How does one transform from a high-powered corporate executive to a free-spirited nomad? Jenny shares her incredible journey from a life driven by seriousness and fear to one led by heartfulness and play. She shares her early years in an emotion-suppressing family and her rise in the corporate world, where she felt increasingly disconnected from her true self.
Jenny Lincoln is a story-weaving sorceress and wise nomadic sage. With 30+ years in the Corporate trenches, Jenny balances authority with gentleness, serving truth with love & grace. Her talks are lightning bolts to your heart & soul, igniting you into action! Jenny is the visionary behind HUMNAV ~ the HUMan NAVigation Practice—your inner GPS for all things leadership.
We discuss the need for personal and professional disruption, exploring how breaking away from comfort zones can lead to tremendous growth. Using examples from early online media's disruption of traditional industries and the evolving role of artificial intelligence, we discuss the importance of embracing change. Jenny also shares her career transformation from finance to psychology and behavioural coaching, fueled by a desire for more human-centred work and fulfillment.
Emotions are at the heart of our final discussions, as we navigate through loss, grief, and transformation themes. Jenny shares her experience of hitting rock bottom and finding a way back to self-love and purpose, likening her journey to a caterpillar's metamorphosis into a butterfly. We also highlight the concept of the "sage age" and the empowering journey of turning 60, emphasizing the importance of heart in professional roles. How Jenny reconnected with her empathic nature through a nomadic lifestyle and how embracing internal feedback and intuition has liberated her to live authentically.
To connect with Jenny: https://jennylincoln.com/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Daniela SM (00:04):
Hi, I'm Daniela.
Welcome to my podcast, becauseEveryone has a Story, the place
to give ordinary people'sstories the chance to be shared
and preserved.
Our stories become the languageof connections.
Let's enjoy it.
Connect and relate, becauseeveryone has a story.
Relate because everyone has astory.
(00:32):
Welcome.
My guest is Jenny Lincoln.
Jenny is a story weavingsorceress and a wise nomadic
sage, and I will also add thatshe's an insightful speaker.
Being uncomfortable createswonderful new beginnings.
This is one of the many nuggetsin Jenny's story today.
Once a high power executive,jenny now embraced a life led by
(00:52):
her heart and play.
In this episode, she shares herpowerful story of breaking free
from the corporate world,discovering her true self and
becoming a wise nomadic leaderyes, a nomad.
You know how curious I am aboutthe nomadic lifestyle.
(01:13):
It was so insightful to spendtime with Jenny.
We could have talked for hours.
She's the visionary behindHuman Nav, demonstrates the
courage to disrupt comfort zones, embrace change and live a life
of purpose and heart.
Let's enjoy her story.
Welcome Jenny to the show.
(01:34):
Thank you, daniela, I'm reallypleased to be here.
Thanks for the invite.
Yes, I'm excited to have a nomadin the podcast.
So, jenny, why do you want toshare your story?
Jenny Lincoln (01:45):
Living a nomadic life after being in corporate.
There is just so manyfundamental transformations that
I've gone through that I seepeople kind of stuck in the
middle of right now.
Two in particular are incorporate.
I was very kind of head-led,very serious and kind of surly
(02:09):
powerful business exec and I'dlost my love of play and
heartfulness and all of that.
And so you know, I've had thiswhole rediscovery of kind of
moving from fear and anger andseriousness to being led by my
heart.
And you know, I think the otherthing that my story illustrates
is the power of everything thathappens around us and also
(02:33):
within us, like our emotions.
Everything is feedback, and soyou know we're actually being
supported and being given allsorts of wonderful information
to guide us.
We have this amazing guidance,internal guidance system.
So they're the two things thatI really want to share through
my story and give someliberation and freedom to
(02:54):
everyone that's listening.
Daniela SM (02:55):
Great, thank you.
I'm looking forward to this.
Jenny, when does your storystart?
Jenny Lincoln (03:01):
The nomadic adventure and journey started 10
years ago, so I've been nomadicfor a decade now.
My corporate journey startedback in the 1980s.
Can everyone remember back then?
Daniela SM (03:12):
Yes, yes, yes, it's not that old.
Jenny Lincoln (03:16):
The combination of the two are really powerful.
So there's kind of two books tome and I'm probably in my third
one now where I bring the twotogether.
Daniela SM (03:24):
You said you were corporate.
You lost kind of like yourplaying and smiling because you
were focused on that.
But you seem to be a typepersonality.
So how were you when you wereyounger?
I mean, what was a combinationof both of these times or what
happened?
Jenny Lincoln (03:41):
Well, actually it's a really interesting story.
That story is the seed of atalk that I'm giving in two days
time which is called Leadingfrom the Lens of Love
Reprogramming for Growth.
And I actually started my lifeas a very fun-loving, smiling,
sensitive.
I'm definitely an empath andback then I felt everything,
(04:03):
every single thing, that I wasborn into a really commercial
family which didn't do emotionsand feelings.
They were considered to be aweakness, also a family where it
was very masculine, verymale-dominated, and women were
seen as feeble spirits kind of.
(04:24):
And so I made a vow very earlyin my life to not be stomped
upon or treated like a doormat,like I saw some of the female
generations getting done in myfamily.
So I kind of chose to be theaggressor myself.
So I took on that serious powerwelding role at a pretty early
(04:47):
age.
Daniela SM (04:47):
Is that easy to do?
I guess survival mode you canchange.
You can be more yourpersonality.
Jenny Lincoln (04:53):
Well, I think it's when everything around you
is supporting that, like whenemotions are considered to be
frivolous or weak or just not avalued currency.
It's kind of smacked out of you.
You're conditioned that way.
That conditioning, andcertainly the conditioning that
I had during my school years,led me to the desire to work in
(05:18):
corporate, because I think I sawthat one.
I wanted to model myself on myfather because he was powerful.
And secondly, I think corporategave me a structure where I
could continue all those defensemechanisms without me having to
be consciously doing it all thetime.
So I think I was drawn to thatenvironment because of that.
Daniela SM (05:39):
But you succeeded.
Maybe not everybody could havehad the same success.
They could have moldedthemselves to a personality that
they are not necessarily nottheir strength.
But you just actually went allthe way until you realized well,
I want to change.
Jenny Lincoln (05:55):
Yeah, absolutely, and I think part of that
somewhere in there.
As a kid I thought it was alife and death situation, Like I
wasn't threatened with life ordeath, but as a child you kind
of work out.
Well, I'm not accepted as thatversion of me, but I get rewards
for being a different versionof me, so I will move hell and
high water to be that version.
(06:16):
It's interesting that likeprobably 40 to 50 years of my
life, I was seeking approval formy father, even though he
wasn't still alive.
I was seeking approval outsideof me and trying to comply with
being the good girl, being toughand strong and capable and
(06:37):
business orientated and all ofthat.
And it really wasn't until Iwent off and started to become a
nomad that I reconnected withmy heart and I realized the
power of open-hearted andintuitive leadership.
And so now that's kind of whereI've gone and that's my true
essence.
I think everyone has that trueessence.
Daniela SM (06:57):
Yeah, quite interesting, because you were
saying that you see that I couldbe accepted if I am this way.
Some other people could havebeen rebellious against it and
still keep themselves.
You, however, were able to mold, to adapt, to survive.
Jenny Lincoln (07:13):
Yes, I think so, and don't get me wrong, I went
through my rebellious stages.
Each of those rebellious stageswere powerful, pivots in my
life, certainly as a teenager.
My response was I actuallystopped working at school.
So I started to fail everything.
I was disinterested in schoolbecause they didn't have any
business subjects.
When I was back in those days,all I wanted to do was be a
(07:36):
business exec and so I thoughtwhat's the point?
I'm not going to waste my timedoing all these silly subjects
that I'm not going to use.
Of course, that bites you inthe end when you go to leave
school and do your final examsand you don't get very good
grades.
So I repeated my final year soI could get grades to go and do
my business degree.
(07:56):
So that taught me a powerfullesson around, I suppose
discipline and doing what I hadto do.
So I did both.
I definitely did arc up and playrebel, and it's really
interesting because I went fromsix or seven years of not really
failing to when I got intobusiness and started doing my
business degree.
I got straight highdistinctions.
(08:17):
It was all about what wasrelevant and what I wanted to be
.
So that's a powerful lessonabout.
You know you need to.
Whatever you're doing needs tomarry up with your sense of
purpose at the time.
And also my parents were goingthrough a divorce and that was
my way of getting attention.
You know to be the disruptor,but it's interesting that that
(08:39):
was an early sign of somethingthat's innate within me I am a
disruptor and I'm a purposefuldisruptor.
Now I disrupt for change andfor evolution and so my clients
hire me as a disruptor.
But not stomping down corridorsback in school and making you
know noise.
Different type of disruptionmeaningful, purposeful
(09:02):
disruption.
Daniela SM (09:04):
I am interested in that.
How do you know?
How do you become a constructeddisruptor?
Jenny Lincoln (09:09):
That's a really good question.
I like that one.
When I was a destructivedisruptor, it came for the
purpose.
It was, if you look at thepurpose of it, one I was seeking
attention, and so I wasmotivated by things outside of
me.
I was seeking attention and soI was motivated by things
outside of me.
The obvious difference as aconstructive disruptor is that I
(09:31):
disrupt to grow, and that comesinitially within me, right, so
I will consciously disruptsomething and shake something up
in my environment when I seeit's an old version of myself
and it's no longer serving me,and so that helps shake things
up.
So I think that's one reallyimportant factor.
(09:53):
And I think the second one isbeing a constructive disruptor
is more about building andreinvention, whereas when I was
in a destructive disruptor, Iwas doing real damage, not just
to myself but the people aroundme.
Daniela SM (10:11):
Yes, you said that your clients hire you to be a
disruptor.
So how do you became that Like?
I mean, I know we're jumping inno order here Well, I think
certainly for me, the pennydropped that.
Jenny Lincoln (10:24):
It's that classic analogy of you can't bake a
cake without breaking eggs.
Some of the challenges that weface in our own personal
development and the evolution inbusiness and the
entrepreneurial kind of journey,we get stuck in our ways.
We get stuck on our comfy, onthe couch, in our comfort zones.
(10:45):
Sometimes we won't initiate thechange, we won't initiate the
reinvention, we won't initiatetaking a new path or pivot, and
so what happens is it's thatwhole thing of uncomfortable
ends create wonderful newbeginnings, and so I think I
(11:05):
started to see the connectionthat there's a certain element
of where you need to be your owndisruptor and then there's
actually powerful ways to dothat in business.
