:49:51
lived with a roommate who is one of my
00:49:53
like closest dearest friends till today
00:49:56
but
00:49:57
she was the only person i would see
00:49:58
outside of people at work you know it
00:50:00
was i was living in this like closed
00:50:02
circuit world and i don't
00:50:04
i don't mind that like as somebody who
00:50:06
has been on a mission before like has
00:50:08
created dan shows where they're you know
00:50:11
you there's this like intensity that
00:50:12
happens for two weeks and
00:50:14
you go really really intense you know
00:50:16
the thing that with the dan show is
00:50:17
though it ends at some point like you
00:50:19
have the show
00:50:20
and it's over
00:50:22
the thing i didn't know didn't realize
00:50:23
about this one is you know it's it's a
00:50:26
marathon not a sprint like the dance
00:50:27
shows can be a sprint
00:50:29
and that definitely got to me and i you
00:50:31
know one of the reasons i even developed
00:50:32
this entire goal setting method was
00:50:34
because three years in so right when i
00:50:36
was at this point where i realized class
00:50:37
was going to take off
00:50:39
i mean it felt like amazing right it
00:50:40
spent like three years i was so focused
00:50:42
i had literally like
00:50:44
probably not talked to anyone in my life
00:50:46
and i found myself alone for the
00:50:47
holidays my sister was away my parents
00:50:50
were in india and i was about to like
00:50:52
literally be by myself on christmas and
00:50:54
it was one of those moments for me i
00:50:56
always hated the holidays as an
00:50:58
entrepreneur because
00:51:00
it was the one like it was the time in
00:51:02
my life where i couldn't work through my
00:51:04
like my loneliness or through work
00:51:05
through any of my issues it was like the
00:51:07
one time where everyone
00:51:09
would go and do things with other people
00:51:11
and i would be that person who would
00:51:13
finally have to realize that i was on
00:51:15
myself right because i wasn't
00:51:17
cultivating relationships at that point
00:51:18
in my life i didn't have time to
00:51:20
and so it was a wake-up call and kind of
00:51:23
going back to you know
00:51:24
my mom may have been pestering me about
00:51:26
it for the years before
00:51:27
at that point in my life i just started
00:51:29
realizing wait a second like
00:51:31
i knew class was going to take off like
00:51:32
i just knew we i mean we only had we had
00:51:34
less than a thousand customers but
00:51:36
i had i had caught lightning in a bottle
00:51:38
like it was there it was so magical i
00:51:40
knew it was going to take over the world
00:51:41
like it was one of those moments as an
00:51:43
entrepreneur i could breathe but i
00:51:45
looked at everything else and i'm like
00:51:46
everything else is a mess my health was
00:51:48
a mess i could barely work out which was
00:51:50
crazy for me i wasn't dancing i was like
00:51:52
i was single i you know i had a few good
00:51:54
friends but i felt like i i like hadn't
00:51:56
been there for them and that's when i
00:51:58
started really doing the school setting
00:51:59
because i'm like i need to have
00:52:01
a bit more i want to make sure my
00:52:03
priorities are more reflective of the
00:52:04
human i want to be in my life
00:52:06
and how in like a practical sense in
00:52:08
terms of a time allocation sense did you
00:52:10
get from that place to living more in
00:52:12
line with those values of connection
00:52:15
community love and health so i you know
00:52:18
i'll the details of like what i did on
00:52:20
that session the first time i did it are
00:52:22
in the book but i will say this so in
00:52:24
the next six months uh after i started
00:52:27
doing that i literally met my husband a
00:52:29
month later really yes i decided to do a
00:52:33
huge dance show
00:52:35
at alvin ailey six months later and i
00:52:37
sold out a thousand uh a thousand seats
00:52:40
at that so i got to do a huge
00:52:41
performance you're gonna sell so many
00:52:43
books just by saying you found a husband
00:52:45
buy something it's really crazy but i
00:52:47
literally changed my
00:52:49
perspective around love and what i
00:52:52
wanted and i met my husband a month
00:52:54
later which was crazy and i also you
