The Eight Key Elements to Political Wellbeing: Anna Miley of Locale Learning

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:04):
Welcome to the Healing Our Politics podcast.
The show that shows you how toheal our politics by starting
with the human in the mirror. Myname is Skippy Mesereau, coach,
former elected official, andlifetime public servant. It is
my job to sit down with the bestthought leaders, coaches,
therapists, authors, scientists,and more, and to take the best

(00:25):
of what they have learned andtranslate it specifically for
the public service experience.Warning, this is a post partisan
space.
No policy, party, orpartisanship here because
well-being belongs to all of us.This show is about resourcing
you and trusting you to make upyour own damn mind about what to

(00:46):
do with it and what's best foryour community. So as always,
with love, here we go. Hello,and welcome to the Healing Our
Politics podcast. The show thatshows you, the heart centered
leader, how to heal our politicsby starting with the human in

(01:08):
the mirror.
In today's episode, I sit downwith expert in mindset and
mental well-being, Anna Miley.Anna is the lead mindset and
mental well-being coach forLocale Learning, an Australian
based company elevating ethical,mindful, and effective leaders,
basically people like you.Effectively, Locale Learning is

(01:32):
our Australian mirror doing thework that the Elected Leaders
Collective does here in thestates on the other side of the
globe, equipping localcounselors with 21st century
skills and mindset they need tosucceed in an ever changing
world. Recognized by theApolitical Foundation as one of

(01:53):
just 20 6 worldwide politicalwell-being trailblazer
organizations. They are theleader in political healing on
the Australian continent.
Locale Learning is the creatorof the political well-being
framework helping you determinewhat areas of your life and
leadership are most ripe forgrowth. I highly recommend you

(02:15):
check that out. Anna is agraduate of the University of
Canberra. I hope I'm pronouncingthat correct with degrees in
sports science, physiology, andpsychology. She's a certified
Santoshayoga and yoga therapyinstructor, giving me some
tongue twisters today, certifiedneurolinguistic programming

(02:35):
expert, certified hypnotherapistpractitioner, and an accredited
exercise physiologist.
In this episode, we dig into thegenetic childhood defect that
set her on the path to healingand helping others heal, Her
journey to yoga at just 17 andhow it can improve your life and

(02:56):
service. Building a mentalhealth first aid kit and
deploying it when you need it.The criticality of exercise and
movement. People pleasing, andperfectionism do these sound
familiar to you and how you canwork with them if you have them
to own your own experience andreceive what you need, Tactical

(03:18):
approaches to saying no, verytimely. How awareness improves
performance, the value andpractice of purpose, the science
and power of affirmations andhow to leverage them to grow in
your leadership, And as coachesmutually focused on the
political space, we freestyle,opening up the kimono to

(03:39):
workshop best practices,learnings, and openly share and
brainstorm about what the,quote, right approach is,
spoiler alert, there isn't one,and what's working and not
working, and how can we supporteach other in improving our
offerings for individuals likeyourselves and your team.

(04:00):
It's a true behind the scenesview into the uncertainty and
iterative nature of improvingthese support systems that can
best serve you. So I hope youenjoy this tactical, practical,
personal, and wide rangingconversation with Anna Miley.

Speaker 2 (04:20):
It's just all too hard basket.

Speaker 1 (04:22):
It's too hard basket?

Speaker 2 (04:24):
Yeah. Yeah. Like, it's literally just like I don't
know.

Speaker 1 (04:28):
One of my close friends, Fiona, is Australian,
and the amount of lingo that youguys have is insane. I'm gonna
start I'm gonna have to, like,like normally, I have, like, a
mental health tool. We're gonnahave, like, an Australian to
English translation dictionarythat's gonna emerge.

Speaker 2 (04:47):
Pull pull me up pull me up if I'm using any,

Speaker 1 (04:51):
No. I'm gonna pull you into it. I love it. I think
it's so good. I just I adoredit.
Like, just makes me chuckle.

Speaker 2 (04:57):
Oh, wow.

Speaker 1 (04:57):
But no, you should you should totally bring it. You
should totally bring it.

Speaker 2 (05:02):
Alright. And I think for me, I am a bit of a person
that as much as I like to beprepared, I'm just better when
I'm in flow. And so while I waswaiting for you, I was like,
okay, don't go and likeoverthink this. So I just sort
of roamed around the office andwhich is actually in a bit of a
state of a mess at the momentbecause we have a big community

(05:24):
engagement project on. So we'vegot all of our stuff off to the
side there.
So I just sort of, you know,roamed around in the mess and,

Speaker 1 (05:31):
I must be hiding in a corner because you look like
you're in a perfectly manicuredstudio.

Speaker 2 (05:36):
Yeah. A 100%. This this little corner and behind my
desk, which is actuallyopposite, we try to keep that
game face ready.

Speaker 1 (05:43):
So good. It's sort of precisely what I'm excited to
talk to you about today, whichis you're halfway across the
world. In some ways, you are ourtwin. Like, what you're doing in
Australia, I and we are doing inAmerica. And I imagine, like us,
people probably look at you likeyou've got everything figured

(06:05):
out and dialed.
But it's like we're both kind ofbuilding this plane as we go,
and I think it's so interestingfor me to get to externalize my
own experience by getting toknow you and where you came from
and how you built the programthat you have and then kind of,
like, what's next for us and andhow are we thinking about it? I
think it's super interesting.

Speaker 2 (06:26):
Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. It is exciting, and you're
a 100% right about building theplane as we go. I think for me
as well, like the piece of thepuzzle that I bring to what
we're doing here at locallearning is very much, you know,
as a well-being practitionerwith a really quite unique
background, it's certainly not,a political background at all.
Like I have very littleexperience, in working in

(06:49):
government and politics. I comefrom a health background, a
corporate health and alsoprivate practice. So I'm really
new in the industry, so tospeak. But the great thing is
it's a human experience. So allof the experience I have and the
information that I'm bringing instill really translates into the

(07:10):
environment.
So, yeah, I'm, I'm excited toshare it and I feel it's so
relevant because of the uniquetype of people that we're
working with.

Speaker 1 (07:20):
And I'm so curious and we'll get there later, but
how you decided to take whatyou've learned and then shift
your focus into the politicalrealm and we'll also talk about,
you know, what is similar ordifferent between the political
realms in Australia and the US.And the bridge that kind of
brought us together, whichindicates that the experiences
are similar, is the Mere Mortalsreport from the Apolitical

(07:43):
Foundation, which did this yearround study of the mental
well-being of elected officialsacross the world and its impact
on society and on politics andon, you know, citizens'
well-being downstream. And fromthat report, they called out
just 26 organizations around theglobe that were making a

(08:05):
meaningful impact on doingsomething about that, on
delivering services. And so thatthat's you from Australia. I
think you and and politics incolor, maybe, are the 2.

Speaker 2 (08:12):
So I do come from

Speaker 1 (08:13):
the political political world. My life is the
wellness experience. And so Igot the experience of having the
treatment, so to speak, of,like, being the client and
seeing how it affected me inpolitics and then being, like,
oh, this would be so useful foreverybody else. And it's really

(08:35):
hard to work in this marketbecause it's brand new and no
one knows it and no one has timeand whatever. So I'm very
interested to learn why youdecided to take that path then
rather than a 100 paths thatwould have probably been easier
from a business standpoint.
But, like, I wanna start at thebeginning or beginning ish,

(08:55):
which is to say, you know, myjourney, my first mental health,
I would never have called itthat at the time, intervention
for myself, as people in thispodcast have heard, is when I
made my mom take me to WeightWatchers, like a weight loss
program in 4th grade. Now, inthe little bit I know about you,
you get kind of very deep intoyoga, in particular types of

(09:17):
yoga in at 17 in in high school.And so I wondered, is that your
equivalent? Is that what wasyour first big moment of, like,
something's going on for me?

Speaker 2 (09:27):
I had kind of, like a bunch of health problems as a
child and not that that wasapparent to anyone else as quite
a healthy from the outsidelooking in, you know, beautiful
rural upbringing, in a beautifulpart of the world. I actually
grew up in Tasmania, which isthe tiny island on the bottom of
Australia.

Speaker 1 (09:45):
So beautiful.

Speaker 2 (09:46):
My parents grew most of our own food and we ate
really well, but I just, was,you know, lucky enough, I'm
gonna say, to, have some geneticstuff come through. And so by
the time I was 17, I was kind ofburning out being a, high
achieving, go getting, wanna doeverything person, but my body

(10:08):
sort of wasn't keeping up withthat.

Speaker 1 (10:09):
Would you be willing to share what it was in
particular?

Speaker 2 (10:13):
Yeah. Well, I'm a unique case. I actually have, an
interesting blood disorder,which is called spherocytosis.
And so my red blood cells areactually spheres instead of
circles. Yeah.
Super interesting. It's reallyrare.