Let me give you an example.
Back when online was starting, Iwas working in the print media
(11:27):
back in Australia and the firstthing that online did was it
threatened.
All of our print classifieds,all the ads for car sales, home
sales, real estate sales and forjobs, employment, all used to
be in print, you know, in yournewspapers, and that's the only
(11:48):
way you could find a job, find acar or find a home right, and
with online, all of that gotthreatened.
That's billions of dollarsacross so many companies.
One of the valuable lessons Ilearned in business then was
that if we had done that well,we would have cannibalized our
(12:10):
own business.
We would have disrupt our ownbusiness purposefully, with
strategic intention, rather thanit being hunted by all these
new startups in online.
But our executive team was tooscared, it was fear-based and it
decided that it said no,online's not a real threat.
(12:31):
We're not going to losebillions of dollars and you know
, within 18 months we lostbillions of dollars.
So sometimes you've got tofollow some of the Hindu you
know.
Have you heard of Shiva thedestroyer?
No, he's.
You know one of the deities.
You sometimes have to do somedestruction to clear the space,
(12:54):
just like a storm.
Sometimes we need to clear offthe dead wood from trees.
We need to clear all the spaceout so that we can have rebirth
and new growth.
Daniela SM (13:06):
Yes, the story is similar to the artificial
intelligence nowadays, right,Like when people are worried
about all that.
And actually I had an episodethat I posted recently and the
lady she's a voiceover she mightthings have changed, but the
way she put it is like whenpeople need a voice, they are
going to say, well, I have theluxury to have a real human.
(13:27):
If you cannot afford it, thenyou are using artificial
intelligence, and then you gofor that diamond, she said, and
I thought, oh my God, that'sjust like the perfect way of
seeing progress, because it'salways like that.
You can avoid it, you cancomplain if you're old, and oh
my God, things were betterbefore and the truth is that
(13:48):
we're getting old.
Everything always gets movedforward.
That's pretty interesting thatyou see it that way too.
Jenny Lincoln (13:55):
It is, and I agree.
I think AI is a wonderfulopportunity in so many different
ways.
And, yes, it just means thateverything's going to change
form and we're going to saygoodbye to some things, old
forms and old ways.
And you know, as humans, we getattached, we like to attach to
things, and you know one of theuniversal laws is the law of
(14:18):
impermanence.
Things come together and thenthey fall apart, and so this is
a normal part of evolution, butwe fight it tooth and nail as
humans, because we don't like tolet things go.
When I look at AI, I look at theopportunity for us to be more
human, which I know soundsparadoxical because we're using
AI, but what we do is that wecan allow AI to do the patent
(14:43):
work, the jobs that don'tnecessarily require the human
touch.
That means, like your otherguests you were talking about,
she can position herself in apremium situation.
I'm all about behavior and thehuman experience For me.
I rub my hands together and Ithink, wow, we can move away
(15:05):
from being so task driven andspend more time in the richness
of being humans and dealing withthe human element, you know,
and the human experience.
For me, it's a powerful shiftfrom the doing, which many of us
hide behind I've been guilty ofthat to the being space.
Who you be, and that's reallyimportant, I think as role
(15:27):
models and leaders incommunities and business, in
families, as matriarchs andpatriarchs.
Daniela SM (15:32):
Yeah, I agree, that's very well put.
So, jenny, you mentioned theword attachments.
Let's go back a little bit.
So you were in the corporateworld succeeding.
Explain a little bit what youwere doing and how did you
change.
Jenny Lincoln (15:45):
Yeah, okay.
Well, you know, for a largeportion of my corporate life I
was in finance and strategy, soI ran finance departments.
I was the numbers person thattook me into kind of mergers and
acquisitions work as well.
So I used to buy and selldifferent parts of companies and
reconstruct them anddeconstruct them and all that
(16:06):
sort of stuff as well.
It was after this brutalexperience and when our
leadership team turned aroundand said, you know, made up all
the excuses and said no, it'snot going to happen and all that
sort of stuff, and our shareprice plummeted and all that I
ended up having to run a projectthat ripped out about $100
(16:28):
million, included retrenchmentof a lot of people.
After that I thought, you knowwhat?
I can't do this anymore.
I need to retrain as something.
So that's when I retrained inbasic psych and became a
behavioralist and a coach and aprofiler and all of that.
So I started.
So I moved away from financeand strategy.
(16:50):
So someone said to me, what'saccounting got to do with the
work you do now?
And I said, well, I've gonefrom balancing the books to
balancing hearts and minds now.
So that brutal experience waswhat gave me the focus and the
desire to make a big change.
Otherwise my attachment to allthe mastery that I had developed
(17:13):
logically didn't make sense.
And everyone that I went andsaw in management you know, in
all my leadership team and somany people said you're too old
to like too old I was like 30s,you know to change your career
and to get retrained and Ithought, bugger that.
So again it kind of fired me up.
(17:33):
I jumped in and retrained.
Daniela SM (17:35):
You were in your 30s and then you decided to
change.
But did you quit the job thatyou were having, or you just
slowly started to do somethingat the same time?
Jenny Lincoln (17:42):
I stayed with them so that they could pay for
it all.
That's a bit naughty, okay,clever, but they got the
benefits of it.
And then, when I was fullyretrained, then I left and
started doing consulting on myown and eventually I became
nomadic.
Sometimes we need these thingsto really tilt us or tip us out
(18:03):
of our comfort zones.
I don't see myself steppingaway and turning my back on all
my finance and strategy work ifit hadn't been for that brutal
experience and also, in myupbringing, my family.
You didn't quit, you know, andso that was perceived as
quitting.
But you know, I don't see it asquitting.
I see it as being readingyourself, reading the signs and
(18:28):
realizing it's time to you know,take a totally different path
and pivot, and sometimes thatpivot takes you in exactly the
opposite direction, which iswhat it took me.
Daniela SM (18:37):
But that means that you were a human, because it
affected you.
Some people are doing your joband they are ruthless.
Jenny Lincoln (18:43):
Yeah, oh, I was ruthless.
You know, back in those days Iwalk into someone's office and
people would start crying.
I can imagine, and as awful asit was, it gives me an insight,
Like now as an open-heartedloving.
You know I'm just a giant lovebug now but I can still be
(19:08):
assertive and firm.
I'm not ruthless and heartlessand cold.
You know my own sense of selfand keeping other people's
integrity and themselves intactis far more important to me.
You know, leading through thelens of love with that soft
strength of open-heartedness andintuitiveness to me I find that
far more successful than beinga ballbreaker, because it's like
(19:29):
a soothing balm.
When you're a ballbreaker, halfthe time you're just pouring
kerosene on the situation.
Daniela SM (19:34):
But the truth is that the job that you did had to
be done.
I mean, there is places thatyou have to go and things need
to change and people need tolose jobs and it's heartbreaking
, but it needs to happen andthose people will survive or
will find another job.
Somebody has to make thedecision.
Jenny Lincoln (19:53):
Yes, yes, but I would do it very differently now
than how I did it.
Daniela SM (19:58):
Is there a different way?
I don't think that there is adifferent way to let people in
half of the company, to let themgo.
Jenny Lincoln (20:05):
There's degrees of brutalness.
Do you know what I mean?
You can be more constructiveand heart-based with really
tough, difficult situations anddecisions.
And, yes, we have these realcommercial and economic needs to
keep changing and redefiningwhat a business looks like.
But if you do that with aheart-based approach, you can
(20:29):
have those difficultconversations differently.
You do them with empathy, likeyou were talking to, and
understanding, and you also lookat what have we got, what is
the natural genius of thisperson and how can we utilize it
.
And if we can't utilize itwithin our organization, within
the restructuring, then how canwe support that person to
(20:53):
getting something just as goodor better?
So I think it's a differentapproach to me.
So the how is different and Ithink the outcome is different
and the energy is very different.
Daniela SM (21:04):
Have you thought about teaching that to the
people that still have to do it?
Jenny Lincoln (21:08):
different and I think the outcome is different
and the energy is very different.
Have you thought about teachingthat to the people that still
have to do it?
Yeah, I have.
Actually, I believe I wouldlove to help and to get back
into, to change management fromthe point of view that I would
love for people.
I think one of the first thingsthat needs to happen when you're
changing anything in anorganization is to sit people
down and have a conversation, adifficult conversation around
(21:31):
helping them to understand whattheir fear of loss is, because
to me, the fear of loss is whatunderlines everything we say.
We have fear of uncertainty andwe have fear of failure and all
of that, but what's the bottomline under that?
The fear of failure is like oh,I'm going to look like a goose,
you know.
So that's losing face, losingego, you know, losing money.
(21:52):
Everything comes back to loss,perceived loss, and so I think
you know when you can havepowerful conversations and get
people to be open about andreflective about.
Well, what am I thinking I'mgoing to lose with this
restructuring?
Okay, I might lose my influence, I might lose my job, I might
lose my power, I might lose mycar park, which is right next to
(22:14):
the elevator.
I might lose my title, and allof these things attach to how we
define ourselves.
So I think there's a secondpiece that needs to be done,
which is to show people they aremore than just the things that
they have and do.
It's the whole, what I call thebe do have model.
They're a human being.
We're not human doings, and yetwe are so defined by what we do
(22:35):
and what we have.
I see you're smiling.
Daniela SM (22:39):
Yes, I mean this is a subject that is really in my
mind constantly, in every level.
And then you mentioned the wordlost.
I was using grieving and youknow we always talk about
grieving as a I've lost someone,but it's actually so many
things that you lose that you'reattached to that.
(23:00):
We think that they are part ofus Every time.
If I lost a job, when I havelost a job, it is hard because
you feel really like a loser.
Even when there was thepandemic, I knew that I was
going to be laid off.
I understood it, but then, whenthe day that I was tall which
(23:20):
lasted two days anyway theycalled me back immediately but I
was like not again, and youfelt that lost.
And so I feel like it's notenough conversations about it in
every level the job, becauseyou think that you are the title
.
The husband because you thinkthat you are a wife.
You know your kids when theygrow up and they want to do
(23:42):
their own life.
You're also now not the momanymore, you know, and so many
things that you're attached to,even wanted or not wanted.
People need to talk more aboutthat subject.
Jenny Lincoln (23:54):
I totally agree with you, daniela.
Agree with you, daniela.