00:52:56
know i set goals around what i wanted to
00:52:57
do with class pass i set goals around my
00:52:59
health and how i wanted to
00:53:02
live and work out on a daily basis
00:53:04
and i did all those things and i
00:53:06
remember this is always my favorite
00:53:08
moment six months later
00:53:10
i was flying home on a plane
00:53:12
and when i first did this goal setting
00:53:13
method i had written it on a post-it
00:53:14
note because i was on a plane and i was
00:53:17
i was on another
00:53:19
plane ride because i was always
00:53:20
traveling and i took it out and i looked
00:53:22
at it and i had done everything on my
00:53:24
dream list
00:53:25
you know and sometimes just writing down
00:53:28
those dreams is the most important thing
00:53:30
but
00:53:31
it was just such an important moment
00:53:33
because i felt
00:53:35
more i don't i don't want to say the
00:53:37
word balance because that has so many
00:53:39
you know wrong intentions with it but i
00:53:42
felt that i was very clear about my
00:53:44
priorities and i went towards them and i
00:53:48
missed things too but i didn't feel
00:53:49
guilty about them and i just felt so
00:53:52
proud of myself for
00:53:54
saying here's what i want to do in my
00:53:55
life and i'm going to go and do it and
00:53:56
accomplishing it not just obviously
00:53:58
professionally but personally as well
00:54:01
there's like an overarching theme here
00:54:02
in your in your journey where the minute
00:54:04
you become intentional about something
00:54:06
yeah the door's open
00:54:09
it's true do you believe in that
00:54:10
manifestation 100
00:54:12
and it goes back to the you saying you
00:54:15
know we were talking about having a why
00:54:18
i think when you don't have a why you go
00:54:20
aimlessly and you you know i think you
00:54:22
start living life thinking that you want
00:54:26
money thinking you want to be famous
00:54:28
thinking you want power
00:54:30
and instead of thinking about like love
00:54:32
and passion and purpose and
00:54:35
whenever i have made decisions that are
00:54:37
about the former and not the latter i've
00:54:39
never been led in the right in the right
00:54:41
direction and you know if that's
00:54:43
something people can take away from this
00:54:44
like i think is one of it's one of the
00:54:46
most important points is
00:54:48
if you go towards purpose even if you
00:54:50
are rebelling right and even if you
00:54:52
might be pissing a few people off i
00:54:54
guarantee your life will be more
00:54:56
fulfilling
00:54:57
what were you like as an entrepreneur as
00:54:59
a leader and as a manager of people
00:55:01
i would say i was very much
00:55:06
i had a lot of positive energy i'm i'm a
00:55:08
small human but i
00:55:10
i show up with all of me um
00:55:12
i
00:55:13
am i expect a lot of people i think
00:55:15
because people have always expected a
00:55:17
lot for me so i'm sort of uh when you
00:55:20
start working with me
00:55:21
i can very quickly tell if someone's
00:55:23
going to like sink or swim you know
00:55:25
because i don't tell you a lot but i
00:55:27
like let you go because i think to me
00:55:29
that's what i've had to do is just kind
00:55:31
of i don't want to put a lot of boxes on
00:55:33
you i want you to just show me what you
00:55:35
can be at your highest potential and i
00:55:37
think like that sort of i liked giving
00:55:39
people that room to be free and then
00:55:41
allowing me to see what their capability
00:55:43
is versus me saying you need to be your
00:55:45
best in this box that i'm giving you and
00:55:48
i've i've found really great talent in
00:55:50
that way um
00:55:52
[Music]
00:55:53
i've had to learn how to like hire for
00:55:55
my strengths and weaknesses you know i
00:55:57
think um
00:55:58
that's probably the hardest the hardest
00:56:00
parts when your company grows is you do
00:56:02
everything in the beginning and then you
00:56:03
have to learn to let go and um i've
00:56:06
definitely learned that building a tribe
00:56:08
around you of great people is the only
00:56:11
way to succeed you struggle to delegate
00:56:13
right in the early days um i've gotten
00:56:16
better at i've got i've i've realized
00:56:18
that there is no other way to success