Speaker 1 (10:28):
Wait. Can I ask a really weird question? Yeah.
Sure. I live in the mountains,so we think about hemoglobin a
lot and the ability to processoxygen.
If it's a sphere rather than aplate and you have the same
diameter, then presumablythere's greater volume. So are
you particularly well adapted tocardio and or high mountain
environments?

Speaker 2 (10:47):
Unfortunately, the opposite. It's a great question
because I had an experience inthe Andes, and I actually got
really sick because of theattitude. Because what happens
if I ascend or descend tooquickly, Basically my blood
cells explode. Yeah. So it'salso catastrophic actually for
me.
So it just basically means thatI have a slightly compromised

(11:07):
immune system. I actually don'thave a spleen because the spleen
was the primary organ that was,destroying my own blood cells
because they weren't the rightshape. And so the spleen wanted
to get rid of them. And so thatjust meant that my body was
working really hard toconstantly make new blood cells
to replace the ones that it wasgetting rid of. Is this so cool?

(11:27):
No one ever asked me thisbecause no one is so no one is
ever interested.

Speaker 1 (11:33):
No. This is so so is it like and I'm I'm sorry. I'm
just super curious about this.So is the is it that the spleen
has a filter function? It's liketrying to put a square peg
through a round hole?

Speaker 2 (11:45):
Mhmm.

Speaker 1 (11:46):
And then the body has to replace those, so a lot of
your energy is going towardsthat. I imagine that's not
something that they test forimmediately.

Speaker 2 (11:54):
Yeah. Well, it was lucky because my dad well, it
wasn't lucky for my dad, but hegot quite unwell, when I was
about 10 and they worked outwhat it was. And then from
there, they thought, oh, maybethis is what Anna has too or
what's going on for Anna. Iguess that was a lucky thing,
unfortunately for my dad becausehe wasn't very well for a while,
but he's good now. So yeah,fully functioning, fully

(12:16):
engaged, you know, doing life.
But, yeah, the tax of thatbehind the scenes was probably,
you know, a not so great thingfor me as a kid who wanted to
get in and do everything. It wassort of, just that feeling,
maybe not being able to keep upall the time, which didn't match
my natural energy, my naturalway of being. So it's been

(12:38):
beautiful because I guess I havelearned so much from that,
learned so much about where Iput my time and energy, how I
use my time and energy and how Iperceive myself. And I think I
was saying to you in myvoicemail to you pre show just
that not needing to always be a100% on a 100% go, go, go. Got

(13:00):
all the answers.
But having that vulnerability tobe like, Oh, Hey, I'm tired or,
Hey, I need to take a rest orI'm not a 100% today. So I'm
just going to have to show upwith what I've got. And this is
as good as I've got today. Sothat's kind of been a bit of a
theme. Yeah.
It was just like year 12, whichis our final year of high. Oh,
we call it college or highschool.

Speaker 1 (13:21):
We got high school. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (13:22):
So before you maybe go get a job or gap year or uni,
I just like at a point, like Iwas quite burnt out. I was head
prefect. I'd be doing all thethings.

Speaker 1 (13:32):
Sorry. What's head prefect for those of us on this
side of the

Speaker 2 (13:35):
so like a college captain

Speaker 1 (13:37):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (13:37):
To like your head leader

Speaker 1 (13:39):
Got it. In school government? Yes. That's

Speaker 2 (13:41):
right. See, I have a political background after all.

Speaker 1 (13:44):
Yeah. It's been hiding in plain sight. Turns out
you just started when you were5, like all the rest of us
secretly.

Speaker 2 (13:51):
And anyway, so I was like, okay, I need to do
something. And I'd always beeninterested in the non normal,
the non mainstream. I had aninterest in the alternative
medicines and health andwhatever, but very peripheral,
you know, as a teenager, I justsaw this little flyer because
back then, you know, there wasno social media. So it was,

(14:12):
flyers stuck on notice boardsand it was yoga. And I thought,
oh, well, I love gymnastics.
Maybe yoga is something that Iwould like to do. I had an
inkling that I had a spiritualaspect to it. Yeah. So I went
along and it was in theSachinanda tradition, which they

(14:32):
used to wear ropes. And theteacher was a really peaceful,
beautiful woman.
I was the youngest in this classby a long shot. Anyway, she
guided us basically through somereally gentle stretches and then
into a deep yoga Nidra, which asyou would know, sometimes in the
west they get called body scanmeditations as a sort of surface

(14:53):
level experience of a yoga, trueyoga Nidra. And, my last memory
that I have of my first yogaclass is, my dad waking me up
because apparently I had sleptthrough the majority of the yoga
class and that all left and theteacher who was so polite had
let me sleep until anirresponsible adult came to

(15:15):
collect me. Oh,

Speaker 1 (15:16):
my god. It's amazing. So how old were you when you had
clarity about your condition?

Speaker 2 (15:22):
It was around 10. And so then just hitting that tween
kind of time. So it was like atotally, I had an early
experience in my life where Ihad to really readjust how I
took care of myself or I had togrow up quickly in terms of
understanding self care and howto manage my health.

Speaker 1 (15:44):
Because they told you you have to do less effectively.
Exactly. Uh-huh. And prior tothat, you had been doing all the
things and then probably beingvery well, just wondering why
you couldn't have the sameoutput as others for as much
time. And was your did you havea story about that when you were
younger?
Like, did you did you make thatabout something wrong with you?

Speaker 2 (16:08):
I think the story was it's unfair because I felt I've
got so much to give, how am Igoing to do all the things if
I'm kind of being held back? Soheading into my teens I think I
kind of had times where Irallied against it and I just
pushed. I just went a 120percent when really I probably

(16:31):
only had 80% or 70% to give inthe 1st place. So, you know, the
up and down of it, and then I'dpull back and I'd get back into
yoga and I'd, you know, stoppartying or whatever for at
least a week.

Speaker 1 (16:45):
I I remember my first marathon, my big training
regimen, which, again, people onthe podcast will know I've
struggled with substance abuse.It's been part of my journey,
but my big training regimenbefore my 1st marathon was no
alcohol for 2 days. And I waslike, oh, this is this is gonna
be tough. Now I look back like,so it's all welcome here.

Speaker 2 (17:09):
Yeah. And maybe a little shame. I think that comes
through sometimes. And maybethis is true for all of us, you
know, but we have the game face,we have the outward face. And
when there's things that arebehind that aren't necessarily
matching up a 100% with thatoutward feel of that part of
your personality.
Maybe there's an element therewhere you have to hide it a

(17:30):
little bit or, you know, Icertainly didn't go through my
teens or my early twentiestelling people, like I've just
told on a podcast that, I hadthis condition and I mean, look,
it didn't stop me doing anythingreally. It just meant internally
I was conflicted because I feltlike I had a lot more to give
and that still occurs now in mylife. I feel like I've always

(17:51):
got a lot more to give, but I'mjust sort of not able to
probably give it all just withmy natural energy levels. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (17:59):
Yeah. And you phrased it the way I would, which I
think you said, you know, youfeel lucky now that you've had
this experience and you had itreally early. And everyone who
just listened to theintroduction knows that you have
accomplished a tremendous amountin a lot of different fields in
a very short time. So I thinkI've got, like, a sense of where

(18:22):
you came from, some of theconstraints and motivating
factors, and you have thisexperience with yoga. I'm
wondering what it was at thattime.
What was it that spoke to youand then what kind of captured
you there? What was working, Iguess, you know, how did it
affect you in a positive way?

Speaker 2 (18:42):
I think because I'm very much a person in my body
and a physically present person,I have really high sensitivity
to all physical experiences,which is amazing, sometimes
overwhelming. And so for me,yoga was this beautiful pathway
through my body and my breathingto get access into my mind,

(19:02):
which I'd never been given thatopportunity before. I was
growing up in Tasmania withinAustralia, very white culture,
middle, middle upper classexperience, private school. Yes,
it was a Catholic school. Soyes, I had some religious
education, which I reallyvalued, but didn't necessarily

(19:23):
always resonate with me, thosespiritual teachings.
So yoga provided me as a veryyoung woman at 17, some access
into some questions that I guessI'd had about how I was in the
world and why I was that way.They gave me permission to slow
down and to stop, which fromwhat we've just spoken about is

(19:46):
obviously not something that wasgiven space for, and that's not
a slight on anyone in my lifeor, you know, the way I was
parented or anything. We're in abusy culture. And so at 17, I
guess my body was telling me Ineeded to slow down. And so
slowing down my body or becomingmore connected to my body

(20:06):
through the mindfulness aspectof the movement in yoga really
gave me opportunity to really dosome great self inquiry, which I
think I've naturally alwaysdone.
I've got memories as a smallchild of sitting and quite still
in a tree. Cause I love to climbthe trees. I love heights.