I think it's a really importantconversation because, at the
end of the day, so many of ourdecisions come back to this fear
of loss.
We've got a lot of peopleoperating and living their lives
from the space of fear and itcomes back to how they identify
(24:15):
themselves.
If we could demonstrate thatyou are more than your words and
actions and your thoughts andbeliefs and even your value set,
you know you are more than allof that.
The essence of who you be isthe most important thing.
Things coming and then going isactually a natural part.
You know us holding on to them.
(24:36):
We're actually working againstthe law of physics.
You know us holding on to them,we're actually working against
the law of physics.
You know the universal laws, soof course it's going to we.
That's why humanity struggles,because we're trying to operate
against a fundamental law andprinciple that things come
together and then they fallapart, and we don't want them to
.
And so instead, instead ofseeing them as loss, we see them
(24:59):
as opportunity and evolution.
And if we can break some of theattachments we have, then that
transition, which is the icky,sticky part that people get lost
in and sometimes they need tocome out of.
Daniela SM (25:13):
But I think it's harder than that.
I intellectually can understandall that that you say.
I have my brain, or maybe 90 isclear about all this.
You know, I can of courseunderstand it, but there is the
emotions and as long as we'rehumans and we have emotions,
this sense of lost is alwaysgoing to be, there, is going to
creep in between the logic andthe intellectual understanding
(25:38):
of it Totally.
Jenny Lincoln (25:39):
I agree, I agree.
So I think the third piece islooking at our emotions
differently, and so, for me, Isee our emotions as our
energetic emailing system.
You know, we're hooked Again,we have an attachment to the
positive ones and we try anddelete the negative ones or we
send them to trash.
You know, we never read them.
I prefer to think of emotionsas treble and bass.
(26:02):
We all everyone loves music,and when we have treble and bass
, we get this beautifulsynthesis of sound.
And to me, emotions the thetreble and and bass aspects of
emotions, instead of positiveand negative, are powerful
streams of information, andbeing authentic with your
emotions and then knowing how tobe with them and then knowing
(26:26):
how to unpack them so that youcan get the messages, is really
powerful, and I think we need tolook at that in a different way
to how we've looked at itbefore.
Daniela SM (26:35):
Yes, you are giving me a lot of and realize that
treating people with like themost human way that they can and
the grieving subjects are twoof the things that are really,
really resonate with me all thetime, so it's something that I
really think I can talk forhours.
So then what happened?
(26:55):
You did all this changing andyou went into coaching and
counseling.
And then what happened?
You did all this changing andyou went into coaching and
counseling, and then whathappened?
Jenny Lincoln (27:02):
Well, I think in the middle of that I fell into a
deep, dark depression.
That was a really icky spacefor me and I wish I had
understood that process.
I realize now that it was areally powerful process of
transmutation.
And everyone talks about thecaterpillar to the butterfly,
(27:23):
but no one talks about theprocess of transmutation that
that caterpillar goes through itwhen it crawls into the cocoon
becomes a pile of goo, it losesform, it loses shape right, it
becomes a little puddle of greenicky goo and it has what I call
a mush moment.
And and I believe we constantlyhave mush moments, which is our
(27:46):
process of transmutation.
And for me, my depression wasactually a deliverance.
I entered at this cold, hard,steely, steely, egoic left brain
, highly successful businessexec, but I came out with an
open heart.
I was transparent again.
I'd found my love, myplayfulness and all of a sudden
(28:11):
I had access to all thispowerful intuitiveness because
I'd let go of all this otherstuff, and so that was a really
powerful state.
That was a really importantpart of my transformation, and
so I would love for people tomaybe look at some of the gnarly
experiences we go through andwe judge as being bad
(28:32):
experiences or we're broken orsomething like that, and maybe
see them as bridges.
Maybe they're bridges to adifferent part of us, you know.
And so depression wasdefinitely a bridge for me not
an enjoyable one, regardless tosay I could never have been the
truth of who I am now withoutgoing through that.
(28:53):
And so I think sometimes, if wejust have a different frame of
reference, a differentperspective I always say freedom
is one perspective away If wecould look at depression and
other things like that as aprocess of metamorphosis or
transmutation, then maybe wecould look at it differently,
maybe we could have greatergratitude and acceptance towards
(29:17):
it, which would lessen ourstruggle, right, and we could
put our energy into going intowhat I call the cocoon room,
treat ourselves with soft eyesand love and gentleness, which
we need, rather than cursingourselves and going, oh, how the
hell am I going to get out ofthis?
I should be better, I should bethis, I should be that.
(29:38):
We should on ourselves all thetime.
Daniela SM (29:40):
Now, with all these technologies, that we get to
listen to more stories and hearall more changes in people.
You always hear I was this way,and now look at me.
They never talked about theprocess, which I feel that
that's the most important thing,because it's very easy to say I
was this and now I that andyou're like, oh, I want to do
that too.
But then when you're stuck inthe process, that is difficult.
That is when people quit.
(30:01):
Nobody shares those momentswhere you're saying you're gooey
and you didn't know what'shappening and so you were
feeling depressed because yeah,it was an emptiness.
Jenny Lincoln (30:12):
I started to head down this road but I was still
empty and I'd get the spark ofinspiration, but then the spark
would go out, it wouldn't hold.
And it was so frustrating.
And I had done so much work onmind mastery, my mind had become
a steely trap.
I was a prisoner in the cellblock of my own mind.
(30:32):
I feel that being in this dark,gnarly space of depression, it
was the only way that I couldfind my open heart.
I just deconstructed myself.
What made it worse was nothingthat used to light me up, lit me
up.
I had a perfectly beautifullife.
I had a beautiful partner who Iloved dearly.
(30:52):
She was so supportive.
I had great friends.
I had a beautiful house.
I lived by the beach.
I had a fantastic life.
But I was just a cesspool ofeverything, everything dark and
gnarly.
That made me detach fromeverything because I withdrew.
But I withdrew with lots ofjudgment and beat myself up and
(31:16):
berated myself to the pointwhere I really wanted to take my
own life.
And then I remember laying onthe floor, because I spent a lot
of time laying on the floor ofmy home office and I was crying
out and I just you know, god,buddha, allah, someone, someone
tell me what to do, because I'mdone.
(31:37):
I'm done, I've made my peace.
I can't do this anymore.
It's just horrendous, it'shorrific.
I cannot because it's soincongruous, because you have
this wonderful life but you justcan't relate to it.
But that is the breaking downof your value set, it's the
breaking down of everything thatyou have constructed yourself
(31:58):
into, down of everything thatyou have constructed yourself
into.
And as I laid on that floor, Iwas like the sun was coming
through my window and I was justenjoying that and then, all of
a sudden, the shaft of life well, I like just it went across my
face, but then it played down tomy heart space and all of a
sudden I just went oh, wow andwow.
And my intuition said, jenny,all you have to do is just
(32:22):
breathe.
That is your sole purpose righthere, right now, just breathe.
And I thought, is that enough?
And my intuition said, yes, itis Just breathe.
And it was like.
That was kind of like I don'tknow.
That was my reboot.
(32:43):
That was my reboot and fromthat moment onwards I place my
focus and my energy in my heartspace.
And so when I'm revolving uphere and I'm the little mouse on
the running in the wheel.
I just re-anchor back into myheart space and I go.
(33:06):
I'm love, I'm love, loving,lovable and loved.
I go back to there and my heartrecalibrates because, you know,
our heart is an intelligencecenter and it's our primary
energy source and it's ourharmonizer.
It gets to recalibrate ourwhole body and our mind can't
recalibrate our mind.
You know, any instrument has tobe recalibrated from outside of
(33:30):
itself, so to speak the mind.
You just get more stuck in it.
So we need the heart to helprecalibrate it, you know.
Coming back to the point youwere saying, these messy moments
are so important, we need totalk about them.
These mush moments are sopowerful because they are how we
rewire ourselves.
I totally rewired my operatingsystem.
(33:52):
It was like going from Windowsto Mac or Mac to Windows.
I went from fear and anger tolove and compassion.
That was my truth.
But I had built such big armory, effectively blew myself up
from the inside out.
We can do that, I think, in amore supportive and a more
(34:13):
managed way.
You don't have to go to thatsame extreme If we look at some
of these catalystic things thatare happening within us and
around us, and we see them asopportunity for metamorphosis
and we look at them with love inour heart, even though at times
you don't feel that you have aheart or that love could even
(34:33):
exist.
But if you could work withpeople that know that, have been
there, done that and hold thatspace for you until you find the
truth of you, that's what weneed more of.
Daniela SM (34:43):
Yes, for sure.
And so then, after that, youquit the job, or when did you
decide to be a nomad?
What happened?
Jenny Lincoln (34:50):
Yeah, well, I did lots of different things, kind
of did some work and, you know,helped a friend start, do a
not-for-profit startup and, youknow, did lots of different
volunteering.
You know I obviously had sometime out as like an unemployed
beach bum.
And then, you know, I used tobox and kick box and one of my
friends was a real estate agentand he said to me do you know
(35:12):
how much you can rent for yourproperty for?
And I went no, how much, tellme.
And he told me I went God, whyam I living in it?
It was permission to gotraveling, packed up the house.
Daniela SM (35:23):
He was a good salesman?
Jenny Lincoln (35:25):
Yeah, he was.
So then he rented my house outfor me and my partner at the
time.
We both started traveling andthat was wonderful.
The rent more than paid for themortgage and what we needed to
travel.
So that's when I became nomadic.
Three months into that, mypartner and I, after 21 years
she was my soulmate, I was hersand we both looked at each other
(35:49):
.
And this is where you know loveisn't true love.
You know when I mean likeunconditionality, that sort of
love.
It's not all unicorns andrainbows.
You have to make some toughdecisions and we kind of woke up
and realized, you know what,maybe we're not partners for
each other going forward, werealized that we needed to grow
(36:10):
beyond the confines of ourrelationship.
We couldn't recalibrate inrelationship and so, you know,
she's still my best friend, wespend time together, but we're
not each other's partnersanymore.
And that was a really toughdecision, but we made that
through the lens of love.
You know, it was freaking hard.
Daniela SM (36:27):
Yes, I can imagine and I hope the travelling wasn't
the issue.
Jenny Lincoln (36:31):
Well, the travelling showed up stuff that
we would not have seen and thatcould have been covered up being
, you know, in having all yourdistractions around you when
you're in your home base.
And like, I'm not saying it'sgoing to happen to everyone
because it doesn't, but ithappened for us that way because
I think we were such loyalists.
