Redefining Success

In this episode, Dawn Baker reads Chapter 8 of Lean Out: A Professional Woman's Guide to Finding Authentic Work-Life Balance. This chapter is titled, Redefining Success. 

You will learn how to identify your values and priorities, and how to be an authentic leader. When you lean out, you are a leader - even if you don't feel like one.

** The Lean Out Confidence Course is here!! ** Check it out by clicking this link. Use the code CONFIDENT to receive $100 off all course options for a limited time.

Get in touch with Dawn:

• Website - practicebalance.com
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• LinkedIn - Dawn L Baker MD
• Book - Lean Out

Transcript

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Welcome to the lean out podcast. I'm your host, Dr. Don baker. Are you looking for a new approach to finding authentic and sustainable work-life balance? You've come to the right. Place. For inspiration. information. and a community. community. of like-minded. Professionals. Let's get to the show. Hello. Hello. Thanks for being here this week. I'm bringing you chapter eight of my book, lean out a professional woman's guide, defining authentic work life balance. This chapter's title is redefining success of the many topics and points I could have included in my book. I felt this was an important concept that most people agree with cognitively, but don't actually practice in real life. In fact, I've also included it as one of the lessons in my new Lean Out Confidence course. If you like what you hear in today's episode, it's only skimming the surface. So go check out the course for more in depth information and exercises on this and other important topics. You can find the course at practicebalance. com slash courses. I'm currently running an introductory offer. And if you use the code confident, that's c o n f i d e n t, you can get 100 off all the different course options. One of my life secrets is you don't have to have it all, do it all, be it all, or buy it all. To be accomplished and successful. How do you figure out what success means for you? I mean, there are literally an infinite number of ways that you can define success, yet we often use very common metrics, money, status, titles, etc. And I think a lot of this has to do with our tendency to compare ourselves to others and to use mathematic terms to measure things, which of course goes back to primitive times when fitting in and being successful meant survival. In this book chapter that I'm about to read to you, I talk about things you've heard me talk about many times before. Identifying your values, gauging your priorities and how they might change with the seasons, and what it means to be a true leader. I also share the story of Cherie, a good friend of mine, who is still leaning out in new ways to this day. And none of them involve status or traditional success metrics. I hope you enjoy this reading of chapter 8 of Lean Out. Chapter 8, Redefining Success. Success is liking yourself, liking what you do, and liking how you do it. Maya Angelou. For many, success is comprised of two main metrics. Salary and job title. Possessions are often included as well. The reality is there are infinite ways to define success, on both a macro and micro level. You can define success by what is most important to you. Is it based on being in a loving marriage? Having the means to travel wherever you want to go? Making an impact in your career field? Feeling a deep spiritual connection? Adding value to your community? Similar to how the self is not physical attributes, accomplishments, or titles, see chapter 6, success is definitely not linear. Rarely does success in any pursuit come without some amount of failure. Setbacks, plateaus, and slow patches are easy to identify in pursuits like sports, but for some reason, we often expect our work lives to resemble a steady linear climb. Even Sheryl Sandberg noted in Lean In that careers are a jungle gym, not a ladder. Not brutal. If your idea of success includes suffering and beating yourself up in the process, You need to leave behind the martyr mindset that's so deeply ingrained in the lean in culture. Most people will agree that good health is at the foundation of everything we might want to do. Thus, true success cannot come at the cost of well being and self care time. Not serious. Life journeys should involve some aspect of fun, even if it's type 2 fun. Are you successful if you're not enjoying what you're doing? Ask a typical doctor, lawyer, or other hard driving professional what they do for fun, and you might get a blank stare. Yet these are people who are traditionally thought of as successful, not absolute. Any woman who would have the interest to pick up this book should recognize that she is already in the top 1 percent of how most people define success. Success is relative to the observer, is a moving target, and should be constantly redefined based on circumstances. I like to envision success as a circular pie with many slices. All the slices are different sizes. Health might be a very large chunk of the pie, while having a sense of purpose also takes up a big piece. Salary and job title make up diet sized slivers. I'm not even sure stuff deserves a piece of the pie. Additional pieces might represent relationships, finances, or other things. It all depends on what you really value. Identifying your values. Your values lie at the heart of your definition of success. When most people think about values, images of church or family come to mind. However, values are much more than beliefs about morality. Values are root principles that guide our actions and behaviors in a wide range of circumstances. Examples include autonomy, creativity, and health. The concept of