Speaker 1 (20:23):
They're very fun,

Speaker 2 (20:24):
very fun, but I think it was the permission piece. So
I think as a child, maybe therewas like opportunity for
daydreaming, exploring nature. Ihad quite a free childhood like
that, but I don't think that themessaging was necessarily there
in my experience as a child anda young person, that self
exploration was something thatis normal, natural, or a good

(20:48):
thing to do. So yoga offeredthis opportunity for full
permission because that is whatyoga is. It's a self inquiry
practice and it gave me somestructure to do it, which I
think I really needed at thattime and still really enjoy the
structure of the yoga practiceto pull me back into some self
inquiry that allows me to go alittle deeper.

(21:09):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (21:10):
You've mentioned to me before that you are in
particular, a kinesthetic and avisual learner.

Speaker 2 (21:15):
Was

Speaker 1 (21:16):
that part of the learning of yoga or did you get
to yoga because you knew that?

Speaker 2 (21:21):
Oh, I had no idea. I had no insight into that at that
age. It was just a intuitive,natural thing that I like to
move my body. I could see thatyoga, I got to do some stretches
and maybe some handstands orsomething. I mean, you know, I
live in the west, so a lot ofthe information that I knew
about yoga was these kind ofphysically flexible feats which

(21:43):
appealed to me because I lovegymnastics and dance and things
like that.
So it was very much justinitially the physical aspect,
just like an intuitive, naturalthing. I had no cognitive
understanding of the way that Ilearned or the way that I was in
the world at that time, but a100% and still to this day being
in my body and moving my body isa spiritual experience for me.

(22:06):
And it definitely is like thefirst stepping stone to go into
meditative state or you know,even like as if I call it, you
know, mental health first aid,like a frontline quick fix for
me. So preparing for the podcasttoday, like I danced around,
shook it out and use my body toaccess my mind in a clearer way.

Speaker 1 (22:28):
I have to bite on that mental health first aid.
Where does that concept comefrom? Is it self created? And
then if you were to describethat as specifically as
possible, so someone who'slistening could, like, picture
you doing it, what would thatlook like for you?

Speaker 2 (22:43):
Yeah. I mean, look, I don't know if it it's mental
health first aid. It's probablymental state first aid should be
a better term because inAustralia, mental health
generally gets tied up in moreof the psychiatric situation.
Like whether you have diagnosedwith a mental health condition.
So I guess what I'm talkingabout is mental state or mental
well-being first aid.
So it really speaking to selfregulation. So having the

(23:06):
insight, you know, I'm churnedup, I'm getting a dump of
adrenaline. Cause I'm about tospeak to Skippy, on a podcast.

Speaker 1 (23:14):
Very scary.

Speaker 2 (23:14):
Yes. It was scary. My heart rates up, you know, I can
feel that butterflies in mytummy, you know, so if I'm
noticing these things thenrather than going into a loop
pattern of, am I going to begood enough? Am I going to stuff
up and what am I going to say?Which is completely unhelpful.
I recognize the signs in mybody. And then I want to do some

(23:37):
first aid. So want to take someinitial action to perpetuate
that into a better cognitivestate or a better state of
well-being. So I might benoticing those thoughts. I might
be noticing that I'm feeling lowmood, that I'm kind of having
this negative, critical kind offilter in my thoughts.
And so the first aid is okay,I've got to get back into my

(24:00):
body. I got to get reallygrounded and embodied here,
whether I need to shake it up, Ineed to get some fresh air. I
need to stretch out getting intomy body, helping reposition my
mental state. So I guess thefirst aid piece means that I'm
applying the tonic, the medicinein the instance. When I say
first aid, it's like, what can Ido right now to get me feeling

(24:24):
better?
For me, it does come a lot tomovement. Yeah, like I jump up
and down. I shake it out. I makesome sound. I guess with my yoga
knowledge in terms of workingwith the energetic lines in the
body, the nadis, like I might docertain movements to stimulate
certain energies in the body.
If I need to be a little moreintuitive, I'll focus on my left

(24:48):
side body. If I need to reallyget myself a little more focused
and concentrate, I might, youknow, kind of tune in more right
side body. But I mean, thoselayers of yoga knowledge aren't
necessary for this to work.There could be any number of
things for people. So sometimeswhen I'm working with clients,
it might be a smell and aromathat works really well for

(25:09):
people having an essential oilthat really lights them up.
That makes them feel good. Andjust carrying that in a little
roller bottle or something, youknow, smell

Speaker 1 (25:18):
is so powerful in our brain.

Speaker 2 (25:18):
Lots of great science around that. There's so powerful
in our brain. Lots of greatscience around that. There's so
many things for some people, youknow, it's just stepping outside
and looking up to the sky, youknow, that reminder of the big
picture to give perspective. Wesometimes lose perspective,
right?
Like our perspective is lostgenerally when we're anxious,
we're feeling anxiety, we'regetting stressed, the brain

(25:41):
tends to get narrow. So I thinka lot of this mental health
first aid that I'm talking aboutis trying to get people to
broaden their view because Iwork in this space and because I
am how I am in the world, it canbe easy for me to use my body to
do these things because I amvery kinesthetic. I am very

(26:02):
connected to my body and otherpeople aren't. For someone
listening to the podcast today,this idea of getting into their
body to shift their mental statecould be really foreign. What
does movement do?
We're moving all the time, butwe're not necessarily conscious
of the movement, right? Likewe're getting from a to b, you

(26:23):
know, walking, we're movingaround the office, we're
clicking the mouse, whatever.That's all movement. The
movement I'm talking about ismovement that is allowing us to
really connect to the senses,noticing how I am, how my body
is.

Speaker 1 (26:38):
So what I'm hearing from you is mental health or
mental well-being first aid, andwe would probably say mental
health here. The words are alittle bit more mashed up, and
we can get into that if you wantto, but I don't think it's
critical for this, is the stepsare basically awareness,
noticing or naming, a patterninterrupt, a release, and a

(27:00):
reset. So you're first bringingawareness to what's happening.
My heart rate is elevated. I'msweating.
I'm something. For many people,this will be so common for them
as to not know that it's notsomething that you don't desire,
and I have definitely beenthere. I lived in in stress all
the time for years, and I justthought, oh, this is my, like,

(27:22):
get up and go juice. I lovethis. Didn't didn't know that
that was not, a place that wasbeneficial for me to act from.
So at first, you're justnoticing the thing, then you're
naming it. Right? So you'reidentifying, oh, this is what's
going on. I feel this here in mybody. I'm noticing this emotion,
etcetera.
And then you're throwing in somekind of pattern interrupt. And

(27:44):
what I'm hearing from you isit's not hypercritical which one
you use. You use the one that'sbest for you. Mhmm. It could be
a scent that triggers a memoryfor you.
It could be something from youryoga practice if you have that.
It could be literally shakingyour body as if a dog gets out
of the water and it's justreleasing that energy.

Speaker 2 (28:03):
Heard that one. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (28:05):
Could be some noise. This is familiar to me when I'm
out skiing, my favorite activitybecause a bunch of grown adults
are hooting and hollering andyelling at each other off the
lift because it's fun, and it'sjust a way to release energy. So
you're doing something topattern interrupt and then
you're grounding thatinterruption and reengaging the
parasympathetic nervous system.Again, variety of tools. It

(28:28):
could be breath.
It could be movement. You'reeffectively allowing yourself to
calm down. Mhmm. And then fromthat place of calm awareness,
you're reengaging with theactivity. You're not avoiding
the podcast.
You're going back into it.

Speaker 2 (28:42):
Sure.

Speaker 1 (28:42):
Is that a fair summary?

Speaker 2 (28:44):
Yeah. And I think just to add to that last piece,
you're going back in withgreater perspective.

Speaker 1 (28:49):
Yes.

Speaker 2 (28:49):
Yeah. I think that's an important piece there. Like,
because the reason that we'rewanting to do all those steps,
which you so perfectlysummarized, thank you so much is
to gain that greater awareness.And particularly if we're
talking about in the context ofleaders under pressure. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (29:04):
Yeah. And I can't overstate as someone who's been
a leader under pressure in theroom, staring down angry
opposition, how much morecapable I have been to respond
from clarity, strength, but alsokindness and compassion in the
room when I've taken the time toset my nervous system up and how

(29:27):
often, but not always, that isthen positively received and
reflected and creates betteroutcomes in the room.