There's no way we could haveleft each other.
(36:52):
Do you know what I mean?
It kind of had to happen inthat situation.
Daniela SM (36:57):
Well, you're scaring me now.
No, no, I'm scaring my husband,I mean we've been together for
30 years, and it's true thatwe're best friends as well.
But uh, you know, I don't know,I don't know, we're already so
used to that I cannot evenimagine.
Jenny Lincoln (37:14):
No, look, I don't think that's the case.
I mean lots of people that arenomadic and they it has cemented
their relationships evenfurther.
I just think that was ourdestiny.
And what the point I'm tryingto make is that love isn't
always, you know, fluffy, duffystuff.
No, that's true.
It's having difficultconversations and making
difficult decisions.
You know, when you lead fromthe lens of love and come from
(37:39):
an open heart, then you can havethose sorts of decisions and
things are a little easier.
I think it's never likebreakups and loss and all that
is not easy, but you would knowyourself, with a successful
relationship at 30 years withyour husband, that when you come
to the table open rather thandefensive, it's a better
conversation, isn't it?
(38:00):
Yeah?
Daniela SM (38:01):
what was the most difficult part of when you
started the nomadic life?
Jenny Lincoln (38:04):
there was no difficult part starting a
nomadic life.
Daniela SM (38:10):
Really Wow, not even like material stuff or like
having a nice bed or somethinglike that.
Jenny Lincoln (38:15):
Yeah, good points .
Actually, that raises twothings.
The difficult part of startingwas the 350 items on my to-do
list.
Okay, you know, and of course II was ex, you know corporate, I
I had a tick list that was anexcel spreadsheet that had, or
(38:36):
project management sheet thathad and I think there was, I
think honestly there was like357 line items.
Oh, my god, I would nevercreate that sort of document now
, it would overwhelm me.
So the logistics we we setourselves a really short
timeframe and just poweredthrough it.
So that was good and because itwas meant to be and it was
(38:57):
aligned, everything justunfolded.
The universe I have a sayingyou go first and the universe
follows.
The universe really supportedus with our exit out into our
new life.
And the funny you say aboutcomfy beds I have one of those
beautiful memory foam pillows.
I had headaches for 18 monthsas my neck and head had to get
(39:20):
used to not having the beautifulsupport that it had had.
I laugh, but it was awful, itwas actually painful.
Daniela SM (39:30):
You adapt to that too.
Like okay, now you have a houseand you have your toothbrush
and everything is in place.
And then it takes a while, Iguess, until your body's like
okay, I can live with.
Like that, if you have thepersonality, yeah.
Jenny Lincoln (39:43):
I agree.
That's a lovely analogy,daniela.
I think that our neck and ourspine and our backs,
metaphysically, are all aroundsupport.
It's a big thing to becomenomadic.
It is really a big deal, as youknow, because you're in the
throes of it.
What happens is your wholesupport mechanism, not just
yourself, but everything, everyarea of your life changes.
(40:06):
I think my body was physicallyrecalibrating or becoming agile
in a different way.
You know, when you were a kid,did you remember getting growing
pains?
I think as adults, we havethese growing pains, but they're
different.
I think that's part of thediscomfort that we experience
all the time when we step intosomething new.
You know, there were somereally severe growing pains,
(40:29):
becoming unattached, but I feltthem as that they were
liberating, and I felt thefreedom aspect of them, the fact
that I had nothing to takeresponsibility of anymore.
I didn't like we'd set off with20 kilos of stuff.
I now travel with 10.
I only own 10 kilos of stuff.
So what's that?
22 pounds.
Daniela SM (40:49):
Oh, I think it's interesting, right.
So what's that?
22 pounds?
Oh, I think it's interesting,right, because it's true, you
get used to and you think youneed it all and then you start
leaving things behind.
Jenny Lincoln (40:56):
Yeah, but it's this whole thing, it's the whole
.
You travel with physical,tangible things which you are
attached to.
So it's this having aspect,it's changing the having
relationship in the be, do, havemodel.
So you let go of physical,physical things, you become a
minimalist with tangible things.
But you, very soon you startletting go of your emotional
(41:19):
baggage too, because you think,well, I want to just have, you
know, my little physical bag andthen still carry you, you know,
the whole suite of LouisVuitton emotional baggage as
well.
You realize pretty quickly whenyou keep showing up in
different countries and the sameattitude or perspective follows
(41:39):
you and you go oh, I can'tleave that behind.
That's interesting.
Daniela SM (41:44):
Wonderful growth and development.
You mean attitude likecomplaining about something or
something bothers you.
Jenny Lincoln (41:49):
Yeah, yeah, You'll, just because you just
different, things will activateyou and you'll go oh, that's
interesting, that's the samething.
But I've been in five differentcountries.
What is that telling me?
And then you realize, oh, it'sjust an old, outdated view I
have of myself, or it's alimiting belief.
You know that you needsomething and it just shows up
(42:11):
that you don't, and then you canlet it go.
So it's really.
You'll become more minimalistin your mental and emotional
capacity as well.
So it's very, it's really good.
It helps you become more agilethere.
Daniela SM (42:24):
Okay, interesting, thank you.
And then, jenny, all this thingabout being holistic or I don't
know if that's the right wordthat you would use, but being an
A-type personality, how didthat happen?
Jenny Lincoln (42:36):
I think it's what I call the kitchen sink
approach.
It's like kind of you're goingto throw everything into it,
like I did theta healing.
I did like after my depressionand when I found myself residing
more in my heart space.
The most important change forme was getting out of my head
and into my heart, because whenI'm in my head I was revolving
(42:58):
and I don't want to make thehead out to be the bad guy.
It's a really importantintelligence center.
It's, you know I always sayit's our command center.
Our heart is our harmonizer andsource of energy.
And then for me the intuitionis you're in a GPS, but I think
what happens is we tend to useour mind as the GPS, and so I
think this connectivity that wecan have with different
(43:20):
dimensions and with energyhappens when you get out of your
mind because it defies logic,or get out of your left brain in
particular because it's logical.
There's a good book by this lady, jill Bolt Taylor, called my
Stroke of Insight.
She's a neurologist and she hada left brain bleed stroke.
(43:41):
She explains in her book thatwhen her left brain was flooded
she couldn't see where she beganand end and where the bed began
and end.
No one had construct, no onehad outlines, no one had the
table is the table, the bed isthe bed.
(44:02):
You are you, I am me.
It was just a blur of color.
So it shows you that our leftbrains are actually putting the
shape and the detail aroundeverything you know, and so this
kind of supports this wholequantum theory that everything's
just moving molecules.
But if we, if we saw that, we'dprobably freak out.
(44:24):
You'd think something's wrongwith us and we're having a
meltdown, you know so.
So I think it's this art ofgetting out of your head, and I
know people call it mindfulness,but for me every mindfulness
approach actually gets you intoyour heart space.
So to me it's actuallyheartfulness.
So when you get out of yourhead and into your heart and
(44:47):
then you open yourself to beingguided by your intuition, you
break down your limiting beliefsaround those sorts of
connections.
Yeah, we also have a lot oflimiting beliefs around our
subconscious mind and ourconscious mind.
So I've got rid of all the kindof limiting beliefs around oh,
that's lost into the ether, or Ican't recall things in an
(45:10):
instant or any of that.
So you know, we can restructureour minds in that way and open
up the access to ourmulti-sensing dimensions,
because that's how we're made,that's our full potency.
You know, I think it's justtrying lots of different things
and finding what speaks to youyes, I understand, and so
(45:33):
Jenny's.
Daniela SM (45:34):
So I want to ask you who is the real, jenny?
Now, who is that Jenny?
What are you doing and who isthat person?
Who is the real?
Jenny Lincoln (45:42):
Jenny.
Well, she's heart-based, youknow.
She's very open and transparent.
She's got a lot of wisdom thatshe likes to speak about.
Um, and hence my brand now isthe sage from the stage
restarted my speaking careeragain.
Turning 60 was a bit of a reallydifficult thing for me uh, as
(46:04):
it is, I think, for a lot ofpeople, this whole aging
equation thing.
And one of my best friends saidto me you know, some people
don't get to turn 60.
It's a gift.
And I went, wow, that was likea slap in the face.
That was a really good, likewake-up call and I thought, oh,
you know, I'm just in adifferent part of my life.
(46:25):
I'm in what I call my sage age.
So that's when I decided youknow what I'm going to be the
sage from the stage.
So, yeah, so that's what I do.
I have talks around leadingthrough the lens of love and
emotional fitness, you know,being able to read your
emotional emails and how to youknow be authentic with your
(46:46):
emotions and use them as part ofyour guidance.
I do talks around unlocking,you know, the power of
introverts, because I thinkintroverts are forced to act
like extroverts and they'remeasured in that way.
So I think we're doing a lot ofdamage to our introverts.
Yes, and you know I do thingsaround courage camp and rising
(47:08):
from rejection.
And you know, at the end of theday, my big body of knowledge
is called HumNav, that'sH-U-M-N-A-V.
Humnav is the human navigationpractice and that's about you
tapping into your internalguidance and using all these
wonderful support programs thatwe have.
Daniela SM (47:27):
And how did you became a speaker?
Like did you just put yourselfout there and then that happens.
Jenny Lincoln (47:33):
I've done a lot of speaking in my previous
corporate role, but at the endof last year I actually started
work with the delightful andwonderful Tricia Brooke.
She's my speaking coach andshe's actually a Broadway
director and producer, and soit's it's about performance and
(47:55):
she lives in New York, so that'swhy every second month I'm in
New York and so, yeah, I've beendoing a lot of, you know,
conscious and purposeful workaround that and finding gigs and
getting back onto the stage,starting to work with different
communities and differentcompanies to help help, having
(48:15):
the conversations that we'vebeen talking about, emotional
fitness and courage camp andfacing, you know, first aid for
failure and facing your fearsand all these sorts of things,
and that will be under the humnav, umbrella, umbrella.
Okay, I see it as a universityeventually.
Wow, so we'll see.
I don't know how that's goingto happen, but you know it'll
(48:35):
happen some way, yes, and youshould add the lost conversation
, yes.
Daniela SM (48:39):
And how to be human when you do the job that you
used to do before.
Jenny Lincoln (48:43):
Yes, I know, I know Exactly.
Daniela SM (48:50):
There's just so many things to talk about Fire
with humanity, fire with heart.
