#95: Hannah Betts: Facing Fear; Lessons from a Stuntwoman

Episode Transcript
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Intro (00:02):
Welcome to Creative spirits unleashed, where we talk
about the dilemmas of balancingwork and life and now here's
your host. Lynn Carnes,

Lynn (00:19):
welcome to the Creative Spirits Unleash Podcast. I'm
Lynn Carnes, your host. My guestfor this episode is Hannah
Betts, Hollywood stunt woman,professional skydiver and more.
If you watch the Super Bowl thisyear, you saw Hannah land in a
cruise ship swimming pool afterjumping out of a helicopter. Now
in this episode, she shares someof the behind the scenes magic
from that commercial, as well assome of the scarier stunts she's

(00:42):
done for other shows and movies.
She's had a number of scarythings happen in her career, and
the way she embraces things notgoing right is inspiring. In our
conversation, we deeply exploredthe topic of fear from angles
rarely talked about. Anna hasbeen to the other side of fear,
as I call it, and she's bringingback the wisdom she's earned to

(01:02):
help the rest of us in our ownrespective journeys, see fear as
a companion, not an enemy. Nowhere's what Hannah has to say
about herself. Hannah Betts haswon many bowl titles, outdoor
adventure sports, instructor,police officer, professional
skydiver and now Hollywood stuntwoman. Beyond the risk and
achievement lies a deeperjourney, one of confronting fear

(01:24):
and vulnerability head on,rising above comparison and
letting go of the expectationsto live a quote, unquote,
conventional life despite whatit may look like from the
outside, fear walks with herevery day. She just doesn't let
it lead. Hannah's mission is toempower others to do the same,
to lean into fear rather thanrun from it. Through the power

(01:45):
of her story, she helps othersbreak free from what holds them
back, unfreeze the parts of lifethat feel out of reach, and
boldly step into their uniquepotential. Now hearing that
biography, you may think I wouldlove to hear Hannah speak some
more, and that's possible. Ifyou get in touch with her, with
the information that we areproviding in the show notes, you
will find a way to book her as aspeaker for your own group. I

(02:09):
hope you really enjoy thispodcast with Hannah. Betts. ANNA
Betts, welcome to the creativespirits unleash podcast.

Hannah Betts (02:21):
Thank you so much for having me. I'm so excited to
be here. I

Lynn (02:26):
needless to say, I am too.
If smiles come through the voicewe're both grinning from you see
that we we met through WarwickSchiller's journey on podcast
Summit, and really only got tovisit briefly last year after I
heard your speech. And so thisis conversation has been a while

(02:47):
and coming, yes, but I rememberleaping out of my chair to
applaud you. I think I actually,I think there might even be a
picture of me, like with myhands up in the air, like the
victory.

And I think there is, and it's funny, that was one
of the first things that I saw,as, you know, I finished the
speech, and this wave of reliefto come over me. And it was, it
was a very magical moment forme, because I'm going to fan
girl on you for a second,because the the year before you
you presented, and it was one ofmy, my favorite talks, and I've
always wanted to connect withyou, so to see you cheering me

(03:25):
on was extremely heartwarming.

Lynn (03:28):
Oh, gosh. Well, I it was, it was just like this moment
where there was something thatyou were able to communicate
around this very essentialemotion, fear that we all share.
There's nobody on the planetexcept for maybe Alex huddled,
and I don't think his brainworks right. He's the free, solo

(03:50):
guy. Yeah, maybe he even hasfear, but it's it's wired
differently or something. But,yeah, this, I this, this thing
that we all have, and whether weadmit we have it or we don't,
whether we work with it or workagainst it, whether we pretend
it's there or pretend whateverwe do with it, there was

(04:11):
something that you communicated.
This is why I leaped out of mychair, that I experienced that
said she's got it. And I wonderif you could just talk a little
bit about how you've come tohave a relationship with fear
that allows you to strap into aparachute and jump out of a
perfectly good plane, by way ofexample, and do other things

(04:35):
that Hollywood stunt women do.
So how did, how have youdeveloped a relationship with
fear? And I'm sure it's stilldeveloping. Let me just say
that. Oh, it

definitely is developing, because there's so
many different layers to it. Isomehow in my life, I've always
had careers that have eitherbeen quite male dominated or. Or
slightly, quote, unquoteextreme, whether it's being an
outdoor sports instructor andthen a police officer, then a

(05:07):
competitive and professionalskydiver and Hollywood stunt
woman, I've been because ofthat. I've been forced into
facing a lot of fears andnavigating through them. And it
occurred to me quite recentlythat a lot of people, just
because of what I have done inmy life, assume that I am this

(05:30):
ultra freak of nature,courageous human being that
doesn't feel fear, or that I'man adrenaline junkie. You know,
all those classic labels, and Ihave to explain to people now
I'm mildly terrified all thetime in every aspect of life,
including all the things thatI've done just somewhere along

(05:50):
the way because of thesituations that I put been put
in, I really have learned how tokind of navigate through that
fear. And I didn't realize thosewere the lessons that I was
learning throughout my life,until quite recently, I've
realized I have lived quite anunconventional life, but the
story, I think that I wasprojecting to other people was,
was was not correct. It it, likesaid, it came across as this

(06:13):
very brave, fearless humanbeing, but it's actually an
incredibly vulnerable and scaredstory most of the time.

Lynn (06:23):
Yeah, so what is what besides the danger side, okay,
but, but, but it's more thanthat. What is the vulnerable
side? What makes it vulnerable?
I

think that the vulnerable side is that before I
do any of these things, whetheror as admit, admitting that, for
example, before I'm about towalk into a briefing of a drug
raid that I am in charge of, andI have to go into a room with 20
men and deliver that, you knowthat prep that speech, I'm My

(06:58):
heart is in my mouth. I'm beyondterrified. I'm not going in
there with this level of likeI've got this I know what I'm
doing. I have to kind of pushmyself through it to the other
side before I'm doing thesecompetitions where I'm winning
World Championships. The samething, I'm terrified. I'm
doubting myself all the timebefore I do a big stunt, before

(07:18):
I come on this podcast, before Ido any public speaking, I have
an element of of trepidation andfear as well. I've just learned,
I've learned to treat thatphysical feeling of fear like a
like a reliable companion that'sactually prepping me. I've
realized that that fear isn'tnecessarily something to be

(07:40):
scared of. It's actually warningme, hey, you're about to do
something really cool. For themost part. On the other side of
this feeling is something reallygreat. This is your body just
preparing you to do somethingawesome. This isn't something
that's telling you to kind ofexit stage left or moonwalk away
from the situation. And I thinkthe more I've lent into that

(08:01):
feeling and understood that thisis a natural feeling to have. It
isn't something to shy awaywith, and I've embraced that
feeling more. It's allowed me tomove through those scary
situations. If any of that makes

Lynn (08:15):
so much sense to me, because you you called it a
companion, right? And I oftenhave come to think of it as
signal versus noise, right,because sometimes, to me, the
noise that happens when I'mabout to do something big is I
shouldn't be feeling this. Thismeans something about to go
wrong, as opposed to about to goright. Yeah, but I wonder where

(08:41):
that message came from, because,as I hear you describe, it makes
all the sense in the world.
Shouldn't we, when we're doingsomething important, feel all
the chemicals our bodiesdesigned to have for us to face,
the things that come at us, theadrenaline and then the
resulting, you know, endorphinsafter that. Shouldn't we be

(09:01):
feeling that? Isn't that normal,and where did the message
become? We're not supposed tofeel shit,

right? Exactly.
And I think I talk about this,what, what's the infuriating
thing is the, and I even talkedabout our about this subject
with Chantal Pratt, our friend,our neuroscientist, because I
wanted to make on my podcast.
Yeah, I wanted to make sure thatI wasn't going crazy, because I

(09:31):
was explaining to her, you know,the difficulty sometimes that
people have in identifying thedifferent kinds of fear, right,
the one that you should listento and the one that you should
ignore, and how youdifferentiate between that,
because the science behind it,and I don't want to butcher it,
but, and I talk about this asthe level of fear and all those

(09:51):
physical sensations that youfeel, if there is a very real
and imminent threat of death,like you think you are about to
be murdered, or you're about. Tobe eaten by a wild animal. That
feeling is no different than Iwould feel the first time I get
up on a stage to do publicspeaking. Right? It's and it's
immediately telling our bodyfrom our natural instincts, from

(10:14):
millions of years of DNA wideinto us. It's telling us to run,
run away from that situation,and it's important for us to
identify which one that is, isit saying? Is it really run, or
is it just an excitement thatproduces this, those same

(10:36):
physical sensations? And that'sthe biggest thing that I think,
that has gotten me through a lotof these situations is I've I
always feel it. I tell my peopleI'm an incredibly nervous
person. I think I feel nervesmore extremely than than a lot
of people, but I've learned totry and observe that fear first,

(10:56):
rather than absorb it and notlet it think. For me, I'm like,
Okay, I'm feeling it. What? Whatdoes that mean? First, well,

Lynn (11:05):
not let it think for you is so big, because you're not
reacting, then you're listening.
Yes,

you're listening.
And what I often say is, and I'mnot telling people to ignore
fear because it keeps us safe.
You know what I mean, like thatcreepy bar looking across at the
bar from you, telling you tomove. Yeah, hell yeah. Listen to
that. But quite often, the way Idifferentiate it, the good fear,
quote, unquote, the one that youwant to lean into, often comes

(11:38):
with, like a tingling sensation,almost like an excitement, a
little buzz. It's terrifying.
But there's also somethingvibrating that feels right. My
good friend Melanie Curtis callsit intuitive tingling, yeah, and
it's learning. And the otherfear that the bad fear, or the

(11:59):
fear that I guess I shouldlisten to, for me, there's a
slight sense of dread, orthere's a sinking sensation in
my stomach, it's it's not theright feeling. So I think it's
really important to listen toyour body. Where the where the
big ones, you know, the thespike in the heart rate, the
tingling feelings, you know, thedry mouth, all the things that
we associate with just beingscared. I think beneath that,

(12:20):
there's some other signals, andI think that's what we need to
really tap into. Is there withthose big signals? Is there a
kind of lightness and a tinglingup in your chest and your heart
and your mind, or is this thissinking dread sensation beneath
it? And that's how I've startedto identify

Lynn (12:41):
which really useful. And so it's like you've calibrated,
yeah, you're calibrating thesensation and tuning in, instead
of running to the, you know, therefrigerator to eat chocolate or
drink wine or, you know, getsomething to make these feelings
go away. Because, yeah, thesefeelings aren't going away. To