00:56:21
and to build big things and great things
00:56:23
in the world without being able to
00:56:24
delegate so i've become much better at
00:56:27
it in my life and it's the only way i i
00:56:30
can do what is my magical thing right
00:56:32
and i've i think i've put a lot of
00:56:34
thought into that is
00:56:35
what part of this company is is
00:56:37
something that only i know i can do
00:56:40
right everything else that i know
00:56:41
someone else can do i shouldn't be doing
00:56:43
is that why you delegated the role of
00:56:45
ceo yes absolutely at some point a ceo
00:56:48
title becomes a lot of you know managing
00:56:51
investors managing team
00:56:54
doing press and i was like this is not
00:56:56
what i want to be doing with my time i
00:56:57
want to be solving the problem i want to
00:56:59
be in with my customers working on like
00:57:02
interesting concepts not spending my day
00:57:04
in a bunch of meetings that you know
00:57:06
didn't feel inspiring so i think like
00:57:08
you know and everyone's set up
00:57:09
differently you have to know how you
00:57:10
work that's another big thing is is
00:57:13
learning the insights of what motivates
00:57:15
you like it's it's the work you do and
00:57:17
why you do it that ends up really
00:57:20
mattering right in any job you're in and
00:57:22
i remember there was a point where i
00:57:23
remember being
00:57:24
so
00:57:26
just disheartened and not wanting to
00:57:28
show up to build my own company and i'm
00:57:30
like what is going on it was because i
00:57:32
hated the work i was doing and i loved
00:57:34
obviously my company but i hated the
00:57:36
actual work that i had to do and so i
00:57:38
had to figure out a way to get past that
00:57:40
it was like 20 like 16 17. i mean we
00:57:44
were launching like around the world it
00:57:46
was so intense it was you know i mean it
00:57:48
was magical like i said it was
00:57:49
incredible to build that but i remember
00:57:52
like i said i was showing up every day
00:57:53
dealing with like hr issues legal issues
00:57:56
like needing to talk to my investors i
00:57:58
wasn't like around my customers and i
00:58:00
wasn't going to class and around my
00:58:02
product you know and that's what really
00:58:04
fuels me as an entrepreneur and a
00:58:06
founder did you have email dread like i
00:58:08
used to at one point i remember when my
00:58:10
company was getting big because there
00:58:11
was lots of chaos in my company there's
00:58:12
all kinds of cash flow issues i used to
00:58:14
like dread opening my emails i was like
00:58:16
it's going to be some other [ __ ]
00:58:17
from like
00:58:18
an investor or something yeah i mean i
00:58:20
definitely i wanted to make sure that
00:58:23
i had more to look forward to and i
00:58:25
think there came a point where i was
00:58:27
looking forward to less and less right
00:58:29
and i think it goes back to what i was
00:58:31
saying about
00:58:32
i didn't want my whole day to be like
00:58:33
ugh okay there's like another competitor
00:58:35
okay we need to worry about this now i
00:58:37
didn't want my days to be about worrying
00:58:38
i wanted my days to be about dreaming
00:58:41
right and by the way you have to
00:58:42
obviously as a leader of any of this it
00:58:45
comes with a responsibility right so
00:58:47
it's not that
00:58:48
it's not that i didn't have to worry
00:58:50
about those things there were certain
00:58:51
parts of it that i knew i had to worry
00:58:52
about i needed to be on my radar but i
00:58:54
knew there were certain things where i'm
00:58:55
like i could hire someone to really work
00:58:57
on this and fix this it doesn't need to
00:58:59
take up my time and energy and that's
00:59:02
really where where the combination is or
00:59:03
where that decision lies
00:59:05
so all of that passion all of that love
00:59:07
driven by this really deep intrinsic why
00:59:09
why did you step away from class pass
00:59:12
you know i think at some point
00:59:14
and this happens i think for so many
00:59:16
founders i mean it had been a decade of
00:59:18
my life solving this problem which of
00:59:20
course i'm so
00:59:22
deeply passionate about and you know i
00:59:25
think the earliest days were when we did