Speaker 2 (29:34):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (29:34):
So for anyone listening who's not driving
right now, I'm just gonna do aquick little 15 second something
and just kinda notice how you'vebeen feeling. You've been
feeling this way all day. You'resitting on the couch. You're in
the kitchen. You're preppingdinner.
You're out for a walk, whateverit is, find yourself a place to
sit right now, and just gonnaallow yourself to sit, plop,

(29:57):
there you are. You're gonnastraighten up your back just a
little bit. You're going toallow your eyelids to close, and
with those eyelids closed, thefirst thing you're gonna notice
is your feet planted firmly onthe ground beneath you. You're
going to place your hands onyour thighs or the side of the
chair. You're gonna sit up justanother half inch taller, and

(30:21):
with your eyes still closed,we're gonna give a little 3
second shake to just shake andshimmy your body, whatever it
is.
Exhale. We're gonna inhaletogether. Exhale together. 2
more in the nose, holding at thetop and out the mouth. Inhale in

(30:42):
the nose.
Hold. Exhale out the mouth, asaudible as you wish. Breathe in
the nose. Hold. Exhale audiblyout the mouth.

(31:09):
Allow the cheeks on your face tofall. Allow your forehead to
unwrinkle. Let your jaw unhinge.Let the tongue fall off the roof
of your mouth. Take one morebreath.
Begin to wiggle your fingers andtoes, bringing a little energy

(31:33):
back into your body, and veryslowly open your eyes. What do
you notice? What do you notice,Anna?

Speaker 2 (31:48):
Feel good, clearer, calmer, which is nice. Thank
you.

Speaker 1 (31:52):
Mhmm. I noticed my voice cadence is lower.

Speaker 2 (31:57):
Yes.

Speaker 1 (31:58):
I noticed my shoulders are softer. So that's
15 seconds. But I think forthose who like a previous
version of me, would have beenlike getting into the body, what
is that? Hopefully that providesyou a little insight. And if you
were driving, look at thetimestamp right now, save this

(32:22):
podcast, and when you get homelater today or tomorrow or in a
week, just fast forward to thistimestamp, hit back 30 seconds
once, and give it a go.
You'd be surprised.

Speaker 2 (32:33):
Yeah. And that's exactly it. Right? That's the
that's the first aid piecethere. It's what we can do right
here in an instance, and it onlytakes a short moment, but I
think it's so powerful.

Speaker 1 (32:44):
Yeah. It's so good. So much I wanna know about how
you got to now. I just wannagive you an opportunity to share
some of the myriad techniquesyou're trained in. There's just
a lot of interesting stuff here.
And if you would like to, Iwould love to learn a bit more
about 1 or 2 of them that peoplemight not know.

Speaker 2 (33:04):
I studied psychology and sports science at
university, and that led to whatwe call being an accredited
exercise physiologist. I'm not aphysiotherapist, so I'm not
doing manual manipulation ofpeople or exercise movement and
motivational counseling isreally what I do to help people

(33:25):
to move their bodies so thatthey can feel comfortable in
their own skin to live the lifethat they want to live. Whether
it's, you know, for some of us,it's just to be able to do the
basic activities of daily livingand for other people it's for
high performance. I've reallyneeded to and wanted to
integrate the myriad of yogapractices that I have learned

(33:47):
from a lot of differentteachers. I don't subscribe to
one particular yoga lineage.
I'm very much a person thattakes little bits from
everywhere because I thinkthere's value in all of the
ways. So when I'm asked, so whatstyle of yoga do you teach? I
say Anna's style. And, you know,not that I am elevating myself

(34:08):
to the great yogis. That's justabsolutely what it is and a 100%
authentic me, taking all of mylearnings and just being the
conduit for that and puttingthat out into the world based on
the person in front of me.
And that is something thatwhether I've got my exercise
physiology hat, my yoga teachinghat, my coaching hat, I am

(34:30):
present with the person in frontof me. So whenever I'm working
with someone, I bring all of thehats, all of the learnings and
the experience, and I just do mybest to deliver what I'm feeling
in that moment that personneeds. And so even in this role
as a political well-being coach,I bring all of that. I bring the

(34:51):
yoga, I bring the mindfulness, Ibring exercise physiology. So
really deeply understanding howthe physiology of someone works,
the nervous system, the brain,and you know, some of these neat
techniques of hypnotherapy andmeditation and how we're
communicating.
For me, it's just taking all ofthe experience and knowledge,

(35:12):
the opportunities that I've hadin working with so many amazing
people over the years. I'velearned so much from them and
and then I just take that andsee if that's gonna help the
next person.

Speaker 1 (35:23):
Anna's style is not actually a particular style.
It's a recognition that you canpull a variety of things from
your toolbox to meet the personin front of you where they are.
And so for each person, it'sgoing to be different because
each person's needs andbackgrounds and experiences are
different.

Speaker 2 (35:42):
Absolutely. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (35:44):
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(38:04):
and starting today. Let's jumpin to what we do now and just
how would you describe your workin the political well-being
area?

Speaker 2 (38:17):
Yeah. Well, I would start off by describing it as
exciting.

Speaker 1 (38:21):
Nice.

Speaker 2 (38:23):
Yeah. I think it's just taking all of this really
good stuff and applying it topeople that put their hand up to
serve their communities. And Ireally admire and respect our
elected leaders. And I guess forme, supporting people that are
doing some really amazing thingsin the world is super exciting.

(38:45):
So for us here at localelearning, we're a really small
business.
And we're actually based in thistiny little town on the east
coast of Australia or about 6hours north of Sydney. Emma, who
I work with, Locale Learning isreally her brainchild, and her
passion. So she is a formerlawyer and has worked in local
government her whole life. Shereally saw the need to take what

(39:08):
she was doing from thatgovernance perspective. She was
seeing people step up to leadtheir communities and to
unfortunately have, you know,quite negative experiences at
times.
And she could see the pressurethey were under because she was
working, you know, closely withthem in in a different role. And
so she bravely was like, right.I'm going to pivot my business

(39:32):
and I'm going to try and educateand support elected leaders at a
local government level here inAustralia. I'm not exactly sure
how that translates Skippy, foryou guys, but we have 3 tiers of
government, about federal level,a state level, and then our
local level.

Speaker 1 (39:50):
Same.

Speaker 2 (39:51):
Same. Similar. Yeah. Same. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (39:53):
Yeah. Yeah. You probably use different words for
the units of measure, but it'sthe same way. You probably have
provinces or something like thatand we have states, etcetera,
but yes.

Speaker 2 (40:02):
Similar level. So that really on the ground level
of politics, you know, you'reour elected leaders in council
are living with theirconstituents. You know, they are
literally at the same cafe.They're at the soccer fields on
a Saturday morning. So it's verymuch the grassroots level of
politics here in Australia,perhaps the most complicated

(40:23):
when it does come to to thatpersonal and professional
divide.

Speaker 1 (40:27):
So how did you get roped into this?

Speaker 2 (40:29):
Yeah. Exactly. How did I get roped in? Exactly. So
COVID, you know, COVID COVID.
In COVID, Emma could see peoplewere really struggling, seeing
the local elected leaders reallystruggling and she reached out
to me. Emma and I met becauseshe came to my yoga classes.
That's pretty much how I knoweveryone in my life because
they've done a yoga class withme And she asked, would I come

(40:53):
and do a complimentary webinar,open it up to local government
leaders across Australia on howto stay motivated and stay well
during that time. I'm going touse the word we've overused it,
unprecedented pressure. And so Idid it and I loved it because it
was exciting for me to see thisgroup of people that showed up

(41:17):
online.
They just soaked it up likesponges, you know, it was like a
lot had been shed on theirexperience. And I guess again,
that permission piece permissionto actually take care of
themselves as leaders to maybebe a little vulnerable and to
show that human side. We haven'tlooked back basically from that

(41:39):
complimentary webinar that Emmajust asked me to facilitate a
one off two and a half yearsdown the track. We have
developed a suite of trainingthat looks specifically at
well-being and yeah, we'reactually working on a specific
framework that's really relevantto the political leadership
space and addressing some ofthose unique stresses that

(42:01):
politicians would experience.

Speaker 1 (42:04):
One of the things that comes up in the mere
mortals report that very muchmirrors our experience in the
states is, I think the stats are70% of elected officials say
that they would want somesupport or could benefit from
support of their mentalwell-being, but 25% say they
would not receive that supporteven if it was available because

(42:26):
of fear of reputational harm orcultural stigma. 65% say they
don't have the time, and 50% saythey don't have the money. So,
basically, you have this hugemass of people who have very
high consequence jobs, who coulduse support but aren't getting
it for a variety of reasons.That's totally what we find. We

(42:48):
find it's very hard to getpeople in the door and in the
practice, even if they say thisis a problem for me and I could
use support.
Do you guys find the same thing?