(13:03):
me, it's I don't surf, but Ioften think of it as the key is
to ride the wave level

completely. And trust me, I don't get this right
all the time, and I would be abig fat liar if I didn't say
that chocolate in the fridgecalled me a lot of times. You
know, it becomes less and lesslike you say that the it's like
a practice, right? The more welean into and really sit with
that feeling, whether it's inthe moment or you have a long

(13:32):
time to think about it, that weget better at practicing it and
identifying it and listening toour gut. And quite often when I
when I realized I've maybe madethe wrong choice, or I didn't
listen to the to the correctfear, I always go back and I
asked myself, where was it?
Because somewhere along thatline, you knew, but you ignored
it, like there, there was athere was something that told

(13:55):
you that wasn't a that wasn'tthe right choice, but you kind
of, you didn't want to listen toit. What was it and and why was
it? So I always go back ondecisions that maybe weren't the
best at the time, not to beatmyself up, but just to
understand where the where thetrip was, or whether where the
blind spot

Lynn (14:16):
was. Well, that's smart.
And I really liked that you madethe distinction not to beat
yourself up. I've I talked a bitabout this in my book, and I'm
still working on it, because Iwork with athletes and other and
corporate people that are highperformance and and I'm a
recovering beat myself upper Iguess that's the way you would
put that. But it doesn't seem tohelp. But it seems to be almost

(14:38):
inevitable that people want tobe really hard on themselves. So
how do you stay out of that mindtrap?

Oh, goodness that that is something that I am
absolutely still working on. Ithink my mind for summary. And
immediately goes to comparison.
I think when we when we beatourselves up, we compare
ourselves to other people thatmade better choices or did did
better things. And I've justrealized that comparison is just

(15:10):
an absolute fallacy, andeveryone's everyone's dealing
with their own stuff, but inregards to not beating myself
up, I think I've just learnedover the years that it no good
comes from that the if, likeTerry real says, and this is
something that I'm working onright now, if it's not kind, I'm
not interested. And I try andhave that mantra a lot, and I

(15:34):
try and catch myself, and if Irealize I'm not being kind, I
tell myself I'm not interested,that's not helpful, that that's
kind of where I'm at right nowwith that is a little mantra,

Lynn (15:49):
yeah, that's a good well, that's a good one. And, you
know, I found we found it withanimals. I work with rain
rescue, and we we've gotMustangs and feral horses, and
we were we have Bruce Andersoncome in to train them. And the
other day, someone was workingwith one of our Mustangs, and
she didn't get the thing donethe way she wanted, and started

(16:13):
to beat herself up. And here wasa new distinction I hadn't
caught before. But as she beganto beat herself up, the Mustang
was reading that, and Brucepointed out, he said, You just
abandoned that Mustang. You justabandoned the horse to go beat
yourself up. And now not only isthe horse left to her own

(16:33):
devices, but you are over there,like taking away from the
session that we're in totallyand so both of you, you're
beating yourself up what you'redoing to help yourself. You're
not doing it because you thinkit's a bad thing to do. You're
doing it because you think itworks. But you've actually,
like, abandoned her, and she canhear it in your head completely,

(16:56):
which most people don'tunderstand. But horses
definitely hear that stuff

completely, and I think I've been more witness to
it, funnily enough, since I'vebeen on set, a lot, there's a
lot of pressure that comes withperformance and getting things
right the first time right. Thepressure of everyone's looking
at you is costing 1000s of 1000sof dollars. You know, Hollywood
is notoriously impatient, andwhether it's, you know, someone

(17:20):
that has to physically performlike a stunt performer or an
actor, I think I've been witnessto the results of beating
yourself up, as opposed toaccepting that everybody makes
mistakes, and if you'redelivering that line and it gets
wrong and you get frustratedwith yourself or you can't do
this stunt that the director isasking. I've witnessed other

(17:42):
people and myself do the beatingup, getting frustrated. I didn't
nail it the first time, and nogood comes from that. It only,
it only makes it worse. It just,it, just, you know, debilitates
you, and the ones that care lessdo and, you know, literally care

(18:04):
less about their mistakes. Fixthe mistakes quicker than the
ones that care, quote, unquote,too much, too much. It just
exacerbates the problem. So Ithink having been witness to
that over and over again on set,it's really drilled into me as
well that the ones that almostlike, give zero fucks, get
through it quicker and easier.

Lynn (18:26):
Yeah, because impression is gone. Every mind sport golf,
you know, the ones who like, letthat bad shot go and then just
make a brilliant shot, are theones that win the tournaments.
It's exactly like you say, caretoo much they carry yeah area
because they care too

much, completely, yeah. And that's something that
our skydiving coach focused onall the time. We only had like
35 seconds to do a lot offormations, and if you fumble
out the door, you can either letthat continue into the worst
skydive of your life, or you itcan almost like calm you and

(19:04):
motivate you into having thebest skydive of your life, just
depending on how you treat thatfirst mistake, whether you take
it on board, or whether you justlet it go and pretend it never
happened, you almost have totrick your brain.

Lynn (19:17):
Okay, so I've got two threads I have to follow. Tell
me about these skydivingcompetitions. You've jumped out
of an airplane, and then you'redoing a formation. Take it from
there. What is, what is this all

about? Yeah, it's, it's a tricky thing to explain,
but I will do my best. So I waspart of what's called a four
person formation team, and I wason the British female teams.
They're all female, and there'sfour of us. And the way the
competition works, or the waythe moves work, is we were kind
of linked. We're all linked inthe door together before exit,

(19:50):
and the moment we exit theaircraft, we have a certain
amount of formations to do onrepeat, five or six formations,
as many times as possible. Allin the correct sequence. Within
35 seconds from the moment weexit the plane, there is a
videographer that jumps with us,that flies above us, and films
the whole thing, and that's whatthe judges look at at the

(20:12):
bottom. Now the here's thekicker, that the competition
that I competed in, there aredifferent disciplines. There are
some disciplines that is morelike a technical gymnastics
routine in the sky, like dancingand doing flips, and, you know,
doing that synchronized withanother partner, and that's
exactly how like a gymnasticsroutine would be judged. And you

(20:34):
can practice that routine overand over and over and over and
over again till it's secondnature. The competition that I
competed in wasn't like that. Sowe have about the teams that
compete, have about 50formations or moves that we
learn, that we understandindividual moves. But on the day

(20:54):
of competition, there are 10skydives. But on the day of the
competition, the moves arerandomly generated by the judges
or a machine, and you're toldthis is the six moves that
you're going to do in sequence.
Now it is impossible to trainall those sequences. It's
absolutely impossible. You wouldnever have done that sequence
before. So you engineer it onthe ground with your teammates,

(21:17):
and then you go up and do it forthe first time ever in
competition. So you have to stayand there's a lot of there's a
lot of moves that can end upbeing like 20 moves in a row
that you have to repeat, and ifyou don't stay calm, you can't
rely on muscle memory, becauseyou've never done it before. But
you're also trying to move asfast as possible, and you're
supposed to be doing it, you'vegot to be completely in sync

(21:39):
with all your teammates, becauseyour hands and your grips have
to land at exactly the same timeand be released. And we could be
doing like, 50 formations in 35seconds. So we're moving really
quickly in the sky. And if youdon't keep your brain calm, you
are going to brain lockimmediately and just and brain
fart and just, it's, you know,you'll lose

Lynn (22:04):
exercise. I mean, that's the most dramatic exercise and
presence I think I've ever heardof.

Yeah, you're definitely not thinking about
what's for dinner halfwaythrough that skydive, that's for
sure.

Lynn (22:14):
And you've had to memorize it, yeah? So we kind of got
bored sitting there going, okay,that's because that

No. So the visualization was huge, huge,
huge. We would, we'd engineer iton the ground on kind of, you
know, like, the same kind ofrollers that mechanics use to
get under their car. So we'd bein a belly to, you know, ground
position, and we'd engineer iton the ground to work out the
most efficient and fastest wayto get from one formation to the

(22:42):
other with the four of us. Andthen all you could do was see it
in your head and think about iton the 20 minute plane ride up
to altitude, and then off you goand you perform it for the first
time. So you've never practicedthat sequence, the moves you
understand, but getting from oneto the other and the order
you've never done before. Sothat, without a doubt, that kind

(23:03):
of training definitely preparedme for stunt work. Because you
turn up on set and you're nevergoing to do the same thing.
Sometimes you don't know whatyou're going to do, and you've
never done the exact same thingever. You know, when the
director tells you what you'vegot to do, you have to really
kind of what's

Lynn (23:19):
the wildest thing you've been asked to

do in stunts?
Yeah, I think one of the mostsurprising things to do, and
this was actually quite early onin my career, and normally you'd
get, you'd be given a bit of aheads up about this stunt, but
the only thing that I was askedbefore was, Are you paddy
certified, like scuba divecertified. And are you
comfortable in water andenclosed spaces? And I, luckily,

(23:44):
I don't lie, and I was like,Yeah, and I and I turned up, and
turns out the stunt was I wassuspended in a Prius car at
night about 10 feet above alake, so it was hanging off a
crane, and the car had a bighole cut out of it in the center
console, and I was blindfoldedbecause of the storyline, and

(24:08):
there were scuba tanks in thecar, and had regulators strapped
to my legs, and I had snuck amask in the in the glove
compartment, but they weresimulating a car crash into the
lake. So I was dropped 10 feetfrom the crane into the lake,
and I had to act a sequence of,you know, trying to get out and

(24:30):
wait for the water to as the carsank, wait for the water to go
above my head before I could putthe regulator in. So the shot
was over then, and the water wasso murky. It was in Long Beach.
It was at night, and it was justthat I had to really prepare
myself for lots of differentscenarios. Ideally, luckily, the

(24:50):
safety team got to me straightaway and got me out. But we also
had to prepare for many worstcase scenarios, like the car
might start to roll. All, and itmight take them 30 minutes to
get me out, and I'm stuck in apitch black car, just regulator,
not knowing when they're goingto come to get me. So I had to
really mentally prepare, preparemyself for Worst case scenario

(25:11):
and work backwards, not theother way around. And you know,
I put myself, I often put myselfin those positions, and I think
about worst case scenario to thepoint I can visualize it, to the
point that I can get my bodyamped, I can get my heart rate
spiking, and I can I can feelthe adrenaline. I can feel what