Thank you, jenny, so much forsharing your story and having
this amazing conversation thatis super insightful and
inspiring.
Jenny Lincoln (49:02):
It was my pleasure, daniela, it's been
absolutely fabulous.
I feel inspired after ourconversation, so thank you for
the opportunity.
Thank you.
Daniela SM (49:10):
I hope you enjoyed today's episode.
I am Daniela and you arelistening to, because Everyone
has a Story.
Please take five seconds rightnow and think of somebody in
your life that may enjoy whatyou just heard, or someone that
has a story to be shared andpreserved.
When you think of that person,shoot them a text with the link
(49:31):
of this podcast.
This will allow the ordinarymagic to go further.
Join me next time for anotherstory conversation.
Thank you for listening.
Hasta pronto you.
Thank you.
Hi, I'm Daniela.
Welcome to my podcast, becauseEveryone has a Story, the place
to give ordinary people'sstories the chance to be shared
and preserved.
Our stories become the languageof connections.
Let's enjoy it.
Connect and relate, becauseeveryone has a story.
Relate because everyone has astory.
(00:32):
Welcome.
My guest is Jenny Lincoln.
Jenny is a story weavingsorceress and a wise nomadic
sage, and I will also add thatshe's an insightful speaker.
Being uncomfortable createswonderful new beginnings.
This is one of the many nuggetsin Jenny's story today.
Once a high power executive,jenny now embraced a life led by
(00:52):
her heart and play.
In this episode, she shares herpowerful story of breaking free
from the corporate world,discovering her true self and
becoming a wise nomadic leaderyes, a nomad.
You know how curious I am aboutthe nomadic lifestyle.
(01:13):
It was so insightful to spendtime with Jenny.
We could have talked for hours.
She's the visionary behindHuman Nav, demonstrates the
courage to disrupt comfort zones, embrace change and live a life
of purpose and heart.
Let's enjoy her story.
Welcome Jenny to the show.
(01:34):
Thank you, daniela, I'm reallypleased to be here.
Thanks for the invite.
Yes, I'm excited to have a nomadin the podcast.
So, jenny, why do you want toshare your story?
Jenny Lincoln (01:45):
Living a nomadic life after being in corporate.
There is just so manyfundamental transformations that
I've gone through that I seepeople kind of stuck in the
middle of right now.
Two in particular are incorporate.
I was very kind of head-led,very serious and kind of surly
(02:09):
powerful business exec and I'dlost my love of play and
heartfulness and all of that.
And so you know, I've had thiswhole rediscovery of kind of
moving from fear and anger andseriousness to being led by my
heart.
And you know, I think the otherthing that my story illustrates
is the power of everything thathappens around us and also
(02:33):
within us, like our emotions.
Everything is feedback, and soyou know we're actually being
supported and being given allsorts of wonderful information
to guide us.
We have this amazing guidance,internal guidance system.
So they're the two things thatI really want to share through
my story and give someliberation and freedom to
(02:54):
everyone that's listening.
Daniela SM (02:55):
Great, thank you.
I'm looking forward to this.
Jenny, when does your storystart?
Jenny Lincoln (03:01):
The nomadic adventure and journey started 10
years ago, so I've been nomadicfor a decade now.
My corporate journey startedback in the 1980s.
Can everyone remember back then?
Daniela SM (03:12):
Yes, yes, yes, it's not that old.
Jenny Lincoln (03:16):
The combination of the two are really powerful.
So there's kind of two books tome and I'm probably in my third
one now where I bring the twotogether.
Daniela SM (03:24):
You said you were corporate.
You lost kind of like yourplaying and smiling because you
were focused on that.
But you seem to be a typepersonality.
So how were you when you wereyounger?
I mean, what was a combinationof both of these times or what
happened?
Jenny Lincoln (03:41):
Well, actually it's a really interesting story.
That story is the seed of atalk that I'm giving in two days
time which is called Leadingfrom the Lens of Love
Reprogramming for Growth.
And I actually started my lifeas a very fun-loving, smiling,
sensitive.
I'm definitely an empath andback then I felt everything,
(04:03):
every single thing, that I wasborn into a really commercial
family which didn't do emotionsand feelings.
They were considered to be aweakness, also a family where it
was very masculine, verymale-dominated, and women were
seen as feeble spirits kind of.
(04:24):
And so I made a vow very earlyin my life to not be stomped
upon or treated like a doormat,like I saw some of the female
generations getting done in myfamily.
So I kind of chose to be theaggressor myself.
So I took on that serious powerwelding role at a pretty early
(04:47):
age.
Daniela SM (04:47):
Is that easy to do?
I guess survival mode you canchange.
You can be more yourpersonality.
Jenny Lincoln (04:53):
Well, I think it's when everything around you
is supporting that, like whenemotions are considered to be
frivolous or weak or just not avalued currency.
It's kind of smacked out of you.
You're conditioned that way.
That conditioning, andcertainly the conditioning that
I had during my school years,led me to the desire to work in
(05:18):
corporate, because I think I sawthat one.
I wanted to model myself on myfather because he was powerful.
And secondly, I think corporategave me a structure where I
could continue all those defensemechanisms without me having to
be consciously doing it all thetime.
So I think I was drawn to thatenvironment because of that.
Daniela SM (05:39):
But you succeeded.
Maybe not everybody could havehad the same success.
They could have moldedthemselves to a personality that
they are not necessarily nottheir strength.
But you just actually went allthe way until you realized well,
I want to change.
Jenny Lincoln (05:55):
Yeah, absolutely, and I think part of that
somewhere in there.
As a kid I thought it was alife and death situation, Like I
wasn't threatened with life ordeath, but as a child you kind
of work out.
Well, I'm not accepted as thatversion of me, but I get rewards
for being a different versionof me, so I will move hell and
high water to be that version.
(06:16):
It's interesting that likeprobably 40 to 50 years of my
life, I was seeking approval formy father, even though he
wasn't still alive.
I was seeking approval outsideof me and trying to comply with
being the good girl, being toughand strong and capable and
(06:37):
business orientated and all ofthat.
And it really wasn't until Iwent off and started to become a
nomad that I reconnected withmy heart and I realized the
power of open-hearted andintuitive leadership.
And so now that's kind of whereI've gone and that's my true
essence.
I think everyone has that trueessence.
Daniela SM (06:57):
Yeah, quite interesting, because you were
saying that you see that I couldbe accepted if I am this way.
Some other people could havebeen rebellious against it and
still keep themselves.
You, however, were able to mold, to adapt, to survive.
Jenny Lincoln (07:13):
Yes, I think so, and don't get me wrong, I went
through my rebellious stages.
Each of those rebellious stageswere powerful, pivots in my
life, certainly as a teenager.
My response was I actuallystopped working at school.
So I started to fail everything.
I was disinterested in schoolbecause they didn't have any
business subjects.
When I was back in those days,all I wanted to do was be a
(07:36):
business exec and so I thoughtwhat's the point?
I'm not going to waste my timedoing all these silly subjects
that I'm not going to use.
Of course, that bites you inthe end when you go to leave
school and do your final examsand you don't get very good
grades.
So I repeated my final year soI could get grades to go and do
my business degree.
(07:56):
So that taught me a powerfullesson around, I suppose
discipline and doing what I hadto do.
So I did both.
I definitely did arc up and playrebel, and it's really
interesting because I went fromsix or seven years of not really
failing to when I got intobusiness and started doing my
business degree.
I got straight highdistinctions.
(08:17):
It was all about what wasrelevant and what I wanted to be
.
So that's a powerful lessonabout.
You know you need to.
Whatever you're doing needs tomarry up with your sense of
purpose at the time.
And also my parents were goingthrough a divorce and that was
my way of getting attention.
You know to be the disruptor,but it's interesting that that
(08:39):
was an early sign of somethingthat's innate within me I am a
disruptor and I'm a purposefuldisruptor.
Now I disrupt for change andfor evolution and so my clients
hire me as a disruptor.
But not stomping down corridorsback in school and making you
know noise.
Different type of disruptionmeaningful, purposeful
(09:02):
disruption.
Daniela SM (09:04):
I am interested in that.
How do you know?
How do you become a constructeddisruptor?
Jenny Lincoln (09:09):
That's a really good question.
I like that one.
When I was a destructivedisruptor, it came for the
purpose.
It was, if you look at thepurpose of it, one I was seeking
attention, and so I wasmotivated by things outside of
me.
I was seeking attention and soI was motivated by things
outside of me.
The obvious difference as aconstructive disruptor is that I
(09:31):
disrupt to grow, and that comesinitially within me, right, so
I will consciously disruptsomething and shake something up
in my environment when I seeit's an old version of myself
and it's no longer serving me,and so that helps shake things
up.
So I think that's one reallyimportant factor.
(09:53):
And I think the second one isbeing a constructive disruptor
is more about building andreinvention, whereas when I was
in a destructive disruptor, Iwas doing real damage, not just
to myself but the people aroundme.
Daniela SM (10:11):
Yes, you said that your clients hire you to be a
disruptor.
So how do you became that Like?
I mean, I know we're jumping inno order here Well, I think
certainly for me, the pennydropped that.
Jenny Lincoln (10:24):
It's that classic analogy of you can't bake a
cake without breaking eggs.
Some of the challenges that weface in our own personal
development and the evolution inbusiness and the
entrepreneurial kind of journey,we get stuck in our ways.
We get stuck on our comfy, onthe couch, in our comfort zones.
(10:45):
Sometimes we won't initiate thechange, we won't initiate the
reinvention, we won't initiatetaking a new path or pivot, and
so what happens is it's thatwhole thing of uncomfortable
ends create wonderful newbeginnings, and so I think I
(11:05):
started to see the connectionthat there's a certain element
of where you need to be your owndisruptor and then there's
actually powerful ways to dothat in business.
Let me give you an example.
Back when online was starting, Iwas working in the print media
(11:27):
back in Australia and the firstthing that online did was it
threatened.
All of our print classifieds,all the ads for car sales, home
sales, real estate sales and forjobs, employment, all used to
be in print, you know, in yournewspapers, and that's the only
(11:48):
way you could find a job, find acar or find a home right, and
with online, all of that gotthreatened.
That's billions of dollarsacross so many companies.
One of the valuable lessons Ilearned in business then was
that if we had done that well,we would have cannibalized our
(12:10):
own business.
We would have disrupt our ownbusiness purposefully, with
strategic intention, rather thanit being hunted by all these
new startups in online.