00:59:27
the most leg work and actually like
00:59:28
figuring out the product you know
00:59:31
the product nuances that were going to
00:59:32
actually like unleash the behavior i
00:59:34
think it just got bigger you know for me
00:59:36
i think there are other things i want to
00:59:38
do in the world and there's probably
00:59:39
other problems in the world i still need
00:59:41
to go and solve and it's on me to
00:59:43
unleash myself to be able to face them
00:59:46
so i can move forward towards them and
00:59:48
have them even come into my periphery i
00:59:50
think if you're kind of stuck in the
00:59:52
past you don't even welcome the doors
00:59:54
right that are that you need to go
00:59:56
through to reach your future and
00:59:58
i know for me my
01:00:00
my future
01:00:02
is waiting for me you know and it's on
01:00:04
me to sit there and walk through the
01:00:05
door and go towards it and was there was
01:00:07
there a feeling of like a loss of
01:00:09
love
01:00:10
yeah i mean it's a bittersweet moment
01:00:12
you know it was um
01:00:14
it's super bittersweet right
01:00:16
i always say this like the the hardest
01:00:17
day was when
01:00:19
i stopped getting my my class pass email
01:00:21
i mean like it was insane i've had this
01:00:23
email for for years it was like my main
01:00:26
inbox and um
01:00:28
[Music]
01:00:30
you know it was it was definitely a
01:00:31
sense of loss i mean i think it's you
01:00:33
know
01:00:34
for it's like having a child and
01:00:36
watching your child get married right
01:00:38
but it's also being able to say like
01:00:40
they're okay i i did all i could
01:00:44
to get them to this point and being
01:00:46
proud of that and that's really where
01:00:48
i'm at i remember the
01:00:49
when i resigned from my company went
01:00:51
public and i said to the company i said
01:00:52
i'm going to resign but i have one
01:00:53
caveat they're like what is it i was
01:00:54
like i want to keep my email
01:00:57
oh you didn't use that
01:00:58
my email
01:01:00
i still have my you know it's funny that
01:01:02
you say that i think i did it going back
01:01:04
to the whole
01:01:05
uh it was just been more noise right for
01:01:08
me
01:01:15
i just think it was it was a nice break
01:01:17
for me i actually remember creating a
01:01:19
new email address and it was like no
01:01:21
mail
01:01:22
what you know and it was it was
01:01:24
interesting because it started making me
01:01:25
realize like what do i want to fill that
01:01:27
part of my life up with what's the
01:01:29
answer what's the answer to that i'm
01:01:31
sort of in the middle of it still but
01:01:33
you know obviously
01:01:34
lots of dance you know i think i
01:01:36
probably have a few more big problems in
01:01:38
the world to solve you know i'm i'm only
01:01:40
39 you know it's interesting because
01:01:44
i'm young you know my mom and i always
01:01:45
talk about this too and she's like it's
01:01:47
interesting because
01:01:49
yeah like i could retire them no there's
01:01:51
no part of me that would ever think
01:01:54
about that you know but
01:01:55
it's an interesting it's a great place
01:01:57
to be the valuation of class pass at
01:02:00
sale is probably confidential as it
01:02:02
tends to be but um i know that in 2020
01:02:04
in the series he rounded was valued at
01:02:06
over a billion
01:02:07
it's a lot of money
01:02:08
how does that change things for you
01:02:11
um
01:02:12
well you know we haven't exited so like
01:02:14
the company hasn't been been sold yet so
01:02:16
it's still private but um is your stake
01:02:18
acquired or your stake is still in the
01:02:20
company my stake is still in the company
01:02:21
yeah so it's not fully you know fully
01:02:23
there but you know i think these and
01:02:26
here's the thing the reason why that was
01:02:27
such an important moment was because of
01:02:29
what it really the message it sent for
01:02:32
women especially and me being you know
01:02:34
an indian woman like that was actually
01:02:36
the most important part of it i don't
01:02:38
think as an entrepreneur you should run
01:02:40
towards numbers like that because what
01:02:41
you should run towards is making an
01:02:43
impact right the 100 million hours of
01:02:45