(25:33):
it's going to feel. And I dothat intentionally so I
understand how I'm going to feelwhen that happens. So if and
when that does, it's not asurprise to me. Oh gosh, I'm
feeling anxious and nervousbecause now I'm trapped in a
car. That's okay. That's anormal reaction to have in my
body. What are you going to doto stay calm in your head like
and this? This is the thing thatI have always, more recently

(25:56):
done is I allow my body to haveall those nervous sensations,
because I've never been able toget rid of them. I try to get
rid of the nerves, but thentrying to get rid of the nerves,
I just couldn't do it. I maybeone day I'll get there. I've
tried so many differenttechniques, but I could never

(26:18):
not physically feel nervousabout anything. So I decided
just to let it happen and justfocus on my mind. So I'd almost
separate my mind from my body,and my mind would say, hey, talk
to my body. I can feel yougetting amped up down there.
That's awesome. Thanks forlooking after me. But if you
don't mind, we're gonna stayreally calm up here and slow
everything down. So that's thefamiliar companion feeling that

(26:40):
I've tried to get used to. Thatfeeling so it doesn't surprise
me, or it doesn't make me feelnervous for feeling nervous, if
that makes sense, because that'swhat used to happen. Yeah, I was
more nervous for feeling nervousbecause I felt bad that I felt
numb. You're not supposed tofeel nervous. You're a
professional. You shouldn't feelnervous before

Lynn (26:59):
competition, yeah, because you're actually making it okay
to feel the way you're supposedto feel. Yes, if you're going to
do those things like be in a carthat might roll over in the dark
in murky water, you better havesome energy running through your
body to animate you, yeah, andif you think there's something

(27:23):
wrong with that, then you'regoing to try to stop the thing
that is actually helping you

Exactly, exactly.
And so once I just let my bodyhave those sensations, like I
said, it just felt like areliable friend was there, kind
of looking after me. It wasrecognizing you're about to do
something pretty big, but it's agood, it's a good, big, but,
but, but my brain, I've just, I,honestly, I like

(27:49):
compartmentalize it and justsay, we're chill up here in my
brain, you're ready, you'repumped up for me. Down there,
you're looking after me indifferent ways, and you're both,
you're both doing the correctthe correct job. And I the same
thing I used to say, and Irealized I wasn't practicing
what I was preaching for such along time, because my skydiving
students would say to me, I'm,you know, I've instructed many

(28:13):
people on their first jumpcourses and taught, you know,
everyone from civilians to NavySeals and people that they're
like, Man, I'm really nervousabout doing this first skydive.
I'm like, Thank Thank goodness.
I said I would be more tariff. Iwould be worried if you weren't
nervous, like you'reacknowledging what you're about
to do. It's a big thing, andthat keeps you that stops you

(28:36):
from being complacent. I said,if you weren't nervous, then I
would get nervous because I'd beworried that you're not taking
this seriously. You're notready, you're not ready. And
then it occurred to me, I'mlike, preaching people saying,
Yeah, nerves are good. And I waslike, beating myself up for
having them when I was doingthings. And I was like, hold on
a second.

Lynn (28:53):
Yeah. I had a call the other day with a client, and we
use the language we use for thatsensation. We call it the
negative positive pole. And wethat means, like a car battery,
so the electricity runningthrough your body, and the
positive pole is like thattingly feeling you were
describing is what I think thatprobably is, and the negative

(29:14):
side is the sort of something'swrong, something's very off
here. That's not beneficial tome. So but the amount of energy
that needs to be running throughthat we were talking about a
client who's consideringstarting a business and jumping
out of corporate and doing ajump like I've done, and I've

(29:34):
had a lot of clients actually dothis. And at the beginning of
the at the end of theconversation, I said, tell me
how high is your negative poleright now? And she goes, Well,
it's like a seven out of a scaleof 10. And I said, Great. I
said, What was it when westarted? And she said it was a
two. And I said, that'sfantastic, because what you're

(29:54):
doing is worthy of a seven, andit's telling you it's a seven.
Like you're listening to whatthis is going to mean. How do
you go all in on going fromhaving a paycheck to writing
invoices and deliveringsomething people are willing to
pay for? And like, I did notexpect this call to go that way.
I thought you were going to calmme down. And I said, I'm not

(30:16):
trying to make you not calm.
What I'm trying to have youunderstand is how much energy
you need

to do. Yeah, and I think that's so important. It's
not all just necessarily aboutthat. You know, fuck it. I'm all
in. Let's just do this. Itreally is acknowledging the
level of the thing that you wantto do. But if you still want to
do it, that's great, but you'rejust equipped with more
knowledge. Now, you know,there's a there's just a sense
of reality there that comes withit. I think that's really

(30:44):
important too.

Lynn (30:45):
Well, you shouldn't be jumping out of airplanes without
having the preparation, bothmental and physical, that is
required

Exactly. And like I said, the people that make me
really nervous, so the Yahoopeople that are like, Look at
me. I'm just doing this for aquick adrenaline in the hit. And
quite often they're the onesthat get hurt. You know, with
that kind of stuff comes a biglevel of responsibility as well,
almost to the point of annoyanceto some people. And it be
boring. You know, it's, I thinkproductions are quite often

(31:13):
shocked about how strict we areabout certain things that we
just won't deviate from to keepus safe when they're not getting
what they want. You know, it'syou. You have to respect what
you're doing and then level ofrisk that you're taking each
time. It's always that you'reconstantly mitigating that risk
and analyzing it, yeah,

Lynn (31:33):
well, and being prepared for the unexpected. Because, you
know, I'm on the other end,flying airplanes, not nothing
out

which is just which is more terrifying to me.
I don't

Lynn (31:46):
think so at all, because I understand the risk, and I've
dove, yeah, and we practicethings going wrong. And
actually, one of the assumptionsI noted as I've been on this
journey in my 20s, my my biggestfear was to have to do stalls
and things that felt weird inthe plane, or, do you know,
engine off landings or whatever,and I was like, I don't want

(32:10):
anything to go wrong. Myassumption then was, I don't
want anything to go wrong as Ideveloped and came back to it in
my 60s. It was okay. Things aregoing to go wrong. Great. Now,
how do you show up when thingsgo wrong? So be happy when the
instructor says we're going topull the power and now land the

(32:32):
plane. Or be thrilled when theysay we're going to do these
steep turns, or we're going todo the engines on fire, do a
steep, spiraling downward, diveto put the engine out, put the
flames out, and it'd be like, Idon't want this to ever happen.
No? Now it's like, hey, Yay,it's happening. Let me see how
well I do putting this fire out,

you see? And it's just, I can relate so well to
that, and it's such a metaphorfor life, right? We want to make
choices or decisions that kindof take us away from the option
of that ever happening or, youknow, but the problem is, is it
will it will happen. Life willspiral at some point, the engine

(33:12):
will stall. My parachute willnot open correctly at some
point, and we it's, it's exactlythe same as the saying with
skydiving, it's not if you'regoing to have a malfunction,
it's when you're going to have amalfunction. I had the same
thing. I had this utter terrorof having my main parachute
malfunction. And it does happen,and it averages one in 1000 and

(33:35):
at one point, I was doing 1000jumps a year. That's how much I
was training. And I now I've hadabout nine parachute
malfunctions, but up until I hadthe first one, I was terrified.
Even though we drilled it allthe time, I still was terrified
of having one. And then ithappened, and you deal with it,

(33:56):
and then I wasn't terrified ofit anymore, like I did it, I did
my drills, I landed on myreserve. I'm alive. Everything's
okay. And it just shifted forme. But I had that attitude of
avoiding and hoping it wouldn'thappen for so long. And if we
take that kind of thing intolife as well, you just, it's

(34:17):
just you have this false senseof safety. But it's not that
kind of attitude is not safety.
It's restraint. It's holding youback. And like you said, when
you lean into it, into the whatcan go wrong, and not be scared
of it, you always come out theother side, kind of just more
confident. You're more capablethan you think you

Lynn (34:36):
are. Oh, I'm so glad you used the word confident, because
it's the courage, I think thatyou had to stay with it that
builds the confidence. And Ialways

say that people think I'm confident, I'm like,
I'm not. Courage leads toconfidence, because confidence
comes on the backside of theexperience. Yes, it does. You
don't get it beforehand. And.
That's what I think, where somany people trip up is like,
it's okay to not feel confident.
You've still just gotta figureout how to be brave enough to go

(35:08):
into it, to gain the confidenceon the other side of it.

Lynn (35:11):
Yeah, I had, I have heard courage defined as commitment
plus doubt.

Oh, isn't that good? Oh, that's so good. You
would actually it. Yeah,

Lynn (35:23):
you wouldn't do it's not courage if there's no doubt. The
piece on the other side iscapture it the nine times you've
captured the confidence that Ican get myself out of this. For
me, the first stall in anairplane was not like it was the
worst feeling of my life becauseon the edge of a spin, and it's
like, I really don't want to dothat. Yeah. And

it goes against all your instincts. Then you

Lynn (35:48):
come out of it, and you're like, oh, okay, now I know how
to do that. Yeah. And then youhave that under your belt, like
it's just normal. And then youcan build on that, if you are
willing to build on it. This iswhere I've had to learn. It's in
those moments of things notgoing right that we build the
mental tools, the mental fitnessfor the next thing

exactly right. How else do we grow? How else do we
learn? Yeah, and I think peoplejust tend to avoid the things
that have the risk of not goingright, but don't realize how
much they're cripplingthemselves in life by by doing
that, by seeking that familiardiscomfort,

Lynn (36:32):
right? Well, then this is what I love. Stevie Delahunt was
also a speaker the same. Yes, Iwas, and I've been out to ride
with her now, and I'm about tobe out there in a couple of
weeks. It'll be my fourth time.

Such a big fan of hers.

Lynn (36:46):
But she talks a lot about predict productive discomfort,
and she is not afraid of puttingpeople in uncomfortable
circumstances at all, people orhorses. It's like, Yeah, but
it's a productive thing in thatit causes you to learn and grow.
And yes, I saw and I talked toChantelle about this as well,

(37:09):
but Andrew Huberman is the onewho kind of got me onto this
idea that it's agitation isrequired for learning and
growth, exactly. And so thisfeeling, whatever we call it,
negative, positive pole,adrenaline, hit, whatever. You
can't change anything. If thelittle cells inside of you are
not vibrating, they have to bekind of loosened or shaken up
like a snow globe. Yeah? And soif you try to change from your

(37:32):
comfort zone, which, believe me,I did for a very long time,
you're not going to change much.
Yeah?