But our executive team was tooscared, it was fear-based and it
decided that it said no,online's not a real threat.
(12:31):
We're not going to losebillions of dollars and you know
, within 18 months we lostbillions of dollars.
So sometimes you've got tofollow some of the Hindu you
know.
Have you heard of Shiva thedestroyer?
No, he's.
You know one of the deities.
You sometimes have to do somedestruction to clear the space,
(12:54):
just like a storm.
Sometimes we need to clear offthe dead wood from trees.
We need to clear all the spaceout so that we can have rebirth
and new growth.
Daniela SM (13:06):
Yes, the story is similar to the artificial
intelligence nowadays, right,Like when people are worried
about all that.
And actually I had an episodethat I posted recently and the
lady she's a voiceover she mightthings have changed, but the
way she put it is like whenpeople need a voice, they are
going to say, well, I have theluxury to have a real human.
(13:27):
If you cannot afford it, thenyou are using artificial
intelligence, and then you gofor that diamond, she said, and
I thought, oh my God, that'sjust like the perfect way of
seeing progress, because it'salways like that.
You can avoid it, you cancomplain if you're old, and oh
my God, things were betterbefore and the truth is that
(13:48):
we're getting old.
Everything always gets movedforward.
That's pretty interesting thatyou see it that way too.
Jenny Lincoln (13:55):
It is, and I agree.
I think AI is a wonderfulopportunity in so many different
ways.
And, yes, it just means thateverything's going to change
form and we're going to saygoodbye to some things, old
forms and old ways.
And you know, as humans, we getattached, we like to attach to
things, and you know one of theuniversal laws is the law of
(14:18):
impermanence.
Things come together and thenthey fall apart, and so this is
a normal part of evolution, butwe fight it tooth and nail as
humans, because we don't like tolet things go.
When I look at AI, I look at theopportunity for us to be more
human, which I know soundsparadoxical because we're using
AI, but what we do is that wecan allow AI to do the patent
(14:43):
work, the jobs that don'tnecessarily require the human
touch.
That means, like your otherguests you were talking about,
she can position herself in apremium situation.
I'm all about behavior and thehuman experience For me.
I rub my hands together and Ithink, wow, we can move away
(15:05):
from being so task driven andspend more time in the richness
of being humans and dealing withthe human element, you know,
and the human experience.
For me, it's a powerful shiftfrom the doing, which many of us
hide behind I've been guilty ofthat to the being space.
Who you be, and that's reallyimportant, I think as role
(15:27):
models and leaders incommunities and business, in
families, as matriarchs andpatriarchs.
Daniela SM (15:32):
Yeah, I agree, that's very well put.
So, jenny, you mentioned theword attachments.
Let's go back a little bit.
So you were in the corporateworld succeeding.
Explain a little bit what youwere doing and how did you
change.
Jenny Lincoln (15:45):
Yeah, okay.
Well, you know, for a largeportion of my corporate life I
was in finance and strategy, soI ran finance departments.
I was the numbers person thattook me into kind of mergers and
acquisitions work as well.
So I used to buy and selldifferent parts of companies and
reconstruct them anddeconstruct them and all that
(16:06):
sort of stuff as well.
It was after this brutalexperience and when our
leadership team turned aroundand said, you know, made up all
the excuses and said no, it'snot going to happen and all that
sort of stuff, and our shareprice plummeted and all that I
ended up having to run a projectthat ripped out about $100
(16:28):
million, included retrenchmentof a lot of people.
After that I thought, you knowwhat?
I can't do this anymore.
I need to retrain as something.
So that's when I retrained inbasic psych and became a
behavioralist and a coach and aprofiler and all of that.
So I started.
So I moved away from financeand strategy.
(16:50):
So someone said to me, what'saccounting got to do with the
work you do now?
And I said, well, I've gonefrom balancing the books to
balancing hearts and minds now.
So that brutal experience waswhat gave me the focus and the
desire to make a big change.
Otherwise my attachment to allthe mastery that I had developed
(17:13):
logically didn't make sense.
And everyone that I went andsaw in management you know, in
all my leadership team and somany people said you're too old
to like too old I was like 30s,you know to change your career
and to get retrained and Ithought, bugger that.
So again it kind of fired me up.
(17:33):
I jumped in and retrained.
Daniela SM (17:35):
You were in your 30s and then you decided to
change.
But did you quit the job thatyou were having, or you just
slowly started to do somethingat the same time?
Jenny Lincoln (17:42):
I stayed with them so that they could pay for
it all.
That's a bit naughty, okay,clever, but they got the
benefits of it.
And then, when I was fullyretrained, then I left and
started doing consulting on myown and eventually I became
nomadic.
Sometimes we need these thingsto really tilt us or tip us out
(18:03):
of our comfort zones.
I don't see myself steppingaway and turning my back on all
my finance and strategy work ifit hadn't been for that brutal
experience and also, in myupbringing, my family.
You didn't quit, you know, andso that was perceived as
quitting.
But you know, I don't see it asquitting.
I see it as being readingyourself, reading the signs and
(18:28):
realizing it's time to you know,take a totally different path
and pivot, and sometimes thatpivot takes you in exactly the
opposite direction, which iswhat it took me.
Daniela SM (18:37):
But that means that you were a human, because it
affected you.
Some people are doing your joband they are ruthless.
Jenny Lincoln (18:43):
Yeah, oh, I was ruthless.
You know, back in those days Iwalk into someone's office and
people would start crying.
I can imagine, and as awful asit was, it gives me an insight,
Like now as an open-heartedloving.
You know I'm just a giant lovebug now but I can still be
(19:08):
assertive and firm.
I'm not ruthless and heartlessand cold.
You know my own sense of selfand keeping other people's
integrity and themselves intactis far more important to me.
You know, leading through thelens of love with that soft
strength of open-heartedness andintuitiveness to me I find that
far more successful than beinga ballbreaker, because it's like
(19:29):
a soothing balm.
When you're a ballbreaker, halfthe time you're just pouring
kerosene on the situation.
Daniela SM (19:34):
But the truth is that the job that you did had to
be done.
I mean, there is places thatyou have to go and things need
to change and people need tolose jobs and it's heartbreaking
, but it needs to happen andthose people will survive or
will find another job.
Somebody has to make thedecision.
Jenny Lincoln (19:53):
Yes, yes, but I would do it very differently now
than how I did it.
Daniela SM (19:58):
Is there a different way?
I don't think that there is adifferent way to let people in
half of the company, to let themgo.
Jenny Lincoln (20:05):
There's degrees of brutalness.
Do you know what I mean?
You can be more constructiveand heart-based with really
tough, difficult situations anddecisions.
And, yes, we have these realcommercial and economic needs to
keep changing and redefiningwhat a business looks like.
But if you do that with aheart-based approach, you can
(20:29):
have those difficultconversations differently.
You do them with empathy, likeyou were talking to, and
understanding, and you also lookat what have we got, what is
the natural genius of thisperson and how can we utilize it
.
And if we can't utilize itwithin our organization, within
the restructuring, then how canwe support that person to
(20:53):
getting something just as goodor better?
So I think it's a differentapproach to me.
So the how is different and Ithink the outcome is different
and the energy is very different.
Daniela SM (21:04):
Have you thought about teaching that to the
people that still have to do it?
Jenny Lincoln (21:08):
different and I think the outcome is different
and the energy is very different.
Have you thought about teachingthat to the people that still
have to do it?
Yeah, I have.
Actually, I believe I wouldlove to help and to get back
into, to change management fromthe point of view that I would
love for people.
I think one of the first thingsthat needs to happen when you're
changing anything in anorganization is to sit people
down and have a conversation, adifficult conversation around
(21:31):
helping them to understand whattheir fear of loss is, because
to me, the fear of loss is whatunderlines everything we say.
We have fear of uncertainty andwe have fear of failure and all
of that, but what's the bottomline under that?
The fear of failure is like oh,I'm going to look like a goose,
you know.
So that's losing face, losingego, you know, losing money.
(21:52):
Everything comes back to loss,perceived loss, and so I think
you know when you can havepowerful conversations and get
people to be open about andreflective about.
Well, what am I thinking I'mgoing to lose with this
restructuring?
Okay, I might lose my influence, I might lose my job, I might
lose my power, I might lose mycar park, which is right next to
(22:14):
the elevator.
I might lose my title, and allof these things attach to how we
define ourselves.
So I think there's a secondpiece that needs to be done,
which is to show people they aremore than just the things that
they have and do.
It's the whole, what I call thebe do have model.
They're a human being.
We're not human doings, and yetwe are so defined by what we do
(22:35):
and what we have.
I see you're smiling.
Daniela SM (22:39):
Yes, I mean this is a subject that is really in my
mind constantly, in every level.
And then you mentioned the wordlost.
I was using grieving and youknow we always talk about
grieving as a I've lost someone,but it's actually so many
things that you lose that you'reattached to that.
(23:00):
We think that they are part ofus Every time.
If I lost a job, when I havelost a job, it is hard because
you feel really like a loser.
Even when there was thepandemic, I knew that I was
going to be laid off.
I understood it, but then, whenthe day that I was tall which
(23:20):
lasted two days anyway theycalled me back immediately but I
was like not again, and youfelt that lost.
And so I feel like it's notenough conversations about it in
every level the job, becauseyou think that you are the title
.
The husband because you thinkthat you are a wife.
You know your kids when theygrow up and they want to do
(23:42):
their own life.
You're also now not the momanymore, you know, and so many
things that you're attached to,even wanted or not wanted.
People need to talk more aboutthat subject.
Jenny Lincoln (23:54):
I totally agree with you, daniela.
Agree with you, daniela.
I think it's a really importantconversation because, at the
end of the day, so many of ourdecisions come back to this fear
of loss.
We've got a lot of peopleoperating and living their lives
from the space of fear and itcomes back to how they identify
(24:15):
themselves.
If we could demonstrate thatyou are more than your words and
actions and your thoughts andbeliefs and even your value set,
you know you are more than allof that.
The essence of who you be isthe most important thing.
Things coming and then going isactually a natural part.
You know us holding on to them.
(24:36):
We're actually working againstthe law of physics.
You know us holding on to them,we're actually working against
the law of physics.
You know the universal laws, soof course it's going to we.
That's why humanity struggles,because we're trying to operate
against a fundamental law andprinciple that things come
together and then they fallapart, and we don't want them to
.