people's lives is actually much more
01:02:47
impactful to
01:02:48
my business and society than hitting
01:02:51
that billion dollar evaluation but in my
01:02:54
case i think it's different because i
01:02:55
know what that represents
01:02:57
to so many other
01:03:00
girls out there who can look at
01:03:02
something and say wow if she can do it
01:03:03
maybe i can too
01:03:05
and that to me is a really important
01:03:06
part of it and that wave of press
01:03:08
whenever whenever someone becomes a
01:03:09
unicorn is tremendous right and that
01:03:11
will reach so so many young women all
01:03:13
over the world and entrepreneurs
01:03:15
your partner
01:03:16
your son completely other part of your
01:03:18
life nick zane yep nick and zayn how's
01:03:21
that been you know
01:03:23
you talk about the obsession you've had
01:03:25
building class pass
01:03:26
um entrepreneurs always struggle and
01:03:29
tend to struggle in managing their
01:03:30
romantic relationships in the other part
01:03:32
of their life what advice have you got
01:03:33
for me on maintaining a good romantic
01:03:35
relationship and family whilst also
01:03:38
striving to build big dreams yeah and i
01:03:40
i'll be honest i think we're always
01:03:42
still learning in the process of it but
01:03:44
i think one of the biggest things i
01:03:45
learned is and this goes along with a
01:03:48
lot of the advice i have with my parents
01:03:49
is bringing them along the journey
01:03:51
nick was
01:03:53
with me through so much of it i mean
01:03:54
when we went to go launch london
01:03:56
um i always actually love this story is
01:03:59
me one of uh my co-founder and
01:04:02
one of my uh sales sales girls cam came
01:04:05
with me and so did nick and we had to go
01:04:07
try out about 30 studios in in london in
01:04:10
about five days and nick just went and
01:04:13
did some of them too like it was amazing
01:04:15
we all just went and worked out and he
01:04:17
was sort of like checking out studios
01:04:18
because we before we put anything on the
01:04:20
platform we wanted to make sure they
01:04:21
were vetted studios and this was like i
01:04:23
said it was like six seven years ago so
01:04:25
it wasn't that much that many reviews on
01:04:27
studios
01:04:28
and um yeah like i mean he would come to
01:04:30
australia with me come to london with me
01:04:33
and he was just a big part of the
01:04:35
process you know and i think that's so
01:04:37
awesome that we got to live like he got
01:04:39
to live the dream with me
01:04:41
and i think that was a really nice part
01:04:43
of it i think as we've had a kid we've
01:04:45
just had to become very clear on
01:04:47
priorities right and he is and he's a
01:04:50
partner at a law firm he's you know one
01:04:52
of the youngest partners at his law firm
01:04:54
it's insane
01:04:55
what he's been able to accomplish in his
01:04:57
career so we have to just always be very
01:04:59
very communicative on what we both want
01:05:02
right in setting goals and hey like what
01:05:04
do we want to accomplish this year in
01:05:06
terms of our lives right the same way i
01:05:08
think about it personally we have to
01:05:09
think about it in terms of what our
01:05:11
family wants to do whether it's like
01:05:13
school whether it's traveling right what
01:05:16
do we want to make sure we both do
01:05:18
as a family unit combined with you know
01:05:21
our jobs and our ambition you know and i
01:05:23
think it's so important especially for
01:05:25
women
01:05:26
to surround themselves with partners and
01:05:28
people who will constantly help them
01:05:30
stay ambitious in their life because
01:05:32
it's one of the hardest things what if
01:05:34
there's conflict between when you think
01:05:35
about what the family wants to do and
01:05:37
what pile wants to do
01:05:39
as in terms of your ambitions and then
01:05:41
his ambitions with his career do you
01:05:43
have to talk it out and come up with a
01:05:44
plan you know i to me a plan
01:05:47
is the most important thing and
01:05:48
sometimes there is conflict but you have
01:05:50
to try new things similar to pivoting
01:05:52
right and iterating like on a company
01:05:54
you sometimes both people have to be
01:05:55