No, you're just intellectualizing everything
from your comfort zone, you'reunderstanding it, but you're not
actually putting it intopractice. And the thing that
stops us from putting thosethings into practice is is the
fear, the fear of the unknownand and that's the thing that we
have to practice, that it's okayto going into something that you
don't fully understand. And Ihad this, one of my favorite

(38:01):
quotes when I start gettinganxious about something, is
you're only scared because it'sunfamiliar, not because you're
capable, you know, not becauseyou're not capable. It's the
unfamiliarity that terrifies us,and it's learning to move
through that

Lynn (38:18):
uncertainty seems to be like one of the human major
dreads. And I think about ourhunter gatherer ancestors, who
probably lived in a level ofuncertainty that none of us
could even Yeah, andnow we want everything
predictable. Yeah,

exactly. And I mean, it is. It's wired into us.
And they say that thatuncertainty, never knowing when
their next meal is going tocome, what predator is going to
come and get them. But we livein a very different world right
now. But like you said, thatprimal instinct is so hard wired
into us, but as we know, sciencehas proven that we can rewire,

(38:58):
you know, the way our brainworks. In that sense, we just
have to keep practicing it.
Yeah,

Lynn (39:03):
absolutely, there is no question. Because I've, I've
been on that journey personally,and the things that I do now
that I couldn't do just a merefew years ago, sometimes even
just a mere few weeks ago, yeah,are mind boggling to me. I've
been open to allowing theagitation to run me and,

yeah, yeah, yeah.
And I still slip back into it. Idon't want people to think that
I've just got this, you know,down to a T. I still have
crippling moments of, you know,anxiety and self doubt and but I
just think over the years, I'vemanaged to move through those
quicker, because I understandthe emotions that are coming
with it right now, and I've I'mless scared to sit in that

(39:46):
feeling and be with it, asopposed to push it away. Yes,
and because we, you know, we sooften, will go back to even if
we're not happy, and. Life, it'sa familiar discomfort, right?
And we've taught ourselves howto live with it, and we like
familiarity, and we know whatwe're dealing with, even if it's

(40:08):
not a nice reality, weunderstand it, and we've taught
ourselves how to live with it.
So we convince ourselves thatthat's safe and that's why we
stay with it, but it'sunderstanding that that really
is just a restraint. It's notsafety. And I think that's what
I always come down to. You haveto ask yourself, are you living

(40:28):
a life out of out of fear orchoice? What is driving you the
fear that's keeping you in thisspot, or are you genuinely
choosing to be where you areright now? Question I have to
ask myself constantly.

Lynn (40:43):
I have to do it for myself, because I am a master of
saying that fear is behind mewhen it's squarely in front of
me. Lots of little tricky waysof saying but I'm not really
afraid. Yeah, you know, totally,I could totally do that, but I
you know, I'm not gonna, andit'd be like, Oh, well, yeah,

(41:04):
you are. Or, I mean, yeah, rightin front of you,

yeah. And you've learned when you kind of that
little voices is creating astory that that's packaged
really well, that makes sense,but deep down, you're like,
Okay, this is, this is bullshit.

Lynn (41:18):
So when you're in those moments and it's so cool to hear
that somebody that's done allthe things you've done, and yet
still done those things, butyou've been in that, what you
called crippling place. How?
What is the first step you do tomove through it? How do you
break it

down? I say, I say something out loud. Okay, like I
say out loud? I am. There's twodifferent things. Let's say I'm
scared of doing something that Iknow I want. That one is a
little bit easier, because I'mnot in a state of anxiety, but
I'm just scared. I will say outloud, oh my god, I'm like, I've
jokingly said this before astunt. I know I'm physically

(41:55):
capable of doing it, but somepeople see this as a like a
doubt. But I've said, Man, I am.
I am shitting myself right now,but it's okay. It's okay, like I
should be, but I don't pretendthat I'm not scared, because for
me, that just, I just don't dowell with it, and that's why I'm
not the hugest fan of fake ittill you make it. I'm more of an
It's okay. Say, say what yourfear is, because it gives less

(42:17):
power to the thing that you'retrying to pretend that you're
you're not feeling, which isfear. I always think, if you say
it out loud and name what you'refeeling, it really does
dissipate. And then for me, forme, it's just been the practice
of moving through that scarything, the 321, action. I know
them. The moment I do it and Imove into it, the fear

(42:39):
dissipates, and I know on theother side that I'll get
answers. And this isn'tnecessarily, you know, a big
stunt, but let's say I'm makinga scary life decision. I always
ask myself, what is on the otherside of this fear, like, how are
you going to feel about walkingaway from the situation, or

(43:00):
pushing through to the situationthrough the other side. So I
kind of, I take the scary thingthat's in front of me out of the
equation, and just think aboutthe feeling that I want to have,
and if I go through it, is thatfeeling good? Let's, let's just
say if it's metaphoricallyjumping, you know, doing a cliff
jump or something. But thiscould be any life decision. Does

(43:22):
the idea of me climbing backdown that cliff and not doing it
feel okay? Does that feelsettled? And if, and if it does,
if you're like, Nope, I feelgood with not jumping off that
cliff, then great, fine. But ifI think about doing, like, not
doing it, and that, feelingcomes with, like this yuckiness
and disappointment in myself.

(43:43):
Then I realize, Okay, I've gotto go, I've got to go the other
side, and I know that on theother side I will normally have
answers. Because the the funnything is, is, what the with the
scenarios of jump or don't jump?
You've already felt the fear.
The fear is already there.
You're already feeling it. Yeah,you felt the fear whether you're
going to jump or whether you'regoing to climb back down the
cliff. And the problem is, whenyou climb that down the cliff,

(44:06):
you've already felt the fear,and now you've also got
disappointment and unansweredquestions. You've already felt
the fear. Or, yeah,

Lynn (44:14):
pay off of the endorphin kick the other side of the
adrenaline

kit, exactly. So sometimes I have to just take
that scary thing off the tableand just imagine what is on the
other side of that scary thing,and what it means to me by doing
it or not doing it. The I thinkthe more the anxious side of
things when I get into that kindof crippling state of anxiety or

(44:40):
fear about life or anything. Iused to be a classic avoidance
of that of just, you know,whether it be, you know, food,
alcohol, anything other thanfeel the discomfort and just, I
think, through a lot of therapy,I've just learned to sit in it
and ask and say out loud, what.
Is this that I'm feeling? Is itshame? Is it guilt? Is it fear?

(45:02):
Is it avoidance? What is it? Andjust naming it and then asking
myself, why do you feel that?
And just going through the verybasic steps again, this was
something that I understood fora long time. I was like, Yeah, I
get it. That makes sense. Saythat loud name of the Uber but I
didn't do it, and it wasn't tillI started doing the very simple

(45:23):
practice of naming it and askingmyself very simple questions
while sitting in thatdiscomfort. It it doesn't take
long to get out of it.

Lynn (45:33):
That's to me, that's what I call riding the wave. And if I
had a thing I did a lot withwith my coaching clients, it is
teaching them to feel thatwhatever that is, it's pretty
stunning, because I'm inleadership and corporate space,
and it's pretty stunning how fora lot of people, making a
difficult presentation can feellike jumping out of an airplane,

(45:56):
or making a big ask of the boss,you know, for a raise or a
promotion, or having to call theboss out on maybe making a
decision that's going to hurtthem long term, yeah, the speak
truth to power kind of thing.
Those kind of decisions feellike jumping out of an airplane
to

people exactly, and that that's what I try and
say to people all the time, likewhen I'm talking about bravery
and fear, I'm not talking aboutthe obvious stuff, like jumping
out of a plane or doing thismassive stunt. It can be about,
you know, saying uncomfortable,something uncomfortable that
you've been feeling, to yourpartner, asking for that raise,
doing that presentation in frontof people that you're

(46:33):
intimidated by, and it's alllife decisions. Then, to me,
they're just as terrifying, ifnot more terrifying than the,
you know, the the obvious, scarystuff that that I do,

Lynn (46:46):
and to me, that's the definition of what I call the
pressure gap, which is, how muchpressure does it take for a
skill that you are very good atand you've been doing your whole
life, possibly walking ortalking? How much pressure does
it take? Let's say you'retalking in front of a bunch of
people, or walking on somethingthat's very high or very thin or

(47:08):
very scary. Well, how muchpressure before your skills go
offline and you can't do thatthing anymore? Yep. And then do
to close that gap

you and your pressure gap thing is just so
essential, because that's whatpeople don't practice or
understand, and that's whatcatches them off guard, because
they they haven't thought aboutlike you say, the difference and
feeling of walking along a 12inch beam on the ground, which
you're perfectly capable ofdoing, or a 12 inch beam 100

(47:38):
feet up, which you're stillcapable of doing but it's
obviously the pressure is verydifferent. And I think that's
the thing that catches peopleoff guard, that makes them
immediately go, Oh, I'm notgoing to do that. This. This
feels horrible now, which is whyI don't, rightly or wrongly,
like before I did thatpresentation, my I before I

(48:04):
started practicing thatpresentation, I would put myself
there, like I said, to the pointthat I would think about it. I
would think about Warwickintroducing me. I would I would
think, and my heart rate wouldspike, and I would get nervous,
and then I would practice mypresentation in that state,
knowing that eventually I wouldbring that back down. But I

(48:25):
knew, and it's not a selffulfilling prophecy. I just know
myself well enough. I've been inenough scenarios where I've been
introduced or done things likethat in a public setting that my
heart rate or go like I like Ithink the audience can hear it
heart rate so loud. And becauseI just know myself, I knew that
was going to happen. I practicethings in that state of mind, so

(48:48):
when it happens, it feelsfamiliar, not Oh, God. I wasn't
expecting that. Like, you know,I practiced this so many times
in front of my cat, and it wasfine, you know, yeah,

Lynn (49:01):
well, that's, I mean, that's, you know, when I, I was
so glad at the podcast summitthat my first time up was
actually on a panel rightstanding in front of the group,
because by sitting in the panel,I got to feel the audience I
got. Because what a lot ofpeople don't recognize until
they're up in front of a crowdis you can go into an empty

(49:22):
theater and practice your yourspeech. We did that at the TED
talk I did, can you and thenwhen you go in and the audience
is there, the energy in theaudience that you can feel is
different

you can feel. And even just catching eye contact
with someone can throw you offfor a second. Yeah,

Lynn (49:39):
and it's not just the I mean, each audience, I think,
has its own tone to it as well.
So and each room sort of createsa different way it echoes and I
and everything. So I was so gladthat I had gotten a chance to
sit in front of the audience theday before I gave my actual
speech. Yeah. Yeah, because andI already was ready for when I

(50:01):
stood up, I felt like they werealready my friends.