And so instead, instead ofseeing them as loss, we see them
(24:59):
as opportunity and evolution.
And if we can break some of theattachments we have, then that
transition, which is the icky,sticky part that people get lost
in and sometimes they need tocome out of.
Daniela SM (25:13):
But I think it's harder than that.
I intellectually can understandall that that you say.
I have my brain, or maybe 90 isclear about all this.
You know, I can of courseunderstand it, but there is the
emotions and as long as we'rehumans and we have emotions,
this sense of lost is alwaysgoing to be, there, is going to
creep in between the logic andthe intellectual understanding
(25:38):
of it Totally.
Jenny Lincoln (25:39):
I agree, I agree.
So I think the third piece islooking at our emotions
differently, and so, for me, Isee our emotions as our
energetic emailing system.
You know, we're hooked Again,we have an attachment to the
positive ones and we try anddelete the negative ones or we
send them to trash.
You know, we never read them.
I prefer to think of emotionsas treble and bass.
(26:02):
We all everyone loves music,and when we have treble and bass
, we get this beautifulsynthesis of sound.
And to me, emotions the thetreble and and bass aspects of
emotions, instead of positiveand negative, are powerful
streams of information, andbeing authentic with your
emotions and then knowing how tobe with them and then knowing
(26:26):
how to unpack them so that youcan get the messages, is really
powerful, and I think we need tolook at that in a different way
to how we've looked at itbefore.
Daniela SM (26:35):
Yes, you are giving me a lot of and realize that
treating people with like themost human way that they can and
the grieving subjects are twoof the things that are really,
really resonate with me all thetime, so it's something that I
really think I can talk forhours.
So then what happened?
(26:55):
You did all this changing andyou went into coaching and
counseling.
And then what happened?
You did all this changing andyou went into coaching and
counseling, and then whathappened?
Jenny Lincoln (27:02):
Well, I think in the middle of that I fell into a
deep, dark depression.
That was a really icky spacefor me and I wish I had
understood that process.
I realize now that it was areally powerful process of
transmutation.
And everyone talks about thecaterpillar to the butterfly,
(27:23):
but no one talks about theprocess of transmutation that
that caterpillar goes through itwhen it crawls into the cocoon
becomes a pile of goo, it losesform, it loses shape right, it
becomes a little puddle of greenicky goo and it has what I call
a mush moment.
And and I believe we constantlyhave mush moments, which is our
(27:46):
process of transmutation.
And for me, my depression wasactually a deliverance.
I entered at this cold, hard,steely, steely, egoic left brain
, highly successful businessexec, but I came out with an
open heart.
I was transparent again.
I'd found my love, myplayfulness and all of a sudden
(28:11):
I had access to all thispowerful intuitiveness because
I'd let go of all this otherstuff, and so that was a really
powerful state.
That was a really importantpart of my transformation, and
so I would love for people tomaybe look at some of the gnarly
experiences we go through andwe judge as being bad
(28:32):
experiences or we're broken orsomething like that, and maybe
see them as bridges.
Maybe they're bridges to adifferent part of us, you know.
And so depression wasdefinitely a bridge for me not
an enjoyable one, regardless tosay I could never have been the
truth of who I am now withoutgoing through that.
(28:53):
And so I think sometimes, if wejust have a different frame of
reference, a differentperspective I always say freedom
is one perspective away If wecould look at depression and
other things like that as aprocess of metamorphosis or
transmutation, then maybe wecould look at it differently,
maybe we could have greatergratitude and acceptance towards
(29:17):
it, which would lessen ourstruggle, right, and we could
put our energy into going intowhat I call the cocoon room,
treat ourselves with soft eyesand love and gentleness, which
we need, rather than cursingourselves and going, oh, how the
hell am I going to get out ofthis?
I should be better, I should bethis, I should be that.
(29:38):
We should on ourselves all thetime.
Daniela SM (29:40):
Now, with all these technologies, that we get to
listen to more stories and hearall more changes in people.
You always hear I was this way,and now look at me.
They never talked about theprocess, which I feel that
that's the most important thing,because it's very easy to say I
was this and now I that andyou're like, oh, I want to do
that too.
But then when you're stuck inthe process, that is difficult.
That is when people quit.
(30:01):
Nobody shares those momentswhere you're saying you're gooey
and you didn't know what'shappening and so you were
feeling depressed because yeah,it was an emptiness.
Jenny Lincoln (30:12):
I started to head down this road but I was still
empty and I'd get the spark ofinspiration, but then the spark
would go out, it wouldn't hold.
And it was so frustrating.
And I had done so much work onmind mastery, my mind had become
a steely trap.
I was a prisoner in the cellblock of my own mind.
(30:32):
I feel that being in this dark,gnarly space of depression, it
was the only way that I couldfind my open heart.
I just deconstructed myself.
What made it worse was nothingthat used to light me up, lit me
up.
I had a perfectly beautifullife.
I had a beautiful partner who Iloved dearly.
(30:52):
She was so supportive.
I had great friends.
I had a beautiful house.
I lived by the beach.
I had a fantastic life.
But I was just a cesspool ofeverything, everything dark and
gnarly.
That made me detach fromeverything because I withdrew.
But I withdrew with lots ofjudgment and beat myself up and
(31:16):
berated myself to the pointwhere I really wanted to take my
own life.
And then I remember laying onthe floor, because I spent a lot
of time laying on the floor ofmy home office and I was crying
out and I just you know, god,buddha, allah, someone, someone
tell me what to do, because I'mdone.
(31:37):
I'm done, I've made my peace.
I can't do this anymore.
It's just horrendous, it'shorrific.
I cannot because it's soincongruous, because you have
this wonderful life but you justcan't relate to it.
But that is the breaking downof your value set, it's the
breaking down of everything thatyou have constructed yourself
(31:58):
into, down of everything thatyou have constructed yourself
into.
And as I laid on that floor, Iwas like the sun was coming
through my window and I was justenjoying that and then, all of
a sudden, the shaft of life well, I like just it went across my
face, but then it played down tomy heart space and all of a
sudden I just went oh, wow andwow.
And my intuition said, jenny,all you have to do is just
(32:22):
breathe.
That is your sole purpose righthere, right now, just breathe.
And I thought, is that enough?
And my intuition said, yes, itis Just breathe.
And it was like.
That was kind of like I don'tknow.
That was my reboot.
(32:43):
That was my reboot and fromthat moment onwards I place my
focus and my energy in my heartspace.
And so when I'm revolving uphere and I'm the little mouse on
the running in the wheel.
I just re-anchor back into myheart space and I go.
(33:06):
I'm love, I'm love, loving,lovable and loved.
I go back to there and my heartrecalibrates because, you know,
our heart is an intelligencecenter and it's our primary
energy source and it's ourharmonizer.
It gets to recalibrate ourwhole body and our mind can't
recalibrate our mind.
You know, any instrument has tobe recalibrated from outside of
(33:30):
itself, so to speak the mind.
You just get more stuck in it.
So we need the heart to helprecalibrate it, you know.
Coming back to the point youwere saying, these messy moments
are so important, we need totalk about them.
These mush moments are sopowerful because they are how we
rewire ourselves.
I totally rewired my operatingsystem.
(33:52):
It was like going from Windowsto Mac or Mac to Windows.
I went from fear and anger tolove and compassion.
That was my truth.
But I had built such big armory, effectively blew myself up
from the inside out.
We can do that, I think, in amore supportive and a more
(34:13):
managed way.
You don't have to go to thatsame extreme If we look at some
of these catalystic things thatare happening within us and
around us, and we see them asopportunity for metamorphosis
and we look at them with love inour heart, even though at times
you don't feel that you have aheart or that love could even
(34:33):
exist.
But if you could work withpeople that know that, have been
there, done that and hold thatspace for you until you find the
truth of you, that's what weneed more of.
Daniela SM (34:43):
Yes, for sure.
And so then, after that, youquit the job, or when did you
decide to be a nomad?
What happened?
Jenny Lincoln (34:50):
Yeah, well, I did lots of different things, kind
of did some work and, you know,helped a friend start, do a
not-for-profit startup and, youknow, did lots of different
volunteering.
You know I obviously had sometime out as like an unemployed
beach bum.
And then, you know, I used tobox and kick box and one of my
friends was a real estate agentand he said to me do you know
(35:12):
how much you can rent for yourproperty for?
And I went no, how much, tellme.
And he told me I went God, whyam I living in it?
It was permission to gotraveling, packed up the house.
Daniela SM (35:23):
He was a good salesman?
Jenny Lincoln (35:25):
Yeah, he was.
So then he rented my house outfor me and my partner at the
time.
We both started traveling andthat was wonderful.
The rent more than paid for themortgage and what we needed to
travel.
So that's when I became nomadic.
Three months into that, mypartner and I, after 21 years
she was my soulmate, I was hersand we both looked at each other
(35:49):
.
And this is where you know loveisn't true love.
You know when I mean likeunconditionality, that sort of
love.
It's not all unicorns andrainbows.
You have to make some toughdecisions and we kind of woke up
and realized, you know what,maybe we're not partners for
each other going forward, werealized that we needed to grow
(36:10):
beyond the confines of ourrelationship.
We couldn't recalibrate inrelationship and so, you know,
she's still my best friend, wespend time together, but we're
not each other's partnersanymore.
And that was a really toughdecision, but we made that
through the lens of love.
You know, it was freaking hard.
Daniela SM (36:27):
Yes, I can imagine and I hope the travelling wasn't
the issue.
Jenny Lincoln (36:31):
Well, the travelling showed up stuff that
we would not have seen and thatcould have been covered up being
, you know, in having all yourdistractions around you when
you're in your home base.
And like, I'm not saying it'sgoing to happen to everyone
because it doesn't, but ithappened for us that way because
I think we were such loyalists.
There's no way we could haveleft each other.
(36:52):
Do you know what I mean?
It kind of had to happen inthat situation.
Daniela SM (36:57):
Well, you're scaring me now.
No, no, I'm scaring my husband,I mean we've been together for
30 years, and it's true thatwe're best friends as well.
But uh, you know, I don't know,I don't know, we're already so
used to that I cannot evenimagine.
Jenny Lincoln (37:14):
No, look, I don't think that's the case.
I mean lots of people that arenomadic and they it has cemented
their relationships evenfurther.
I just think that was ourdestiny.
And what the point I'm tryingto make is that love isn't
always, you know, fluffy, duffystuff.
No, that's true.
It's having difficultconversations and making
difficult decisions.