flexible to be like okay well like if
01:05:57
this current situation isn't working
01:05:59
we're gonna try something new right okay
01:06:01
like you want this i want this what if
01:06:03
we try a combination of this for six
01:06:05
months what if we you just have to be
01:06:07
flexible and adaptable i think the
01:06:08
biggest mistake
01:06:10
is not doing anything
01:06:12
and staying sort of stagnant in a place
01:06:13
where someone's uncomfortable or
01:06:15
someone's not happy
01:06:17
and
01:06:18
not helping the other person right at
01:06:20
the end of the day
01:06:21
nick being happy in his life is going to
01:06:23
make him the best husband to me and the
01:06:25
best dad and me being happy in my life
01:06:27
is going to make me the best mom and
01:06:28
best wife to him right and we both know
01:06:30
that so it's about saying what does
01:06:32
happiness look like
01:06:34
to both to us individually but then us
01:06:36
together as a family your journey has
01:06:39
weaved and up down left right all of it
01:06:42
it's been a tremendous roller coaster
01:06:45
with so many highs and lows and
01:06:47
everything in between you spoke earlier
01:06:49
about the importance mentorship has
01:06:50
played in your life have you ever been
01:06:52
to therapy
01:06:53
have i ever been to therapy um i did a
01:06:56
little bit of therapy actually at the
01:06:58
beginning of last year um
01:07:01
you know it was i had a baby by the way
01:07:03
six weeks before the pandemic
01:07:05
and then like my company came to a hall
01:07:08
it was just a really crazy time so i had
01:07:10
just
01:07:11
gone to therapy to just start talking to
01:07:14
somebody because i didn't even know how
01:07:16
to make sense of so much of where my
01:07:18
mental state was at that point i hadn't
01:07:19
seen people i'd literally been a mom for
01:07:22
a year living at home right it was just
01:07:26
my life was so different than what it
01:07:28
looked like pre-pandemic at that point
01:07:30
and so i yeah i have and i i mean i
01:07:32
recommend it to anyone it's it's sort of
01:07:34
like a fitness instructor who works on
01:07:36
your body you need to work on your mind
01:07:38
sometimes and see you know what your
01:07:39
roadblocks are right we know them like
01:07:41
oh my god i feel i don't feel strong
01:07:42
with my left arm like how do you get
01:07:44
that stronger we sometimes have blocks
01:07:46
like that too
01:07:47
and it's sometimes
01:07:48
for me it's been like sometimes there'll
01:07:50
be a feeling which i can't but you just
01:07:52
know you're out of orientation or
01:07:54
something's not right i think the
01:07:54
pandemic did that to a lot of us which
01:07:56
was yeah destabilized our us in many
01:07:59
many ways um your journey is phenomenal
01:08:02
it's really really phenomenal and you're
01:08:03
a really phenomenal person for so many
01:08:04
reasons one of the reasons why is just
01:08:06
you're just this from like the minute
01:08:07
you walked into this room you're just
01:08:08
this like ray of sunshine oh thank you
01:08:12
and that's why i think i asked the
01:08:12
question about like therapy and your
01:08:14
hard moments in particular because
01:08:16
you have you have just an unbelievable
01:08:17
smile and you have such an it you i'm
01:08:20
like is this person always this this
01:08:22
this
01:08:23
you know but it goes down to i always
01:08:25
believe there's the light right like i
01:08:27
think
01:08:29
it's the question you we started with it
01:08:31
was
01:08:32
i just
01:08:34
believe there's like goodness to give
01:08:36
and service and and purpose and
01:08:40
when i'm
01:08:41
not aligned with my purpose i do feel
01:08:43
sad right those are my like hardest
01:08:44
moments where
01:08:46
you know if i didn't care about sharing
01:08:48
you know my insights and stuff like i
01:08:50
could be you know somebody who wasn't
01:08:52
happy but i i do things intentionally
01:08:55
and therefore how can you not be happy
01:08:57
doing the things that you love in your
01:08:59
life
01:09:00
so beautiful we have a closing tradition
01:09:02
okay
01:09:04
the previous guest writes a question for
01:09:05
the next guest oh okay and they don't
01:09:07
know who they're writing it for
01:09:10