Yeah, massively, no, I didn't think about at the

Lynn (50:09):
beginning, because at the beginning I was just like, well,
who are you? You know, who am I?
What are we doing?

Yeah, I just if there's a place where I can
prepare or give myself as muchfamiliarity as possible. I will
take that on board, you know, Iwill get to set early and look
at what I'm dealing with. Soit's not brand new when I get
there, or, for example, doingthat presentation. I I asked
Tyler, can I go there the daybefore? Because I was there, I

(50:36):
wanted to stand on the stage. Iwanted to get there on my own,
and I wanted to stand there, andI wanted to look out so it
wasn't the first time that I didthat on the day, just because I
know I'm a baby sometimes and Iget really nervous, and anything
that I can do to for thescenario to feel more familiar,
I'll take it. But you also haveto train yourself that you're
not always going to get thoseopportunities. But if I can set

(50:58):
myself up for success andprepare as much as possible. I
always will do that.

Lynn (51:02):
I in most of the settings I've been in with professional
speakers, etc. There is a lot oftalk about that, like, I need to
have access to the stage aheadof time. You know, I would like
to have the lectern here thespeaker this way, whatever
things that you can do to setthings up in your own just to
get yourself moved along,because that's part of breaking

(51:24):
down the process. It'scompletely not unlike having to
go see something before you do astunt. You're not going to just
go in there and walk in and dothe stunt, right?

Yeah, yeah. And I think that that brings us on to
another thing that I think youtalk about as well. Quite often,
people stop themselves fromdoing things by comparing
themselves to others. They seethe end result, and like, I
could never do that withoutknowing all the failures and
fear and mental breakdowns thathave come along the way to get

(51:53):
you there. You know people like,Oh, she's a cool Hollywood stunt
woman. They're not seeing me cryon the kitchen floor with my me
saying I'm never gonna make it,or, you know, what am I doing?
I'm never gonna be, you know,good enough. And my friend
saying you've got to keeptrying, you know, or driving
three hours on the freeway justto meet one person that might be
able to give me a job or train.
And people see the end result,and they're like, Oh, I could

(52:16):
never do that. But they don'tsee the hot mess that happened
for

Lynn (52:21):
you, all the preparation, all the all the things you've
done along the way, because we,I think we are also conditioned.
I call that gulping. We'reconditioned to get to the end
very quickly, right? Yeah, I'm,I'm notorious about it. In fact,
I'm back in it again with mybook, because I I read my book
into the podcast, and initiallyjust had to read one chapter

(52:44):
because I was not going to do anaudible book. I was not finished
audible book is like, I don'teven know how to do that. And so
I gulped, you know, a lot, andthen I said, okay, just break it
down. And actually, the firsttime I read the chapter, I
didn't even publish it. Like, Iwas like, Okay, I did it once.
Now let me just see if I can doit again, and this time maybe
like, not sound like monotone.
And then I was like, okay, thereI am, because I could tell it

(53:07):
wasn't me talking, yeah. And soI said, Okay, break that down to
another piece. And now I'm atthe stage where it's like, okay,
what am I going to accept aroundstumbles in my words? Does it
have to be 100% perfect, orbecause it's me and I'm reading
my book and I'm the publisher,and it sounds like me, and I
sometimes stumble over my words.

(53:30):
Should that not also maybe bethe case in the book so clean my
my little, tiny step I'm workingon right now is what's
acceptable and what's not aroundjust that but, but before I had
been gulping, going, it has tobe perfect. And I was looking at
how to figure out how to get aneditor to piece in new

(53:50):
sentences, and do I have to readthe whole thing over again. In
other words, I was gulping, andit was intimidating.

And that, I love that phrase gulping, and I'm
going to use that because I'm soguilty of it whenever I go into,
like, my next phase of life, andit, it's that whole thing you're
waiting to feel ready, or you'rewaiting for everything to be
perfect before you start moving.
And something is better thannothing, and you just need to
start with the tools that youhave, right? And then it starts

(54:15):
to fall into place. But I canrelate to that massively as I'm
moving like, you know, I stilllove performing, but I want to
move more into this angle ofthings as well, and talk about
this, and do more publicspeaking and content on fear and
understand it more, because Ithink it's so important. And in
my brain, it's the same thing.
I'm like, I gotta have awebsite. I gotta do this, I

(54:35):
gotta do that, I gotta do this,I gotta do all these things. I
gotta read 20 books. I've got todo and then you go into freeze
mode, everything that you've gotto get done. And you think, and
I have to do it in a week. It'sjust impossible. And like you
said, just do one thing. Just doone thing today.

Lynn (54:55):
And I, I'm a huge fan of the Pareto Principle, which is
the 8020 rule. Yeah, which is 8%of your success comes from 20%
of your actions. And that's thatsignal versus noise piece.
Again, what is the high leveragething that I can do next? Yes,
and, and if I can't find a highleverage thing, then just do

(55:15):
something, because movement isthe first thing you have to
have.

I just took the weather my life just moved
towards it in some, some way,

Lynn (55:25):
yes, even if it's just something simple, like, I'm in
the process of moving house, andit'll take us a year. But I at
first it was so intimidating. Itwas like, You know what? I can
clean one drawer and clean onecloset, and then if I can't
clean the whole closet, I canclean one shelf

Exactly, exactly, just just to start something,
and it's okay. And it's okay ifyou start it and it messes up,
or it's harder than you thoughtit was going to be, or it didn't
go how that's okay as well. Itdoesn't mean just starting it is
going to go perfectly the firsttime around. It doesn't matter
if that first thing that you dois absolute crap, it's fine.

(56:05):
You've started Yeah,

Lynn (56:07):
and it never is that way, like every Master is a master,
because they suffered throughall the starts and stops and
starts and stops and starts andstops, the plateaus where it
looked like you're as far as youcan ever go. Yeah, and I've,
I've sometimes think that we getstuck not because of our lack of

(56:28):
skill, but because of ourbeliefs. I think of it as, like,
our belief. It's almost alwaysour belief holding us back. And
that's like our personal glassceiling, with,

without a doubt, without a doubt. It's just, it
can be so limiting it like, youknow, there are those that think
they can and there are thosethat think they can't, and
they're both right? And it's,it's, it is a huge thing. And
another thing that I found inlife, genuinely, is just when
you get to that point, if you'relike, This is never going to

(56:58):
happen, but you've still gotthat, that moment of, just keep
trying, but you feel like you'recoming to the end of, you know,
your tether. That's whensuddenly movement happens. When
you get to that point of justfeeling like, I just need to
stop. This is never gonna, thisis never gonna come to fruition.
It's that moment. Normally, ifyou push through when when it

(57:19):
changes, or when you get thatopportunity, or something comes
through, it's always been atthis time when I've just gotten
to the almost, almost about togive up, but haven't

Lynn (57:30):
at the edge. Yeah, yeah.
And that's the edge. Issomething I was taught as a
young child, because my motherwas afraid of heights. Don't go
near the edge. I built wallsaround every edge, not just the
like physical ones, although Idid like to drive her crazy. As
a kid, I would go jump offcliffs and the like and stuff
like that, which would be crazy.

(57:52):
I don't do that, but I would notgo near the edge of anything
that felt like it could take meto another place. And yet I've,
I was just thinking, as you weredescribing that, how many times
it's been right at that momentwhere the answer comes to me in
a problem and it's like, oh, itwas there all along. I was just

(58:13):
so busy gulping that I didn'tsee answer was sitting right
here, just one little, tiny

thing, yeah, oh gosh, I love that phrase,
gulping, yeah, so huge. So I

Lynn (58:27):
one of the things I have to ask about is how you
prepared, and I'm sure it wasdone in many steps, like we're
talking about for the big I wasso happy to see the carnival ad
where you jumped in. Yeah, tellme, like, how did that come to
be and describe, first of all,what it was for people that are
listening, that might not haveheard about it, but because I'm

(58:50):
on your Facebook page, so I sawthis whole like, Hannah jumped
in a swimming pool on a

cruise ship. First of all, I don't want to
disappoint you, but I do have tosay that we did fake the
swimming pool part at the end,so I didn't actually land my
parachute in a cruise ship pool.
But with it came a lot ofcomplications and a lot of
challenging times. But I canbreak it down for you know,

Lynn (59:15):
see how things break down because, yeah, lots of great
example and results, and what wesee are not the same, and

there are there also, it's true and but there
are so there's so much hiddenstuff that people don't see
behind this commercial thateverybody just goes, Oh my god.
That looked like so much fun.
And it was actually one of thescariest guys that I've done.
Yeah, I was smiling, but that sothere was a commercial. It was
for Carnival cruises. I'm in ahelicopter, and they're actually
featuring me. I'm not doublingsomeone, and I jump out of a

(59:43):
helicopter. I kind of fly overthe top of the cruise ship. It's
in the Dominican Republic andand we make it look as though I
landed the parachute into aswimming pool. What I actually
did was jump off a platform wecut and because the the pool was
too. Died that the windconditions were right, it would
have been an extremely,extremely tricky maybe, maybe

(01:00:04):
get it right stunt that we justweren't prepared to risk. But
the end result is me, you know,smiling, jumping out of a
helicopter, looking like abadass, landing in a pool, you
know. And everything's great.
The prep that went into that wasjust so many production
meetings, getting differentkinds of equipment together. Me

(01:00:28):
wanting to go back, try, youknow, on my own time, back to my
home drop zone, because I hadn'tskydived for a while, and I just
wanted to get really familiarwith all the safety and basics.
Again, I've got, I got noproblem being a world champion
skydiver and then going to mymentor, hey, I want to go back
all the basics, please. Becauseit's been a while, it's I just
think it's so important forpeople never to lose that

(01:00:50):
feeling of you're never you'renever too good to go back to the
beginning again when things

Lynn (01:00:56):
smart. If you say that, because in pilot, for example,
we have to stay current.