Speaker 2 (42:59):
At a surface level, that is a 100% true. Stigma is a
huge problem, and I think that'sjust historically the nature of
politics in that perhapsweaponization of any weakness
that a political leader mightshow. A few weeks ago, our
former prime minister cameforward and has publicly
declared that he was beingtreated for severe anxiety

(43:23):
during his term. He was hisleader during COVID and has
released a book and subsequentlyin the book spoken about his
struggle with Interesting.Severe anxiety, which he
received pharmaceuticaltreatment for, but didn't really
mention any other supports thathe might have got.
And I think that's aninteresting piece there. You

(43:45):
know, if our political leaderswere to be seen, you know,
heading into, a therapist'soffice, you know, would that be
weaponized against them? It'snormal for even a leader to have
to go to the GP and no one'snecessarily going to know what
that prescribed. And yeah, thestigma around perhaps 1
disclosing, you know, mentalstruggles to being treated for

(44:07):
that. And then 3, the types oftreatment that they might seek,
whether it's preventative ortreatment.

Speaker 1 (44:12):
Yeah. And I'll just jump in with a PSA here because
I think it's important forpeople to understand, and this
is not a case againstpharmacological interventions.
They, we are unbelievably luckyto live in a time where those
are available to us, and forsome people, that is the right
option. And it is not the rightoption for everybody. It's

(44:34):
something that we often jump tosometimes prematurely or just
unnecessarily.
And in many but not all cases,what we're doing is treating the
symptom, not the root cause. Andin treating the symptom, very
frequently, we also have sideeffects. Whereas, if you can

(44:54):
treat the root cause throughnonpharmacological interventions
in a coaching container or atherapy container or something
else, and sometimes it's yesand, it's both, you are not only
treating the symptoms thatyou're experiencing and
suffering with, but you're alsoup leveling your understanding
of self and, as an extension,others and society in a way that

(45:18):
will make you infinitely moreable to understand and connect
with your work day to day, be itpolicy or communication or
conflict resolution ornegotiation. And so really doing
the work, quote, unquote, as wesay, like, the internal work, is
the equivalent of going to thegym. Yeah.

(45:39):
Right? Like, there's nothingwrong with taking Ozempic if you
have a weight issue and that'saffecting your heart, etcetera.
But if you're going to the gym,you are also going to lose the
weight and you're going toimprove bone density. You're
going to improve your sociallife because you're gonna meet
people there. You're gonnaimprove your self confidence.
You're going to improve yourability to respond resiliently.

(46:03):
And so the same thing is true.And so I just wanna put in that
PSA of of applying the workcomes with many other leadership
growth opportunities that apill, even if the pill is what
you should do, will not comewith.

Speaker 2 (46:18):
Yeah. That's so true. Looking at the whole person,
that 360 degree approach to allof the things that you just
suggested, you know, aroundthat, the whole of their
well-being that could beaddressed. And that's the space
that I'm really excited to beworking in. What can we take
from what we know generallyaround mental health, mental

(46:38):
well-being and high performance?
Because look in Emma, in myopinion, like we approach
working with our elected leadersas high performing people. I
mean, we are working with peoplethat do have good resilience
levels. They do have learnedlevels of stress management.
They tend to be naturally likewhat we would say, thick skinned

(47:00):
people, you know, the, they'renot stepping into the political
sphere generally without all ofthose things already there in
their personality or having beenlearnt from their experiences
previously. We're aware thatwhat we're doing is taking the
knowledge we have to these highperforming people in a way that

(47:22):
makes sense to them andparticularly increasing the
awareness of the multiple pointsof stress or stressors that are
coming in, working individuallywith our elected leaders to
elevate them back into thatspace of being able to perform
at the level that they'rewanting to, because they're
passionate people, they'repurpose led people, you know, it

(47:43):
doesn't sit well for themgenerally if their performance
is lacking because they puttheir hand up for a reason.
They wanna make a difference.So, generally, we find that
they're highly motivated to bementally well. We are coming
across more and more leadersthat are looking to us and and

(48:05):
other resources for support andbeing prepared to put their hand
up. I mean, look, I don't knowif they're putting it out there
on their social media oranything like that, but they're
coming in the door, they'resigning up to our webinars. We
do a lot of complimentary, work,and I know you've jumped on a
couple of our complimentarythings.
And that's purposeful from Emmaand my perspective. We want to

(48:28):
break down some of the stigma.We wanna have more people having
this conversation with usbecause through that we can
only, you know, progress as asociety, I think, in taking care
of the people that we've electedto to serve us.

Speaker 1 (48:42):
Here's the analogy that just popped into my head,
and you don't know me that well,but random analogies are kind of
my thing. So in terms of thecultural shift, I think about
professional baseball or justprofessional sports, but
professional baseball comes tomind because back in the early
days of baseball, the days ofBabe Ruth and these, like,
legends of the game, smoking anddrinking were a huge part of the

(49:06):
culture. So these players wouldbe out getting hammered the
night before a game. And theculture was as such that if you
didn't do that back then, theother players would look down at
you and call you a, you know,insert offensive expletive here.
Right?
Like, you were weak for notgoing out and drinking a bunch
of booze before a game. Well,fast forward to modern day,

(49:29):
we're paying athletes 1,000,000of dollars. They are training
their butts off. They'retraining their minds. They're
training their bodies.
They're training everythingevery day. Imagine how you would
feel if you were a fan and yourteam finally made the World
Series and your ace pitchercomes out on the mound and
throws a terrible game 7, andyou find out he was out drinking

(49:50):
the night before.

Speaker 2 (49:51):
I love the analogy because I think it's true. The
difference is, though, with highperforming athletes, often they
get to have just one event thatare building up to. And I think
with our political leaders, it'sjust the constant, there's
always another game or anotherbig event. And for me that says
that even more, there has to bethe recovery time and the other

(50:13):
things built in to bolster theirperformance even more than an
athlete.

Speaker 1 (50:19):
Yeah. And one of the things that you will learn, I
don't know, I can't speak foryour containers, but if you were
in a coaching program with us isboundaries are part of your job.
Mhmm. If you have no boundaries,you are going to be a very poor
performer, and you're gonna beout of that game really quickly.
Mhmm.
And the trap of always doingeverything for everyone all the

(50:39):
time 247 is a trap of our ownconstruction.

Speaker 2 (50:43):
Yes.

Speaker 1 (50:43):
We can go back to our most famous presidents. FDR in
wartime was at his time offplace for 90 days in the middle
of World War 2. That's not anexact time stamp, but for a long
period of time. And if you goback and look at some of the
quotes, he recognized that hewas only able to make the

(51:03):
decisions that were required forthe saving or losing the lives
of tens of millions of Americanswith the right mind and built
structures around himself tofacilitate that proactively. You
know?
And so it is our job to do that.It's part of what we would do in
a coaching container. And so,you know, to me, this is

(51:25):
ultimately about not just highperformance, but prolonged
performance.

Speaker 2 (51:31):
Yeah. The sustainability. Absolutely.

Speaker 1 (51:33):
100%. I'll be speaking at a a conference
upcoming, and we're kindatweaking the talk a little bit.
And one of the things we'regonna do is share that stat
about 70% of people wanting tohave support, but 65%
effectively not doing it. Andwe'll do a hand raise where one
out of every 8 people gets toraise their hand. And then you

(51:56):
look around the room and saylike, okay, well, if we wanna
keep going in the status quo,this is how many of your
colleagues, your allies, quoteunquote, that you're gonna have
left to work with in a handfulof years.
Good luck. It's just notsustainable. And so, yes, it
will take time to shift theculture. It's gonna take time to
go from all the boys arepartying before the World Series

(52:16):
to the boys get paid to takethis seriously to win the game.
Mhmm.
It's gonna take time. But do youwanna be on the front end of
that to be revered and look backon as one of the people that
actually started taking your jobseriously for the best interest
of your constituents? And Ithink that's the question that,
you know, 5 years from now,we're gonna be asking in the

(52:37):
rearview mirror.

Speaker 2 (52:38):
It's so true. To add to that. And it's modern
politics now, right? It's fasterpaced social media in
particular, as we know theresearch is there, like the
negative impacts of social mediaon everybody's mental
well-being. And thenparticularly people who have a
public profile and politicalleaders.
I think, actually, our currentprime minister just was quoted

(53:00):
as saying, you know, I'd neverread the comments on my social
media, he said, because Iwouldn't leave my house Yeah. If
I did. And I was like, yeah.Yeah. You're right.
Like, there's gotta be, theboundaries there.

Speaker 1 (53:12):
Yeah. One of the things that I am most interested
in your perspective on becauseyou come from an exercise
physiology background, you hadinterest in training
professional and world classathletes. I would not consider
myself a world class athlete,but I certainly was a
competitive athlete for a longperiod of time. And for me,

(53:33):
personally, diet and exercisewere absolutely the gateway. If
If it wasn't for those things,none of the downstream mental
health work could have beenpresent, and it is absolutely
the case for me personally thatthose are the last things to go.
Like, if I have to choose onething for my mental health, it's
long form cardio, period. End ofstory. There's nothing else that
comes close for me. And so Iwonder how much you think about

(53:58):
being prescriptive versus selfdirected in your coaching. You
talk about having theflexibility to bring in
different things from yourtoolkit.
But are you telling people, hey.You should do this or you should
try this. You should follow thisplan. Or are you on the full
like, if the it's a spectrum,the full self directed is like,

(54:19):
what do you think is best foryou? And I'm gonna support you.
And I've seen both things work.Where are you in that spectrum?
Do you have an answer? Are youfiguring it out? I'm so curious
to know how you think aboutthat.