values is quite simple, but identifying and consistently living by them might not be easy. In a word or two, they represent what we each consider to be most important. Values can change over time based on life's different seasons, but they tend to be fairly constant principles. They form an internal compass that affects both everyday decisions and long term directions. You can find many lists of values online, but I've included one in the resources section of this book. You can also find clues to your values by asking yourself some questions. What kinds of relationships do you have and want in your life? What inspires you? If you had infinite money and resources, what would you do? What do you want to be known for? What pulls at your heartstrings? Forget comparison. Through his social science research on high achievers, Author and professor Arthur C. Brooks has realized that outwardly successful people often continue the patterns that earned them success while inadvertently detracting from their own happiness. He talked of interviewing a very successful businesswoman who admitted to having a loveless marriage, empty relationships with her adult children, newly diagnosed health problems, and poor sleep. He asked her why, as a billionaire CEO of her own company, she doesn't fix those problems by changing her schedule to make them a priority. After a moment of thought, she said, I guess I'd prefer to be special than happy. This is success, addiction, and ultimate entrenchment on the treadmill of achievement. The hidden costs often occur behind the scenes. The glossy social media photos and curated posts. Why compare yourself to this? If you agree with my assertion that there are many different definitions of success, why would you compare how you're doing to others? When we base success on intrinsic factors like self identified values, we avoid the comparison trap of the worldly success metrics. Money, power, and recognition. Eleanor Roosevelt said, No one can make you feel inferior without your consent. If you believe you're successful and are clear on how you define it, you will also avoid measuring yourself against others. The Changing Seasons In the middle of my residency, I had my first coaching experience. I met my coach when I was seriously ill and didn't know it yet, questioning why I had chosen to upend my life and pursue medicine. He was an executive coach and was married to my faculty mentor. She graciously arranged for us to work together for a few sessions. Due to his relationship to one of my superiors, I initially hid my burnout and intermittent thoughts of quitting altogether to become a Starbucks barista. Instead, I flooded him with all sorts of conflicting ideas. What do I really want to do when I finish residency? I was already doubting the highly specialized path of perioperative echocardiography I had jumped on. I knew I wanted my work life to have vast variety, with a mix of patient care, writing, speaking, and other things not yet identified. All the overwhelm and confusion paralyzed me. Should I pivot entirely and work in a pain clinic? What about just going into private practice? How about non clinical pursuits? What about my other loves, my marriage, which was suffering, travel, and rock climbing? When would I be able to focus on them again? And when would I be able to have a child? My coach looked at me with a smile and said, You can do all these things, but you can't reasonably focus on them all at the same time. This was mind blowing. Up until then, I had an idea in my head that all the successful people I saw around me just hammered at all their endeavors. Maybe some of them do, but not the ones who have sustainable, long term happiness without dysfunctional relationships and burnout. My coach had me construct a chart. I listed important time periods such as now until graduation, first two years out of residency, and next five years down the left column. Across the top, he had me write three headings focus, let slide, ignore all together. I still use this exercise with my own coaching clients, and I pull it out when I'm personally feeling overwhelmed. Work life balance changes with different seasons of your life. One season, you're ramping up a business from scratch, learning a new technology, or completing intensive training in your profession. Social obligations will likely drop off your priority list. The next season might be the year of relationships, where you focus more on your marriage or perhaps an ill loved one you must care for. Another season might be the time to place hard boundaries at work so you can focus on supporting your children's passions. Yet another season might be the time to prioritize your own wellness by setting meeting times in pen with a personal trainer, investing in a yoga meditation retreat, or carving out time every week to prepare your own fresh meals. Very few things in life, besides our age in years, progress as an upward climb toward a pinnacle. Yet, for some reason, we often assume that's the way things will go. As years go by, you'll steadily make more and more money. If you consistently work out in the gym, you'll just keep getting stronger. The reality is that progress in any pursuit ebbs and flows. Thus, our definition of success can also change with the seasons. Authentic leadership. In Lean In, Sheryl Sandberg argued that if more women were in leadership positions, better work life balance policies would exist for all of us. The dream of better policies is a nice one, but the key need is flexibility for individuals. Flexibility will only proliferate in the workplace when women step up as authentic leaders. Traditional leaders command corner offices, make policies, and supervise large teams. But there is also the kind of leader