Hannah Betts (01:01:00):
And that's the same with skydiving. You do have
to stay current as well, and itwill will diminish. They will
diminish. And the if I'm beinghonest, that the free fall side
of things is not difficult atall, but where you can come into
problems is flying a parachute,or your safety drills, just a
lot of stuff that you need toreally stay calm and make

(01:01:20):
decisions quickly when you'reunder a parachute, if you're not
in the right place, because wedon't have engines, we're only
going down. We can't circleagain, right? If we don't like
our approach, there's no doovers and the wind, we're at the
mercy of the wind direction. SoI was jumping out of it's and

(01:01:41):
this is part of my prep is itwas a lot of unknowns. We had
planned landing areas, butbecause we didn't fully
understand the winds in thatpart of the island, and it's one
of those things that you don'tknow until you do the jump for
the first time. And we hadalternate landing areas prepared
depending on what the windconditions may or may not be. We
can get an idea from thereports, but you never truly

(01:02:04):
know. But part of my prep and Iactually videoed myself doing
this, because I rememberthinking, this is really
important for people tounderstand. I went over and over
just my opening sequence, buteven to the point that I went
over the I talked myself throughthe pilot saying 8000 feet, and
me getting nervous, and then thepilot saying, 10,000 feet. Me
getting more nervous. Mechecking my gear. This is all my

(01:02:26):
drills in my head that I wasgoing over and over again. Me
looking out at the spot with mycameraman to check we're in the
right place. Me reminding myselfI have to smile when I get out
of the plane, even though I'mterrified, like in my head, it
was 321, smile, not 321. Exit.
Exiting was going to happenregardless, checking out, going
through the sequence that theywanted to, you know, for the to

(01:02:48):
capture in frame where I wasgoing to be, in regards to the
lighting, making sure that Iwasn't backlit, making sure that
I was in the sun, and thecameraman was in front of me,
keeping an eye on my altitude,and part of my drill was opening
up my parachute, looking downand me not liking the picture,
me not being where I thought Iwas going to be, and having to

(01:03:13):
make quick, solid decisionswithout panicking. And I drilled
that into my visualization, likenot best case scenario, a little
bit of a worst case scenario.
And thank goodness I did,because when Craig and I,
Craig's my videographer, welooked down, we had drifted

(01:03:35):
about half a mile in free fall.
The upper winds were that strongin free fall, the winds have
moved us that far, and we endedup in a spot that was, let's
just say, less than ideal, overterrain that you would not want
to land. And the first thing Isaid to myself was, this was the
point where you said youpromised yourself you would not
panic, you would breathe deep,and you would make some

(01:03:56):
decisions. So it was. It was afamiliar feeling of going, Oh,
this is bad. It's okay, asopposed to it being a surprise,
like, this is not the picture Iwas hoping for, you know, and it
it, it was. It was some sketchywind conditions. I landed fine
that the because I was in a goodframe of mind, I made a decision

(01:04:19):
I knew was going to make it backto the spot that I needed to get
to, landed next to a Longhorncow in a field, which was
hilarious, you know. And thenthere was other parts of the of
that skydive that we really hadto adjust for wind conditions
that were actually really out,you know, incredibly
uncomfortable for me, where wehad to get out upwind over

(01:04:41):
mountains. It just felt veryexposed. But people only see the
end result of me jumping out thehelicopter and smiling. They
don't understand all this. Istill gotta land somewhere
safely after I've done that, andthen the jumping into the pool
section, which seemed quitestraightforward. Like to the
outside. It wasn't completelystraightforward, because inside

(01:05:03):
the swimming pool, all thesemetal water cannons to simulate
water shooting out of the poolviolently to make it more
comical when I hit the water. Sothere was a flash. Yeah, so,
but, and the reason thathappened is because there are
all these huge metal basicallydeath traps beneath me,
surrounding me as I land in thepool. So every time I jumped in

(01:05:24):
the pool, I had to make sure Ilanded in exactly the right
spot, or I would have had acatastrophic injury. Yeah. So
what people see me just going,woo, jumping into a pool,
smiling. I'm actually every timelooking going, okay, don't push
out too far. Don't push out toosmall. Don't make 321, action.
Amp you up more. So you push offmore. You know, it's just, it's

(01:05:45):
normal. So what just seems likea simple jump into a pool, that
there's always more, there'salways more than meets the eye
with the with the end product.
And I, and I just think that's abig lesson for people to take
away all the time.

Lynn (01:06:03):
Yeah, it goes back to what you were talking about
comparison, because thensomebody's going to, like, try
to dive into a pool and makeyour splash, for example, and
they'll never make it becausethey don't have the hidden,
can't

realize that there's, yeah, exactly, there's
a whole bunch. And this is,

Lynn (01:06:19):
this is, I mean, in today's society, you know, with
social media, there is so muchpressure to match what you see
on camera, which is comingthrough social media, which is,
you know, a few steps shy ofmovie life, but definitely not
real life, that comparingourselves to other people's

(01:06:39):
lives on camera that are editedfor the best moments, almost
never edited for the worstmoments. And you know, and no
wonder we're all saying, oh, Ishould feel good all the time. I
shouldn't be feeling thissensation of agitation or
discomfort or whatever you wantto call it. I should be just

(01:07:00):
fine, and I should be able to dothat. And the answer is, No,
you're comparing yourself to thewrong thing.

Yeah, you're comparing yourself to something
that is not a reality, yeah, andit's so and I have to remind
myself all the time, and if youhave to stay in your lane, and
you know, Brene Brown,Comparison is the thief of joy.
It really it's just the mostenergy sapping, unproductive
thing that you can do. And Icatch myself in it constantly,

(01:07:32):
but I pull myself out of it alot quicker. I understand when
I'm doing it now, where I usedto live in it, I used to live in
comparison, and it wascrippling, absolutely crippling.
And it's just such a such apointless thing. We're all
individuals with such uniqueattributes, and we all have
something positive to contributeto this world. We're all so

(01:07:53):
special, and we spend so much ofour energy trying not to be that
person and trying to imitatesomeone that you're not meant to
be. What a waste

Lynn (01:08:03):
of time. I'm just sitting here kind of going, check,
check, check, do I comparemyself there, yes, do I compare
myself there? Yes. Like, I do itall the time. Now, I catch
myself more often, but I can'tsay I always successfully, like,
break away, and I'm in a sportwith water skiing, where the
comparisons are really easy tosee, because, yeah, how many

(01:08:25):
movies did you get? And, youknow, I remember, sometimes I
cringe when I get off the dockand somebody says, Well, what'd
you ski today? And it's like,I'll just try to say something
for my own sake, better thanyesterday, or I have work to do
rather than number.

Just say the number, yeah, you're
auditioning. You're auditioning.
Or, like, giving it, yeah, like,excuse it. It's, I think it's
very hard in this day and age,just the way that we are just
bombarded with other people'sstuff, not to compare. I think
it's unrealistic to think thatwe can just get out of that
comparison zone all the time. Ithink it's just important to

(01:09:03):
understand that we catchourselves in it and want to do
with it quicker. I mean, I'msure there's people out there
that are maybe out of it all thetime. Unfortunately, I'm, I'm
forced into social media becauseof my work. It's like I have a
love hate relationship with it.
And right now it's, yeah, itsucks. I wish I could delete all

(01:09:24):
of it.

Lynn (01:09:26):
You know, it's funny that you said that. I've actually
backed away. I'm not posting asmuch on Facebook or Instagram as
I was before. I've kind of justdoubled down on LinkedIn,
because that's where most of myclients are and and as I I mean,
at least weekly, I think I'mjust going to back away all the
way, and I'm like, Yeah, exceptfor you know, you have a
podcast, you have a book, it'skind of hard to, like, keep

(01:09:50):
those things alive, if notcompletely step away. So

I think it's just understanding, yeah, what it is
for tool and. How it works withyou, and I think that you, you
just have to keep yourself ontrack to make sure it's a
healthy use, and it doesn't pullyou in into an unhealthy use.
And it's, as you say, it's thatyou we're never going to have a
balance all the time. This issomething that I just loved so

(01:10:16):
much from your presentation thatstuck with me. And I tell people
all the time, because it wassomething I struggled with that
I thought I had to be balanced,or like, I'm not in this center
place all the time. I'm notgetting it right all the time.
We're never balanced. You'reconstantly balancing. And the
idea is to just try and keepthat seesaw a little bit more

(01:10:37):
level, rather than the hugehighs and lows, but to think
that you're just going to havethis perfect horizontal line the
whole time is the most reallyridiculous thing. And so the
idea of constantly balancing,yes, in a healthy way, as
opposed to being balanced allthe time, was honestly, like,
revolutionary for me. So one ofthe things that I quote to

(01:10:58):
people all the time when theywhen they're stressing
themselves out about, like, Oh,I was eating so well last week,
and now I'm terrible. Or, Oh, Ihaven't done this and I haven't
done that. I'm like, hold on aminute. Have you like, have you
gone to an extreme? No,

Lynn (01:11:12):
you know, the one time you're balanced is when you're
no longer moving in your coffin.

Be Exactly. But I just think the analogy was, was
it's just, it's so important,it's never been explained to me
that way either.

Lynn (01:11:27):
Well, I'm glad, I mean that was, that was in my
horseback riding journey,perhaps the biggest thing,
because I'd already been allabout balance, but realized it
had been only an intellectualopportunity until I had to
actually face what I had done tomyself, falling off that and
whether I got back on and thenyou've got the literal balance
of being on the horse, butthere's so much metaphorical

(01:11:49):
balance as well. And having apicture that kept yelling at me
I don't want the horse to do thepicture when all I wanted was
the horse to stop and do thepicture like Just please,
perfect. And when you find out,like what you see in movies
about horses, which is where Igot all my knowledge, is as off
as your description of whathappened with the you know,

(01:12:10):
helicopter. Yeah, right. We'renot seeing reality.

You're not seeing reality. And you've met, you've
made up your own story in yourhead, and you've filled in the
gaps without understanding.
Yeah, this the same way we do.
If we get into arguments or we,you know, we we start filling in
the gaps of the stories thatwe're telling ourselves. It's
not it's not true.