Speaker 2 (54:30):
The middle path. And it might seem like a cop out,
but it's not. Like, I mean, somuch of Eastern philosophy comes
back to the middle way andthat's not true for everyone.
Some people do need to be oneither end of the spectrum and
as a coach or a facilitator,that is absolutely my job to
meet that person where they'reat and at the best of my ability

(54:54):
on that spectrum, help themwhatever end. But even within
one person, there's going to bedifferent pieces of the puzzle
that require different support,different ways of coaching or
different ways of facilitating.
I mean, I'm not a dietician. Idon't give advice on diet except
system basics. I definitelyshare, but I'm, I'm a really big

(55:16):
referrer in, in that, part of itthat that's not my domain. So I
do like to refer out pointpeople to really great resources
Exercise that is my domain andwe're human. We need to move.
We are designed to move. Thereis no question about that. And I
love to support that. Themotivation piece behind that is

(55:37):
probably the more interestingdiscussion. You know, how do we
get people to move?
How do we get people to connectto the desire to move value
exercise and movement? I mean,Skippy, it sounds like you've
had a personal experience whereyou've really been able to work
it out and stick with it and andhave an experience of being an
athlete. For people that haven'thad that experience

Speaker 1 (55:59):
Well, I'll just also say very, very hard fought, long
and asynchronous road to that.You know, for my entire youth
adolescence into youngadulthood, I yo yoed fairly
dramatically between periods ofathleticism and being very
overweight. I mean, obese iswhat you would, I guess, call it

(56:20):
based on a BMI scale. And it wasa hard one challenge that
eventually I did find mediationwith, and it's remarkable. And
that first experience, you know,was the benchmark of I can beat
some stuff that provided thefirst stone of confidence up the
arc to eventually reach thecapstone of I know shit's gonna

(56:43):
come up.
It's gonna go sideways. It's notgonna go well, but I know that I
have the ability to meetwhatever it is. But that's a 30
plus year journey.

Speaker 2 (56:52):
I love that. And, yeah, none of this is easy. I
don't think like, none of thisbusiness of taking care of
ourselves is easy. Some of usare naturally have a greater
propensity towards being awareof our self care and our
well-being and, and for othersit's less important or there's

(57:12):
different expressions of it. Andso, you know, this idea of the
spectrum I think it comes backto meeting each person exactly
where they're at to have theskills, to discern what approach
I need to take with each person.
And then that next layer downwhen we're looking at the
different aspects of theirwell-being, where do I need to

(57:32):
be more prescriptive and wheredo I need to encourage that that
self efficacy?

Speaker 1 (57:37):
You know, my formal training is as a, you know, what
we would say in the coachingroles, a transformational coach.
And that methodology is it isnot prescriptive. It's about
cultivating the container,creating this space, regulating
the nervous system, asking theright questions for people to
get down deep into the root ofwhat's driving their behaviors,

(58:00):
and then let them test and findthings that are best for them,
recognizing that that's slower,but ultimately stickier, and
more empowering.

Speaker 2 (58:10):
Agree.

Speaker 1 (58:11):
And the truth is, the athlete in me who, you know, is
also a type a challenger, I dohave many clients who have
incredible physical fitness andwhatever, but I have a lot who
don't, who live a very sedentaryoffice bound life. There's part
of me that wants to say, like,hey. If you're gonna work with
me, you're required to do 2hours of activity a week because

(58:33):
I just know in my actual mindthat there will be benefit. A
100% time, there will bebenefit. But then the coach
training side of me, you know,wants to, like, shame myself
like, no.
You can't do that. That's notgood. Like, you're gonna be
robbing them of their agency.Calm it down. And so I go
through that dance in my head,and I wonder what you would say

(58:54):
to that.

Speaker 2 (58:56):
Oh, again, the middle way. Like, I think, you know,
your intuition there to say thatto them, I think that's powerful
because I think you have a livedexperience of that perhaps in
yourself and it's worked. And Imean, look at our high
performance athletes. Like theyare told exactly what to do

Speaker 1 (59:10):
for sure.

Speaker 2 (59:11):
Yes. They might have a Nate desire to perform, but a
lot of them don't, you know, alot of them have a natural
talent, but it's been asituation of a whole team of
people supporting them to getthem where they are. It's not
like they've been motivatedevery day. Sometimes I've needed
people to tell them, you knowwhat? You've got to get out
there today.
It's that's just a fact. Soyeah, in my experience as a

(59:33):
healthcare professional, as aclinician, like I think it's
yes. And, and maybe, you know,as a high achieving type a
personality as well, sometimesit just feels good to someone
else. Tell me what to do.

Speaker 1 (59:45):
Oh my god. I mean, I'm in any agreement 8, so I
love it. If I go into a coachand they're like, oh, I don't
know how you feel. I'm likenext. Like, I'm like, I don't
have time for that.
I'm here because I I don't knowwhat to do. So tell me and I'm
gonna do it. Yes.

Speaker 2 (59:58):
Yeah. So there you are.

Speaker 1 (59:59):
But that would never work for my partner who's also a
coach. Like, that would neverwork for her. Right? To your
point, we're all individuals.

Speaker 2 (01:00:06):
Yeah. And therefore, you know, this skill as a
facilitator, as a coach, as atrainer, whatever it comes down
to, Trusting your intuition, butalso taking the learned
experiences because I lovecoaching and I love the
transformational coachingphilosophy that it's deeply
grounded in a lot of greatscience as well. But we're
messy. We're complicated humans,and so we need a bit of

(01:00:27):
everything.

Speaker 1 (01:00:28):
What type of containers do you work in 1 to
1? Do you have particulartimeframes? How often are you
meeting? What's the blocking andtackling of working with locale
learning or with youspecifically as a coach?

Speaker 2 (01:00:38):
Well, there's no straight answer. I mean, look,
we have prescriptive programs,so we've, we've set them up sort
of like a, you know, 3 partshort liftoff type coaching
package. We get to have a 15minute discovery call. Sometimes
it goes for 30 and then we sendthrough the client a package.
They can take some time to readit and see things that we would

(01:00:58):
like to offer them based on thephone call.
And then, pricing, according tothat, we do tend to find that a
lot of people would like that asa start point, because like,
this is the start, this is theend. You get to choose 3 things
you'd like to work on over the 3sessions.

Speaker 1 (01:01:15):
Is it a check these boxes or can they say anything?

Speaker 2 (01:01:18):
Well, we would have identified it probably in the
discovery call. And it's notthat we have to work to those
three things, but there's anopportunity there to work to 3
different areas. Having saidthat, we also offer more open
ended opportunities where peoplecan choose a longer form
coaching package, where it is alittle bit more in flow. And so

(01:01:41):
it might be that there's justone main thing that we have to
work on over an 8 session periodor whatever comes up in each
session is what we work on. Wedecided with this 3 point thing,
because we found that peopleweren't sure why they wanted to
work with us.
Like they knew that they werestressed. There was conflict,

(01:02:04):
you know, relationship breakdownwithin the elected body, you
know, conflict betweengovernance staff or, you know,
they might've been experiencingstress around social media
bullying, that sort of thing.And then sometimes people are
coming in and they're reallyneeding help with their personal
lives because the impact hasbled into their personal life.

(01:02:27):
We kind of sometimes presentwhat we're doing quite
prescriptively to use that wordbecause with this coaching
people were coming with morespecific professional issues,
pinpoint issues and or personalstuff. And so we found that it
was nice kind of like steppingstone that Lily pad to say,

(01:02:51):
right.
You know, you've got 3 sessions.If there's 3 things you want to
work with, we're going toworkshop these per session. And
then if there's more work youwant to do, then you can step
into this other level of longform coaching And look, we're in
early stages, maybe there's adifferent way of doing it. I
think for us, we're trying to asyou are, break down the stigma.
We have different flavor to youas well, of course.

(01:03:14):
I don't really know how todescribe it, but I know that the
work that you're doing is sortof like more familiar to me
outside of my politicalwell-being coaching and more in
that life coaching generalwell-being coaching. In this
sphere, we tend to be working alittle more, within this
framework that we're developing.I think to break down the

(01:03:34):
stigma, we felt that we neededto sort of be like, well, these
are the facts, you know, themere mortals report from a
political foundation showingthis. This research is showing
this. There's been some greatwork done by Ashley Weinberg.
He's identified that there'sthese particular stressor types,
institutional stressors,cultural stressors, and then the

(01:03:55):
individual layer as well. And sowe've sort of taken it all of
these things and tried todistill it into something that
is culturally relevant here inAustralia to our local
government politicians here.