what is one thing
01:09:12
you would do
01:09:14
if you weren't
01:09:16
afraid
01:09:17
at all
01:09:19
you know it's interesting i'm i like
01:09:21
mentally
01:09:23
i
01:09:24
don't have many things that
01:09:27
i don't feel like i could solve so it's
01:09:28
like not mental i i probably have more
01:09:30
physical things because i'm such a small
01:09:32
per like i'm 411 right it's like it's an
01:09:35
interesting thing because
01:09:36
i feel more physically fearful of things
01:09:39
than i do actually you know what i would
01:09:41
do i would do
01:09:43
i would run a marathon
01:09:46
interesting
01:09:47
i love running i just have never run
01:09:49
that you're afraid
01:09:51
i'm not probably not afraid but
01:09:55
potentially i'd have to work through
01:09:56
what's holding me back from it but maybe
01:09:58
there is some fear
01:10:00
i'm gonna pay attention see if you end
01:10:01
up running a marathon thank you so much
01:10:03
for your time and your wisdom it's so
01:10:05
you're such a breath of fresh air for so
01:10:06
many reasons but you're a real source of
01:10:08
inspiration and what you've um what
01:10:10
you've accomplished with with class past
01:10:11
is just astounding it really is
01:10:14
astounding and yours like humility and
01:10:15
openness to share the truth about that
01:10:17
not just in the book but but here today
01:10:19
is i'm going to be liberating for a lot
01:10:20
of people and that the whole you know
01:10:22
one of the key lessons i come away with
01:10:24
even though i feel like i
01:10:28
i might have said this if you'd asked me
01:10:30
it's just the unbelievable importance of
01:10:33
having and following that voice inside
01:10:35
of us which is there and all the reasons
01:10:37
we suppress it because of external
01:10:38
whatever whatever but you know um
01:10:42
as as you i was sitting there as you're
01:10:43
talking i was thinking you know what as
01:10:44
well the other thing is like even if you
01:10:47
you try and do something else whether
01:10:48
it's
01:10:49
management consulting whatever you're
01:10:50
never actually going to master it yeah
01:10:52
because it's always going to be a
01:10:54
tedious job when you ended up mastering
01:10:56
the thing that was in line with your
01:10:57
passion and i think that's a really
01:10:58
important lesson to everybody who feels
01:11:00
like they're in a situation now that
01:11:01
might not be in line with that voice
01:11:02
inside right
01:11:04
thank you be the master of you a man
01:11:06
yeah you're brilliant thank you so much
01:11:07
for your thank you thanks for having me
01:11:09
stephen i had a few words to say about
01:11:10
one of my sponsors on this podcast as
01:11:12
the seasons have begun to change so
01:11:14
how's my diet and um
01:11:16
right now i'm going to be completely
01:11:17
honest with you i'm starting to think a
01:11:19
lot about
01:11:20
slimming down a little bit because over
01:11:22
the last couple of probably the last
01:11:24
four or five months my diet has been
01:11:25
pretty bad um and it started to show a
01:11:28
little bit really over the last two
01:11:29
months i go to the gym about 80 of the
01:11:31
time so i track it with 10 of my friends
01:11:33
in a whatsapp group and this tracker
01:11:34
online that we all use together we call
01:11:37
it fitness blockchain and i'm currently
01:11:39
at 81 percent um so 81 of the days i've
01:11:43
done a workout in the last 150 days
01:11:46
right so i'm going to the gym about six
01:11:48
times a week
01:11:50
that's been a little bit impacted by the
01:11:51
derivative live tour but i'm trying to
01:11:53
stick to it
01:11:54
and so one of the things i'm doing now
01:11:55
to reduce my calorie intake and trying
01:11:58
to get back to being nutritionally
01:11:59
complete and all i eat is i'm having the
01:12:02
heel protein shake thank you hill for
01:12:04
making a product that i actually like
01:12:06
the salted caramel is my favorite i've
01:12:07
got the banana one here which is the one
01:12:08
my girlfriend likes but for me salted
01:12:11
caramel is
01:12:12
the one
01:12:14
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foreign
01:12:24
[Music]
01:12:34
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