Lynn (01:12:34):
It's not true. We, if we really knew how much of what we
think is reality are theassumptions of stories we're
telling ourselves, yeah, goingback to that sensation you were
talking about, it's not thesensation, it's the story you
tell about the sensation,exactly, and you change your
story, yeah, right. And itchanged your relationship,

yeah, and exactly.
And, you know, change the way wesee things, the things we see
changes Borik always talks aboutbut, and I think that was the
biggest takeaway from me, thatthe fear that I used to feel
terrified me into feeling morefear, and now the fear that I
feel, I'm like, cool, it's withme. I like it, yeah, I like it.
Like

Lynn (01:13:15):
letting it like I like the distinction of it's informing
versus interfering,

yes, yeah, exactly. And when, when it, when
I first feel it, I, like I said,trying not to observe, trying to
observe it, rather than absorbit. I also treat it almost like
a little distraction. Like, holdon a minute. Let me just put
this feeling aside, thisphysical feeling. What is it
that that my brain is trying totell me right now that, you

(01:13:43):
know, it's just a noise in thebackground. It's not something
that's telling me to moveimmediately one way or another.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, but youcalibrated it,

Lynn (01:13:53):
yeah. So, so what do you have coming up? Do you have
anything we can be looking outfor that you can talk about at
this point between your speakingor your stuff, or any place you
might be appearing that we canlook for,

um, possibly, well, I was just telling you
about this. I just got,probably, by the time this airs,
I just got a random call,potentially about jumping in a
in a wedding dress for for amovie premiere promotion, which
is random. I don't often getvery many skydiving jobs. It
just so happens that I just gota call about one right before I

(01:14:26):
got on the this call with you.
I'm trying to think what else iscoming out right now? Nothing,
nothing too crazy. There's justTV stuff that you quite often
you're not going to see mebecause it's not me. I'm
pretending to be somebody else.

Lynn (01:14:44):
Yeah, is there other I know? When I had Kansas
Carradine on, she had just beenon heartland, which is one of my
favorite shows episode, andagain, after she told me where
she was and everything, I wentback and watched, and you can't
tell it's Kansas at all. No.

Of doing our job

Lynn (01:15:04):
like I knew she was filling in for

right? So, yeah, and, I mean, that's one of the
huge things that I had to dealwith. Being in Hollywood, you're
literally compared when you'restunt doubling people, you're
matched up with someone height,weight, you know it's, it can be
really, you have to really havea strong sense of self,
especially when it comes to, youknow, size and women and all

(01:15:26):
those kind of things. So we'reconstantly being directly
compared to the very person thatyou have to stunt double for,
yeah, because they

Lynn (01:15:35):
are looking for a match, yeah, yeah. I mean, they're not
gonna double for somebody who'sa totally different body type or

different ethnicity or, yeah, looks
different, but, yeah, no, that'sgreat that you didn't recognize
who your Candice was, becausethat's that means we're doing
our job. We're blending in withthe character.

Lynn (01:15:52):
And see, that's kind of the weird that's like the weird
dichotomy, right? Because you'rein an industry that's sort of
known for the exposure it bringsyou. Yeah, well, then you
already know you're not going tohave that. Yeah,

it's very interesting, because I most
stunt people aren't really in itto, you know, be on camera or
feel the fame. It's just weenjoy the job that we're doing.
And it is quite funny. Just, I'mso used to looking away from
camera intentionally, or havingmy hair down, hiding my face, or
falling in a way where you can'tsee my face, which is really

(01:16:31):
funny when I did this Oscarscommercial, because I kept
getting told of like, myinstinct when I came out from
under the water was to have myback to camera like, Anna, this
is about you. We actually wantto see like, sorry, sorry,

Lynn (01:16:43):
yeah, because you mentioned that, like having to
be in the right place for thesmile and the lighting and all
of that stuff,

yeah, yeah, there's, there's so much more
going on behind the scenes. Andpeople see it's like, yeah, it's
a lot more. Even there's nothingsimple, you know, there's no
such thing as an easy stunt.
That's something that we alwayssay, because that's when you get
hurt, when you start thinking,Oh, this is a nothing thing.
That's when you're gonna hurt.
That's when you get hurt.

Lynn (01:17:09):
Well, you said something that triggered a question for
me, which is, what is it thatdoes drive people to enter your
industry? What makes you want tobe a stunt woman, or what made
you want to be a stunt woman?

I know, gosh, that's a million dollar
question. I'm sure a lot ofpsychologists can have a field
day. And I ask myself thisquestion all the time, and I
think I talked about that in mypresentation. When I when I talk
about being brave, doesn'tnecessarily I'm not talking
about doing a huge stunt,because that can often become
attached with outside validationand ego. And I'd be lying. I

(01:17:42):
would be lying personally, if Ididn't say I can sometimes still
be driven for the wrong reasons,for the for the outside
validation. You know the look atyou, look how cool you are. I
think, I think a lot of peoplenaturally get into stunts
because they have excelled atwhat sport they've done
genuinely, you'll often find,you know, someone's a world

(01:18:04):
champion motocross person or amartial artist or a gymnast or a
skydiver, and that has led theminto stunts. And then they get
more well rounded. Theyunderstand how to train, if that
makes sense, they've alreadyexcelled at sports, so they kind
of understand the formula, andthey have great body awareness,
so it's easy for them to kind ofpick up new skills. I one, one

(01:18:27):
common theme that I will saythat stunt performers have other
than a little bit of an ego anddrive for outside validation, is
you're around a bunch of grownups that have not lost their
sense of play, which I finddelightful. They're not
immature. They're not drillingin junkies. They're not risk

(01:18:47):
takers. They're actuallyincredibly professional people,
hard working people are workinghard outside of the camera to
hone in their skill. They'redialing in action that's
incredibly, you know,complicated with so many
different things that are goingon, whether it be, you know,
rigging and driving and just allthese safety things that you

(01:19:09):
have to put in place. But sothere's this absolute level of
professionalism with a bunch ofbig kids. And I like that, that
there is still such a thing theyhaven't lost their sense of
play. And I think that's just animportant thing that as grown
ups, we need to, we need tocarry with us. Remember,
Christine Dixon did that wholepresentation on how important
play was, and we and we lose it,and that is something that I

(01:19:31):
definitely enjoy about ourindustry.

Lynn (01:19:33):
I love to play. And, you know, I've actually discovered
when I go catch horses, andsince I don't have my own horse,
I'm often going to catchsomebody else's horse, sometimes
in a big pasture, sometimes youknow, and sometimes I know them,
sometimes I don't, but I'velearned if I have a halter in my
hand, I come out with a sense ofplay. And if I say to a horse,
you want to go play, I've neverhad one turn away me. They're

(01:19:57):
like, yeah, I

want to go play.
Yeah. And then you what? Thosepeople going on there. I gotta
catch him. I hope he doesn't runaway from me. What do you think
is going to happen? Right?

Lynn (01:20:07):
Wow, I call that agenda brain, and I totally can have
that too, right? Funny when youtalk about having a sense of
play, and it's the same withpeople. I remember years ago, I
had a coach, I was in a session,I was in like a some kind of
leadership session, and theysaid, you know, what do you
think your purpose is? And theygave us a couple of ways of
finding it, but the first onewas literally close your eyes

(01:20:30):
and asked what you thought itwas when you were eight years
old. And I closed my eyes andimmediately was have fun and
help people. And if I look at mylife today, it's like, that's my
life now, some people look atLinda has too much fun. It's
like, she didn't work very hard.
It's like, No, I do. I amhelping people too.

Yeah, sorry, I'm the the audience can't see me
just gritting from ear to ear,right? But if it wasn't fun, or
there wasn't a sense of play,why on earth would you not you
know what? That's what we shouldbe doing. We, like of you, can't

(01:21:13):
have fun all the time.
Obviously, we can't have joywithout feeling sadness. But I
do think if, if, if we're nothaving fun, and what are we
doing? And if we're not, we needto really figure out what's
stopping us from from

Lynn (01:21:28):
that. And actually, honestly, if it's something I
still have to do, and I wouldn'tnormally call it fun, I find a
way to make it fun, or I find away to make it at least
satisfying, like I had topressure wash 100 chairs, and I
had to move them. And, you know,it was physically challenging,
but I was like, You know what?
There is nothing more satisfyingthan seeing dirt disappear, you

(01:21:50):
know. And then I made a game of,like, looking at all right, how
am I going to move the chairs?
Where do they need to be? Andjust went into, like, breaking
it down step by step, justputting the same things I use
for applying pressure andsomething fun, quote, unquote, I
used for something that wasn'tnecessarily fun. And I ended the

(01:22:11):
day very satisfied. I was tiredtoo, pressure washing. But

you make it, you make it part of the dance. You
can see it. And I think that's,that's a big thing about that. I
think ranch living has taught methat about life as there's the
jobs are never done, right?
They're never done. So if you'reconstantly thinking, I've got to
do this, I've got to get thatdone. I got to do that as if
it's just this never ending todo list, that's just a miserable
way. And I was guilty of thatfor a long time, and then I just
realized this is part of thelife. This is part of the dance.

(01:22:37):
Change how you do the things andaccept that this is part of life
all the time. You're never goingto have this list done. It's
always going to be there. Andnow you can choose how you're
going to move through that. Ifit's this desperate list that
you're just trying to get ridof,

Lynn (01:22:56):
and it can either be a burden or it can lift you up,
and it's all about your mindset,yes, yes, and yeah, oh gosh,
because you're talking abouttasks. And yet, do we go through
life going, I cannot believe Ihave to brush my teeth again, oh
my god, I have to comb my hairagain. And it's like, yeah, you
have to put load the dishes inthe dishwasher, and you have to,

(01:23:18):
and you have to, and you haveto, like, it's like, I love the
idea of calling it part of thedance,

yeah. So it's really great. I wish I had the
quote it, damn it. I'll have tofind it, but it's something to
do, yeah. The end is, or you cantreat it as part of a dance. And
those it changed everything forme. Like, yep, this is how it
is,

Lynn (01:23:36):
well. And in the same vein, I heard a quote the other
day that said, instead ofpraying for an easy life, pray
for the strength to live thelife you've been given. Yeah,
yeah. And I was like, Oh, ifthat doesn't define my
transformation and my my and Idon't say I'm transformed, but I
feel like I'm transforming. It'sthat, you know, beginning to see

(01:23:59):
the things that not going wellas part of it, yeah,

but it's only because you're courageous enough
to lean into the discomfort, butlook what you got on the other
side. It's just keep recovering.
It's it's constant. It's neverending. I'm in the middle of it.
It's so layered and nuanced, youknow, and fear is as well. I was
talking to you earlier about Ican talk about how brave I am of
doing all these things, and I'velearned to make these hard