Speaker 1 (01:04:08):
Let me put myself back 3 months into my first
term. What would I say? I had 3things to work on. I would have
probably said I have all thesegreat plans that I've been
working on for years and I can'teven get anyone to read them.
What do I do?

Speaker 2 (01:04:28):
Mhmm. Yep.

Speaker 1 (01:04:30):
I would have probably said I'm trying to do what I
think is my job, which is bringthe public who voted for me in
to demand what they need. And mycolleagues are pissed at me for
it, and I don't understand why.And I probably would have said,

(01:04:54):
I'm just completely overwhelmed.I am on my phone from the moment
I wake up to the moment I go tobed 7 days a week. Help.

Speaker 2 (01:05:04):
Yeah. Yeah. I love that.

Speaker 1 (01:05:06):
Similar to what you

Speaker 2 (01:05:08):
A 100%. A 100%.

Speaker 1 (01:05:10):
I realized there's a 100 solutions that could work,
but, like, if we pick one ofthose, what might I leave the
session with?

Speaker 2 (01:05:18):
So I would pick so in my role, I would be coaching you
with the overwhelm piece. Emma,my colleague would probably step
in with your other 2 because herbackground really allows her to
support people around conflict,coaching, governance,
legislation, where and how to dothe job of being an elected

(01:05:40):
leader on that level.

Speaker 1 (01:05:41):
Awesome.

Speaker 2 (01:05:41):
And then I step in more with the soft skills of
leadership in general, lifeorganization.

Speaker 1 (01:05:47):
What might I leave that session knowing or would I
have a system or an approach?Like, what would I leave with?

Speaker 2 (01:05:54):
If you came to me in the in the session was really on
this overwhelm, I would betalking to you about boundaries
and what boundaries are. Mhmm.Because sometimes people aren't
sure what it is to have aboundary around time and energy.
Some people don't alwaysunderstand their energetic
output. So that would beprobably a conversation that
we'd be having as well.
Like how is it for you to benaturally feeling good? What

(01:06:18):
does it feel like for you tofeel overwhelmed? What does it
feel like for you to feel tiredor exhausted and to start to
have a little bit more languageand understanding around their
energy and how it works for them

Speaker 1 (01:06:32):
and

Speaker 2 (01:06:33):
remembering that boundaries are for us to keep,
not for others to enforce orkeep for us. How does that look
for that particular person? Asyou mentioned being on your
phone from first thing in themorning, I would definitely jump
into and workshop that with you.You know, why is that a little
bit of questioning around whatwhat's the need for that? Is

(01:06:56):
that something that is expectedof you or that you expect of
yourself?
How are you feeling? You know,what are you noticing when you
do that? What are you noticingaround? What else is happening
in your house if that's whereyou are at that time. It's also
individualized, but withoverwhelm, I think it's
necessary and important to lookat boundaries and understanding

(01:07:17):
your energy output as a person.
And maybe I would jump in alittle bit with some it's bland,
but I think it's really relevantlooking at people's ability to
prioritize and time managementand some structural skills
around diary management andthings as well. Like, I, I do
think that that is a valuablehelpful thing.

Speaker 1 (01:07:35):
Yes. My, for podcast listeners and not YouTube
viewers, my eyes just cut 4times larger than their normal
diameter. I'm like, yes, that.

Speaker 2 (01:07:45):
But I would definitely start the session out
by asking you, how do you wannafeel at the end? What do you
wanna walk away from with thissession and getting people to
articulate that in terms of howthey feel? And that's what I
would work towards.

Speaker 1 (01:07:58):
Yeah. Beautiful. So that might be a great bridge
into this new well-beingframework specifically for
politics that you guys have.You've had a bunch of clients.
You've tried a bunch ofdifferent things for different
people with different needs.
I'm sure you've tried differentapproaches naturally,
organically, and alsointentionally. So what has
worked with clients? What hasreally not worked with clients?

(01:08:22):
And then what have you cherrypicked to put into this
political well-being framework?

Speaker 2 (01:08:28):
We're still working out what's working and what
hasn't worked. I can't bedefinitive on that. We've had
great feedback on everythingwe've put out there, which is
exciting, but also hard for usto pick and choose what is the
most effective here in New SouthWales. So the state of New South
Wales, we're just about to headinto, elections for local

(01:08:49):
government in September thisyear. So this previous election
cycle that we've just workedthrough has been the groundwork
for us.
And we feel like as a collectivewe're about to really launch
into the world, these, thelearnings that we've taken from
this election cycle into thisnext one. So we're really
excited to be sort of deliveringthings a little more formally in

(01:09:12):
terms of our well-being. We'vebeen doing some 1 on 1 coaching,
which we were just speakingabout. But this framework that
we've been working on is sort ofour, our flagship into really
propelling what is politicalwell-being into the world. Yes.
Our framework is specific tolocal government counselors, in

(01:09:33):
Australia, but I think it's allrelevant and would apply across
a lot of other jurisdictions.It's actually something that
we're launching into the worldfor individual counselors to
take and use as a self guidedexperience. Of course, we are
pointing them in the directionof utilizing services like ours,

(01:09:57):
like yours, and a whole bunch ofother resources. But our
intention with this work is verymuch to elevate the conversation
that you and I are having now,into something that is black and
white on paper, bolstered by theresearch of the Apolitical
Foundation and others so thatour leaders can have a reference

(01:10:20):
point, a framework to workthrough. We've identified 8 core
elements that we believe are themost important in terms of
elected leaders impact andperformance, wanting our leaders
to understand the correlationbetween their mental well-being

(01:10:40):
and their ability to executewhat they want to as a leader
and to draw that line for them.
And it might seem obvious, butit's not. And so we're really
wanting each individual electedleader to have this self
awareness on, are thesestressors that are unique to me
as as a councilor? Are theyimpacting? And if they are

(01:11:00):
impacting, how are theyimpacting?

Speaker 1 (01:11:02):
I'd love to pretend that that person is listening,
and we probably don't have topretend. So you are taking them
through these 8 periods ofwell-being to execution as a
leader or to being a moreeffective leader. And I wonder
how much of that course is themeta learning of this is

(01:11:23):
important, like, tying thattogether for them versus the
learning of how to do it and andput it into action. And if any
of it is the meta learning, howdo you get them to opt into the
program before they fullyunderstand that?

Speaker 2 (01:11:34):
I can't answer your question on how are we gonna get
them to opt in yet because Ireally don't know. You know,
there's a whole lot of hope,goodwill, and determination
behind us just like with you.Right? Like, we know this is
important. This conversationtoday is hopefully gonna have a
few more ears listening in.
We're gonna keep shouting fromthe rooftops, approaching

(01:11:56):
political organizations, andsharing what we're doing. We're
madly waving our arms aroundlike pick us, pick us for your
next conference, your nextforum. We're working hard to get
ourselves out there. But morespecifically, there's 8 core
elements which I'll go throughin a sec, but how we ask people
to move through the process isthat first people need to be

(01:12:17):
aware of what the stressors are.And it sounds obvious, but it's
not always obvious.
And I think awareness is key.Then we ask the elected leader
to identify from those 8elements, which ones are most
out of balance or of mostimportance to them to address
initially. Of course, theyprobably all need addressing,

(01:12:40):
but most people will have somethat are really in dire need of
some support, some work. Thenfrom there, we've actually
identified specific mindsets foreach of the 8 elements. So the
next step is to adopt themindset for that element that
you're wanting to work on.
And I can talk you through that.So if it was the overwhelm

(01:13:03):
thing, there's going to be amindset that we want to adopt to
come out of overwhelm. And thenthe micro skills within this
core element need to bedeveloped to make change and
there's going to be skills thatwe're going to want to learn and
implement. And then the finalpiece is to access resources. So
whether it's coaching, onlineresources that are available,

(01:13:25):
which we've listed them, we'vegone deep and wide to cast the
net to allow our elected leadersto have a whole suite of points
of information and support thatthey could dive into.
We'd like to think that thecoaching that we do would be
absolutely a piece in thatbecause we're really invested in
the elected leader space, butthere is a lot of good stuff out
there and we definitely want topoint people to all sorts of

(01:13:50):
ways of getting help becausethere's no one answer. So, let
me go through the 8 elements,these, these 8 things that we've
identified, and this is off theback of the research that
apolitical have done, but morespecifically, Ashley Weinberg,
has done in looking at politicalwell-being prior to that new
models report that a politicaldid number 1, the obvious one,

(01:14:11):
your physical and mental health.So this is talking about your
diet, your exercise, and yourgeneral mental health. And
that's why that little kind ofsticky bit is without
definitions. This is aboutpolitical well-being.
So your political, mentalwell-being impacting on your
performance. So people can begreat politicians and have pre

(01:14:34):
existing mental healthconditions. And so your mental
health is something that is likeyour physical health. There is
lots of things that can supportthat specifically. Now, of
course, if we're becoming unwellphysically because we're eating
Tim Tams and hot chips

Speaker 1 (01:14:52):
I know what Tim Tams are, but not everyone's gonna
get

Speaker 2 (01:14:55):
that reference. Is that an Australian thing? Oh my
gosh. Okay. Chocolate biscuits.
The chocolate biscuits. They'requite delicious. But we do have
a thing here around eating awhole pack of Tim Tams is an
emotional sponge. Yeah. Thepoint being that if your
physical and mental health isnot good, then there's going to

(01:15:16):
be repercussions for that.
It's an obvious thing. We knowthis. This is not a mind blowing
piece of information I'm sharinghere that your, your physical
and your mental health impact onyour performance. So the second
one is social connection.Isolation, loneliness is a real
risk in civic life.