who empowers others merely by setting an example. This is an authentic leader, a person who shows others that it's okay to be human, that boundaries are a gift to herself and others, that forging a new path is possible. She embodies the John Quincy Adams quote. If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more, and become more, you are a leader. An authentic leader also welcomes different visions of work fulfillment and balance, knowing that her definitions might not resonate with others. She fiercely aligns with her personal vision, but accepts the diverse views of others. This is the kind of leadership that will change the culture of hustle and invulnerability. She courageously steps away from the status quo and demonstrates for others that it's possible. She is leading by example. Exercise What are your core values? This exercise is very simple, yet it takes some time and iterative examination to complete. Look at the list of values included in the Resources section. Which words speak to you? Write 10 of these words on a separate paper. This is your working list. On a different day, revisit your list. On another day, narrow your list to five words. Can you narrow the list even further? Having three to five core values is a great place to be. Cherie's Journey. Oh, I'm leaning way out. This is what Cherie replied when I asked if she would be featured in this book, and she wasn't kidding. Cherie goes by two distinct names, Dr. Made a Name and Mrs. Married Name. For almost 15 years, she was solely known as the former, while working as a full time physiatrist and breadwinner for her family in a moderately sized mountain town. After a conflict over compensation for clinical services, she left her hospital based small group to work at a skilled nursing facility. Again, when leadership experienced an upheaval, I knew there would be changes coming. So I started looking for other options. She transitioned to travel only work as a locum tenens physiatrist, which took her all over the country for her assignments. When COVID hit, my work evaporated overnight, she said. At the same time, she noticed that she really enjoyed being home with her family more than she thought she would. Her two daughters were entering their teens, a difficult time for a parent to be away. When an opportunity to fill a position as a long term substitute math teacher came up at her daughter's school, she said yes. This was not an immediate hell yes. In fact, she wasn't so sure she'd like teaching. Her husband thought she was crazy for doing it. But she decided it would be a fun experiment. She completed another long term assignment as an English teacher and now works as a regular sub for the school. In addition, she coaches the cross country team and started the school's first personal finance club. Now that locum work has ramped up again nationwide, Cherie travels for a few clinical assignments here and there. She also performs disability evaluations for the U. S. Department of Veterans Affairs and expert witness work for a couple of loyal law firms. In addition, she and her husband own a couple of small businesses and real estate investments. On the surface, it seems like Cherise got her hands full. I did not think I had it in me to be that mom, she said of her transformation from being known as Doctor to Mrs. She does not carry reservations about frequently putting her role as a physician aside. In medicine, we learn to talk to lots of different people. We learn to hold space for people. She's doing that now as a mentor to teenagers in her local town. How has Cherie been able to embrace so much uncertainty and try entrepreneurial ventures, different medical business models, and even substitute teaching as part of her journey? I immersed myself in the FI, Financial Independence, space between 2009 and 2012, she said. By following early FI bloggers J. D. Roth of Get Rich Slowly and Pete of Mr. Money Mustache, she gained inspiration that it was possible to embrace minimalism and find financial freedom. She also found camaraderie and advice from the nationwide FI community at conferences and retreats, which she continues to attend yearly. On navigating financial uncertainty, Cherie advises other women wanting to lean out that Money is only the most important thing if you don't have enough of it. She encourages other women to recognize what enough means for them. They have the ability to live on less, if necessary, to get the life they want. You have a skill set. You are already resilient. For as long as I've known her, Cherie has designed her life through experimentation. She's been a part of multiple small business ventures, including her husband's base jumping guide business and a lactation cookie company. While she continues to wonder if she's finally found her thing, her calling, her purpose. She's never been happier with her current blend of teaching, clinical work, mentoring, and being a mom. Ten years ago, I was so unhappy. I felt like I was drowning, she said. This has been so much fun. I'm so much happier than when I was in the hospital every day. Thanks for listening to the lean out podcast. If you find these conversations inspiring and useful, please forward them to a friend and also leave a review on iTunes or Spotify so that other people can find them easier. If you want to get in touch with me, you can find me at my website, practice balanced.com, where you can subscribe to my newsletter and get updates regularly about new podcast episodes, blog posts, speaking, engagements, and coaching services. You can also support my work by buying my book, lean out a professional woman's guide to finding authentic work-life balance for yourself, a friend, family member, or coworker. Have a great day and we'll see you next