(01:24:27):
decisions in life, but now I'mgoing through that stage of the
fear of, is it okay to not beexceptional, like the fear of
just being seen as Hannah andnothing and not all these cool
accolades all around me juststrip bare. That's another fear
that I'm leaning into now, beinggood enough without all this
external buzz around me. So, youknow, it's very easy to think,

(01:24:49):
oh, that person's got her lifetogether. I'm like, No, I'm
going through an existentialcrisis right now, and it's all
to do with fears. Well. That,

Lynn (01:25:00):
because I know that feeling of like, okay, how do I
make myself special? How do Imake myself stand out and like,
that was my corporate journey,because it was the people who
stood up that got up ahead and,you know, whatever, whatever.
And I kept wanting to climb andclimb and climb and just being
somebody who just shows up

every day. That should be enough,

Lynn (01:25:25):
but, but sometimes it's not. I get that. And, you know,
I had, I had, it's some sointeresting, because I had a day
like that Not long ago, and Igot to the end of the day and I
was very tired, and I was like,What did I even do today? And
then I looked at what I had donethat day, and it was like, Okay,
you're just missing the point.
Because you actually had perhapsthe most perfect day ever, but

(01:25:46):
weren't like, running and underpressure and in front of a bunch
of people while you were doingit,

you're just yeah, there it is. I mean, mine's a
very obvious one, like, I justhad a childhood where, like, you
know, love was given upon mefrom performance and winning and
being the best person, andthat's why I'm unraveling now.
But you know, we can always, wecan always go back to where it
stems from. It's just whetheryou're brave enough to really
get into it and feel it and andre navigate it. So I definitely

(01:26:21):
just want people to understandthat it's just a constant work
in progress. And just when youyou think you've got one thing
kind of settled in your life,then another thing pops up. But

Lynn (01:26:35):
aren't we set? Go ahead, I remember. I've got a note I'll
remember.

No, no, please, please.

Lynn (01:26:43):
Okay, so I think the word that we're not using yet, or to
haven't talked about, is theword pressure, the pressure to
be exceptional, the pressure foranything, the whatever the
pressure is, is just is. And inthat podcast summit where I
spoke, Philippe Moran. Was it?
Philippe massetti lete spokelong writer who did what 16,

(01:27:05):
17,000 miles from Canada toBrazil, had a such a good
speech, such a good speech. Andhe's such a pro on the stage.
But he said he talked about hisdepression after it was all
over, and this was after hetalked about the pressure of the
trip and facing grizzly bears onthe highway, and where do we get

(01:27:27):
water for the horses, and wheream I going to spend the night?
And, you know, you think aboutit, he just basically had, what,
two years of nothing butpressure, yeah, and then

Unknown (01:27:40):
stillness.

Lynn (01:27:43):
And it I wrote on my remember this moment so clearly
I wrote, deep pressure equalsdepression, question mark, and
it made me wonder if we're notalso hardwired to always have
some form of pressure, likedon't so do we need

(01:28:04):
exceptionalism? Probably not.
But do we need pressure?
Probably so

I think so. I think it all comes down to
intent of what that pressure isgoing to give you on the other
side, or why you what you wantat the end of the other side of
that pressure. And does it comefrom inward going out, or does
it come from outward going in?
And if the pressure that you'reconstantly feeling is from an

(01:28:29):
outside source, so that you canprove that you're good enough,
worthy enough, lovable enough,then that's where it's all going
wrong. If it's coming frominward out, because it's truly
what brings you joy and fulfillsyour soul, regardless of what
the outside world thinks aboutit. Fantastic.

Lynn (01:28:51):
Okay, so I'm going, I'm glad we're recording this,
because I'm going to be writingthat down afterwards, because
she did a better job of definingwhat I call a proving mindset
versus sending mindset than I'veprobably ever done, because that
proving that that we kind of getconditioned into through school
and work and social media andaccolades and all that when

(01:29:15):
we're when we're working fromthat mindset, I do think that's
a form of pressure that's nothealthy,

no. And then, and then you need to deal with, and
if that's what you've beenbrought up, thinking that to be
worthy and lovable and seen toto achieve, to achieve, to be
the best or the most highperforming, the idea then of
being seen, the fear of beingseen just as you, as a human

(01:29:44):
being, is terrifying to manypeople, myself included, and
that's what I'm dealing withnow, and that's the outside in
versus inside out feeling. And Ijust, I got, I encourage so many
people to do the Terry reel.
Self esteem, course, because itjust really talks about just
your worthiness as is, likeeverybody is born onto this

(01:30:06):
planet just as worthy as theother person. Yes, there may be
people that do things betterthan you, or have a higher moral
standard than you that does notmake your innate worth any more
or less than them. And a thingthat I found so healthy is
somebody was questioning was, Isit wrong to want these things,
to achieve these things, or tobe good at these things? And

(01:30:29):
what I loved how he describedwas, you can be great at things
or want that as long as youallow it to move through you,
that those achievements movethrough you. They don't settle
upon you as your identity orvalidation. Oh, that's good,
right? Yeah. And I was like, Ohcrap. It's just, it's, it's so

(01:30:52):
important to understand what thedrive is,

Lynn (01:31:01):
because settling on you is building up your armor as a
building up strength to not needthe armor like you need you. We
need a lot of strength tonavigate life. We need it. But
is it an outer shell that we'rebuilt like that, or is coming
from the inner tools we weregiven at birth, and have those,

(01:31:25):
rather than what's being put onus exactly. That's beautiful way
of describing, oh, my goodness,

it's it's so important. That's something I'm
definitely digging into rightnow.

Lynn (01:31:37):
You know, that's my life's work. It's digging into it for
myself, and, yeah, with probablywhy we are so connected, like,
why completely,

completely. But I think that the more you get
comfortable being uncomfortable,that I find it even the hard
things now, you know, when youyou kind of feel like you're
unraveling, even though you'rein it, and it feels awful.
There's just this knowing thaton the other side, you're going
to come back on the other side,lighter, better, happier, and
it'll happen again. But eachtime you sink down, you come out

(01:32:09):
a better form of yourself, ahappier, lighter person each
time. And I don't ever wantpeople to think like doing the
work is just disgusting and astruggle, and it's not worth it.
It just

Lynn (01:32:19):
really is. You know you perhaps the thing that everybody
should leave this podcast withis the thing you said earlier
about fear. If I, if I stilljump off the cliff, I felt the
fear if I climb back down thecliff, I felt the fear. You're
gonna feel the discomfort eitherway, unless you're masking it.

(01:32:40):
And if you're masking thediscomfort you're you're giving
away your opportunity to buildyour inner strength and tools.
Yes, yeah. So well, go ahead andfeel it and yes. On the other
side, then, instead of beatingyourself up for not doing it as
well as you could have, claimthe endorphin kick, because I
think a lot of people miss it,

yeah, claim it and get clarity on the other side.
Oh, yeah,

Lynn (01:33:04):
yeah. And, I mean, I say get endorphin kicks for doing
little, little things, right?
Like, you know, I joke about, Iputting the bot the lids back on
my vitamin bottles in themorning. You know, when I'm,
like, in a, in a, like, gulpingspace, I come back in later, and
I find all of the caps arehalfway on right. If I'm in a
mindful space, I have givenmyself an endorphin kick as I

(01:33:25):
screwed every lid back onproperly completion.

And you're present in that moment in time as well.
You're right there. Your brainis in 10 steps ahead. That's

Lynn (01:33:37):
exactly it. I'm presence.
And then you have the presencein the moments of pressure,
because your brain already knowshow to be there.

Yes, and I think that's something I'm learning as
well, how much you can practicethroughout the day just doing
stuff that it doesn't have to bespectacular, but it can be such
a huge learning tool, and thatthat's a perfect analogy just
putting the lids back on you ofyour vitamin supplements.

Lynn (01:34:01):
Yeah, exactly. Well. So tell people, I know you're
beginning to start a speakingcareer, and as a result, people
are gonna be able to find you.
So tell people how they can findyou, and if they want to follow
you, how to follow you becauseyou're fun to follow.

That is the goal.
Yes, I am in the process ofbuilding a website. It's one of
those things that I did the goalpost, like I'm going to get this
done immediately. It did. But Iam on LinkedIn as Hannah bets,
and I am also on social media.
Instagram is Hannah bets one,and Facebook, I am just Hannah

(01:34:38):
bets. And pretty easy to find.
It's fairly obvious that it'sme, yeah, and then eventually I
will have a website up inregards to what I'm hoping to
start doing, more more speaking,more speaking arrangements,
talking about these verysubjects, just from a just
really want to lean into thepoint of fear and vulnerability.
Take that myth away. That peoplelike me are fearless.

Lynn (01:35:03):
I am going to do a shout out as we're ending this to my
corporate people, whooccasionally are hiring speakers
to come speak, and I know theworlds that they're living in,
because that's what I came from.
And there's a reason that Lynn,the corporate person, jumped up
higher than anybody else duringyour speech, because you have a
message, I think that people whoare struggling in business need

(01:35:24):
to hear, and there is somethingthat gives you a validation,
because you have done scary anddangerous things that a lot of
us aren't out there doing. But I100% believe that you have
found, I don't want to call it aformula, but you have found a
set of skills and principles andmindset to navigate to the other

(01:35:45):
side of fear. And so for thoseof you who hire speakers, I'm
going to tell you, this is awoman you need to be hiring. So

that means well to me, coming from you. Thank you.

Lynn (01:36:02):
It means the world for me, for you to have made the time to
have this conversation. I'm sograteful we got to do it.

I could speak for hours with you.

Lynn (01:36:11):
We'll talk after about how we can keep this out. But y'all
want me in on this one.
Say thank you to all thelisteners of the podcast, and if
you've enjoyed this podcast, besure to share it with your
friends. If you want to continuefollowing me, you can always go
to my website@lyncarns.com andsign up for the coaching digest.
I've got something coming out atleast once a week. Thanks for

(01:36:33):
joining us, and we'll see you onthe next podcast. Thank you for
listening to the creativespirits unleash podcast. I
started this podcast because Iwas having these great
conversations, and I wanted toshare them with others. I'm
always learning in theseconversations, and I wanted to
share that kind of learning withyou. Now, what I need to hear
from you is what you want moreof and what you want less of. I

(01:36:56):
really want these podcasts to bea value for the listeners. Also,
if you happen to know someonewho you think might love them,
please share the podcast and ofcourse, subscribe and rate it on
the different apps that you'reusing, because that's how others
will find it. Now, I hope you goand do something very fun today.
You.

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