You know, when you lead fromthe lens of love and come from
(37:39):
an open heart, then you can havethose sorts of decisions and
things are a little easier.
I think it's never likebreakups and loss and all that
is not easy, but you would knowyourself, with a successful
relationship at 30 years withyour husband, that when you come
to the table open rather thandefensive, it's a better
conversation, isn't it?
(38:00):
Yeah?
Daniela SM (38:01):
what was the most difficult part of when you
started the nomadic life?
Jenny Lincoln (38:04):
there was no difficult part starting a
nomadic life.
Daniela SM (38:10):
Really Wow, not even like material stuff or like
having a nice bed or somethinglike that.
Jenny Lincoln (38:15):
Yeah, good points .
Actually, that raises twothings.
The difficult part of startingwas the 350 items on my to-do
list.
Okay, you know, and of course II was ex, you know corporate, I
I had a tick list that was anexcel spreadsheet that had, or
(38:36):
project management sheet thathad and I think there was, I
think honestly there was like357 line items.
Oh, my god, I would nevercreate that sort of document now
, it would overwhelm me.
So the logistics we we setourselves a really short
timeframe and just poweredthrough it.
So that was good and because itwas meant to be and it was
(38:57):
aligned, everything justunfolded.
The universe I have a sayingyou go first and the universe
follows.
The universe really supportedus with our exit out into our
new life.
And the funny you say aboutcomfy beds I have one of those
beautiful memory foam pillows.
I had headaches for 18 monthsas my neck and head had to get
(39:20):
used to not having the beautifulsupport that it had had.
I laugh, but it was awful, itwas actually painful.
Daniela SM (39:30):
You adapt to that too.
Like okay, now you have a houseand you have your toothbrush
and everything is in place.
And then it takes a while, Iguess, until your body's like
okay, I can live with.
Like that, if you have thepersonality, yeah.
Jenny Lincoln (39:43):
I agree.
That's a lovely analogy,daniela.
I think that our neck and ourspine and our backs,
metaphysically, are all aroundsupport.
It's a big thing to becomenomadic.
It is really a big deal, as youknow, because you're in the
throes of it.
What happens is your wholesupport mechanism, not just
yourself, but everything, everyarea of your life changes.
(40:06):
I think my body was physicallyrecalibrating or becoming agile
in a different way.
You know, when you were a kid,did you remember getting growing
pains?
I think as adults, we havethese growing pains, but they're
different.
I think that's part of thediscomfort that we experience
all the time when we step intosomething new.
You know, there were somereally severe growing pains,
(40:29):
becoming unattached, but I feltthem as that they were
liberating, and I felt thefreedom aspect of them, the fact
that I had nothing to takeresponsibility of anymore.
I didn't like we'd set off with20 kilos of stuff.
I now travel with 10.
I only own 10 kilos of stuff.
So what's that?
22 pounds.
Daniela SM (40:49):
Oh, I think it's interesting, right.
So what's that?
22 pounds?
Oh, I think it's interesting,right, because it's true, you
get used to and you think youneed it all and then you start
leaving things behind.
Jenny Lincoln (40:56):
Yeah, but it's this whole thing, it's the whole
.
You travel with physical,tangible things which you are
attached to.
So it's this having aspect,it's changing the having
relationship in the be, do, havemodel.
So you let go of physical,physical things, you become a
minimalist with tangible things.
But you, very soon you startletting go of your emotional
(41:19):
baggage too, because you think,well, I want to just have, you
know, my little physical bag andthen still carry you, you know,
the whole suite of LouisVuitton emotional baggage as
well.
You realize pretty quickly whenyou keep showing up in
different countries and the sameattitude or perspective follows
(41:39):
you and you go oh, I can'tleave that behind.
That's interesting.
Daniela SM (41:44):
Wonderful growth and development.
You mean attitude likecomplaining about something or
something bothers you.
Jenny Lincoln (41:49):
Yeah, yeah, You'll, just because you just
different, things will activateyou and you'll go oh, that's
interesting, that's the samething.
But I've been in five differentcountries.
What is that telling me?
And then you realize, oh, it'sjust an old, outdated view I
have of myself, or it's alimiting belief.
You know that you needsomething and it just shows up
(42:11):
that you don't, and then you canlet it go.
So it's really.
You'll become more minimalistin your mental and emotional
capacity as well.
So it's very, it's really good.
It helps you become more agilethere.
Daniela SM (42:24):
Okay, interesting, thank you.
And then, jenny, all this thingabout being holistic or I don't
know if that's the right wordthat you would use, but being an
A-type personality, how didthat happen?
Jenny Lincoln (42:36):
I think it's what I call the kitchen sink
approach.
It's like kind of you're goingto throw everything into it,
like I did theta healing.
I did like after my depressionand when I found myself residing
more in my heart space.
The most important change forme was getting out of my head
and into my heart, because whenI'm in my head I was revolving
(42:58):
and I don't want to make thehead out to be the bad guy.
It's a really importantintelligence center.
It's, you know I always sayit's our command center.
Our heart is our harmonizer andsource of energy.
And then for me the intuitionis you're in a GPS, but I think
what happens is we tend to useour mind as the GPS, and so I
think this connectivity that wecan have with different
(43:20):
dimensions and with energyhappens when you get out of your
mind because it defies logic,or get out of your left brain in
particular because it's logical.
There's a good book by this lady, jill Bolt Taylor, called my
Stroke of Insight.
She's a neurologist and she hada left brain bleed stroke.
(43:41):
She explains in her book thatwhen her left brain was flooded
she couldn't see where she beganand end and where the bed began
and end.
No one had construct, no onehad outlines, no one had the
table is the table, the bed isthe bed.
(44:02):
You are you, I am me.
It was just a blur of color.
So it shows you that our leftbrains are actually putting the
shape and the detail aroundeverything you know, and so this
kind of supports this wholequantum theory that everything's
just moving molecules.
But if we, if we saw that, we'dprobably freak out.
(44:24):
You'd think something's wrongwith us and we're having a
meltdown, you know so.
So I think it's this art ofgetting out of your head, and I
know people call it mindfulness,but for me every mindfulness
approach actually gets you intoyour heart space.
So to me it's actuallyheartfulness.
So when you get out of yourhead and into your heart and
(44:47):
then you open yourself to beingguided by your intuition, you
break down your limiting beliefsaround those sorts of
connections.
Yeah, we also have a lot oflimiting beliefs around our
subconscious mind and ourconscious mind.
So I've got rid of all the kindof limiting beliefs around oh,
that's lost into the ether, or Ican't recall things in an
(45:10):
instant or any of that.
So you know, we can restructureour minds in that way and open
up the access to ourmulti-sensing dimensions,
because that's how we're made,that's our full potency.
You know, I think it's justtrying lots of different things
and finding what speaks to youyes, I understand, and so
(45:33):
Jenny's.
Daniela SM (45:34):
So I want to ask you who is the real, jenny?
Now, who is that Jenny?
What are you doing and who isthat person?
Who is the real?
Jenny Lincoln (45:42):
Jenny.
Well, she's heart-based, youknow.
She's very open and transparent.
She's got a lot of wisdom thatshe likes to speak about.
Um, and hence my brand now isthe sage from the stage
restarted my speaking careeragain.
Turning 60 was a bit of a reallydifficult thing for me uh, as
(46:04):
it is, I think, for a lot ofpeople, this whole aging
equation thing.
And one of my best friends saidto me you know, some people
don't get to turn 60.
It's a gift.
And I went, wow, that was likea slap in the face.
That was a really good, likewake-up call and I thought, oh,
you know, I'm just in adifferent part of my life.
(46:25):
I'm in what I call my sage age.
So that's when I decided youknow what I'm going to be the
sage from the stage.
So, yeah, so that's what I do.
I have talks around leadingthrough the lens of love and
emotional fitness, you know,being able to read your
emotional emails and how to youknow be authentic with your
(46:46):
emotions and use them as part ofyour guidance.
I do talks around unlocking,you know, the power of
introverts, because I thinkintroverts are forced to act
like extroverts and they'remeasured in that way.
So I think we're doing a lot ofdamage to our introverts.
Yes, and you know I do thingsaround courage camp and rising
(47:08):
from rejection.
And you know, at the end of theday, my big body of knowledge
is called HumNav, that'sH-U-M-N-A-V.
Humnav is the human navigationpractice and that's about you
tapping into your internalguidance and using all these
wonderful support programs thatwe have.
Daniela SM (47:27):
And how did you became a speaker?
Like did you just put yourselfout there and then that happens.
Jenny Lincoln (47:33):
I've done a lot of speaking in my previous
corporate role, but at the endof last year I actually started
work with the delightful andwonderful Tricia Brooke.
She's my speaking coach andshe's actually a Broadway
director and producer, and soit's it's about performance and
(47:55):
she lives in New York, so that'swhy every second month I'm in
New York and so, yeah, I've beendoing a lot of, you know,
conscious and purposeful workaround that and finding gigs and
getting back onto the stage,starting to work with different
communities and differentcompanies to help help, having
(48:15):
the conversations that we'vebeen talking about, emotional
fitness and courage camp andfacing, you know, first aid for
failure and facing your fearsand all these sorts of things,
and that will be under the humnav, umbrella, umbrella.
Okay, I see it as a universityeventually.
Wow, so we'll see.
I don't know how that's goingto happen, but you know it'll
(48:35):
happen some way, yes, and youshould add the lost conversation
, yes.
Daniela SM (48:39):
And how to be human when you do the job that you
used to do before.
Jenny Lincoln (48:43):
Yes, I know, I know Exactly.
Daniela SM (48:50):
There's just so many things to talk about Fire
with humanity, fire with heart.
Thank you, jenny, so much forsharing your story and having
this amazing conversation thatis super insightful and
inspiring.
Jenny Lincoln (49:02):
It was my pleasure, daniela, it's been
absolutely fabulous.
I feel inspired after ourconversation, so thank you for
the opportunity.
Thank you.
Daniela SM (49:10):
I hope you enjoyed today's episode.
I am Daniela and you arelistening to, because Everyone
has a Story.
Please take five seconds rightnow and think of somebody in
your life that may enjoy whatyou just heard, or someone that
has a story to be shared andpreserved.
When you think of that person,shoot them a text with the link
(49:31):
of this podcast.
This will allow the ordinarymagic to go further.
Join me next time for anotherstory conversation.
Thank you for listening.
Hasta pronto you.
Thank you.
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