Speaker 1 (01:15:35):
Yes.

Speaker 2 (01:15:36):
Becoming an elected leader can really change how you
socialize. We have digitalsafety. So here we're referring
to your online presence and weknow that bullying, trolling and
abuse is absolutely a realityfor elected leaders. And that
that does have reallysignificant consequences for

(01:15:57):
your mental well-being andperformance. Number 4 is the
technical know how.
So actually knowing how to doyour job. We hear time and time
again from Councillors thatwe're working with that the
learning curve is so steep whenthey step into an elected
leadership role for the firsttime or even the second time.

(01:16:18):
You know, no one likes feelingout of their depth. No one wants
to give away that they might notfully understand their roles and
responsibilities or how itworks. So that's definitely been
something that we have comeacross in our own coaching that
that's a huge source of stressfor counselors.
Just not understanding thetechnicality of the role. So the

(01:16:42):
actual governance andlegislation and all of that.

Speaker 1 (01:16:45):
And I don't know if this is the case in Oz, but
here, not all, but very manylocal level elected just don't
get any training. This theirmunicipality, their county
simply doesn't provide it.

Speaker 2 (01:17:01):
Just in I think it was 2016 legislation came in now
that it's mandatory for newcounselors to undergo training,
the specific things that theyhave to cover off on. And as, as
a business, we, we provide thatparticular induction training as
well. We're lucky to get theinsight into what's missing from
those induction trainingpackages and well-being is one

(01:17:23):
of the things that we've addedas a base module in our
induction training because we'vejust seen time and time again
that where people have comeunstuck, but of course it's, it
is governance heavy and it hasto be because people need to
know what they're doing. They'retaking all their passion and
their purpose. But there is theconfines of leading in a group

(01:17:46):
and all of the other things.
Yeah. So moving on, number 5we've identified is your
motivation and attitude. This islooking at the quality of your
thoughts, being aware ofunhelpful thought patterns,
whether you've got a decliningattitude towards your role. So

(01:18:07):
looking at, you know, if you'reruminating, if you're becoming
rigid, if you're constantlyhaving expectations or, or
whatever else it might be. Sothis one's quite a nuanced one,
and this is where I love to workin this space.
So number 5, being ourmotivation and attitude. So for
example, we've had, say maybe acouncil has been really

(01:18:28):
passionate about a decision andit has gone against them. So
maybe, you know, they weretrying to get something across
the line. It was voted down. Sothey're feeling under motivated
now, and they're starting tofeel quite negative about lots
of things involved in their roleand the people that they're

(01:18:50):
working with, etcetera.
And so their attitude towardstheir role is declining.

Speaker 1 (01:18:55):
Mhmm.

Speaker 2 (01:18:55):
So it's a really important piece, I think.

Speaker 1 (01:18:58):
Super common.

Speaker 2 (01:18:59):
Number 6 is your time and capacity. So this is what we
were speaking about a secondago. It's like juggling the
demands of being the electedleader with other life
responsibilities and thatfriction that can start to occur
between your civic role, youremployment because most
counselors have to remainemployed because it's quite an

(01:19:21):
underpaid role here inAustralia. And of course their
personal lives. We speakdirectly to time and capacity as
a standalone stressor forpeople.
Number 7 is relationships andconflict. So politics is
generally a low trust andcompetitive working environment.

(01:19:45):
But it's also dependent on therelationships you have. And it's
all about relationships andbuilding relationships with
other counselors and obviouslyyour constituents and other
stakeholders. So as humans, ifwe're in conflict, that's very
impactful on our mentalwell-being.

(01:20:06):
It's a really difficult thingfor us to manage. And so we do
like to speak about thatdirectly. And then number 8 is
ethical action. If someone actsoutside their integrity or their
values, this causes reallysignificant internal stress for
us. And so, again, here, it's anelected body that makes a

(01:20:27):
decision.
It's not one single counselor.And so if one single counselor
is feeling like the decisionthat the group has voted on is
not ethical, it doesn't alignwith their deeper values. That's
very stressful for the humanmind and experience. So that's
our 8 core elements that alllead into a counselor's impact

(01:20:51):
and performance. And so each ofthose elements has a mindset
that we thought about, we lookedat and we wanted to connect each
of these core elements ofwell-being with a specific
mindset so that people couldhave a tangible way to approach
it from that cognitive or thatmind space.

(01:21:12):
And we've developed anaffirmation. So each mindset has
an affirmation to support thepositive bolstering of that
mindset. And so that thatmindset can then support an
improvement in that area of yourwell-being.

Speaker 1 (01:21:29):
Amazing. I want to sign up now. Yay. I mean, yeah,
it feels deeply comprehensive,deeply applicable, deeply
useful. And I'm curious aboutthe structure of it.
Are the 8 modules in aparticular sequence? No. No. So

(01:21:52):
you can complete the 8, but theycan happen in any order.

Speaker 2 (01:21:55):
The idea is for it not to be prescriptive in terms
of any hierarchical or linearprogress. It really very much
we're developing a selfreflection tool for people to
use to see all the possiblestressors, influences that could
be impacting on theirperformance as a counselor. And
when I'm speaking aboutperformance as a counselor, I'm

(01:22:18):
talking about the counselorfeeling that they are doing the
best job that they can do withthe resources they have
available to them so that theyfeel like at the end of their
day, their week, their term,that they have achieved to the
best of their ability what theyset out to achieve because I
think that's a pretty nicedefinition of performance. I'm

(01:22:40):
not talking about how many votesthey get across the line or how
many decisions go their way orwhether people like them or not,
you know, if they're a popularpolitician. We're really
speaking here to how thatindividual councilor feels about
the contribution that they havemade and that they've
contributed to the best of theirability and done the things that

(01:23:02):
they needed to do to make surethat they were operating at a
level that they were giving ittheir all.

Speaker 1 (01:23:09):
Got it. So it's not as though if I were to complete
all 8 modules of this course, Iwould have superhuman abilities
in all of them, and I would havesolved every problem that's ever
come up in my life. Rather, theintention is that I would now
better and more fully understandthe challenges that stand before

(01:23:31):
me, the opportunities I have forgrowth or improvement, and have
a clearer vision to make aconscious choice on if and where
I would like to invest more timeto improve my condition in 1 or
8 or anywhere in between ofthese elements?

Speaker 2 (01:23:51):
Yeah. Absolutely, Skippy. That's exactly what it's
about. So

Speaker 1 (01:23:54):
Love that.

Speaker 2 (01:23:54):
It's really empowering the individual
counselor to understand theexternal and internal influences
or points of stress or stressorsthat they will experience in
their civic duty, in their civicrole. And then from identifying
those, allowing them to gothrough that process of, well,

(01:24:18):
do I want to develop skills inthis area that might bolster
against, you know, my decliningattitude towards my role? Do you
know, do I want to start toexplore a mindset that would
allow me to switch out of thisnegative pattern that I'm
starting to go into? Thisinformation is presented

(01:24:38):
visually. It's like a web.
There's no hierarchy or linearmovement through the framework.
It's literally a framework. It'sa scaffolding from which people
can jump off or, you know, stepdown or up or out or in or
whatever they wanna do, butgiving some really concrete
ideas for people to look at. Sothe micro skills that come under

(01:25:00):
each of the 8 elements are gonnaspecifically help people address
that element. Mhmm.
So with digital safety, forexample, we need to talk about
boundaries in that. So talkingto people in their digital
safety about how they interactwith social media and reminding
counselors that they have achoice around that. And actually

(01:25:23):
they have the choice not to usesocial media. It's actually not
necessary. Yeah.
We've listed out a bunch ofpoints where people can question
and inquire for themselves aswell as identify specific skills
that they might be lacking insocial media. It might be that a
counselor is replying to everysingle comment underneath a post

(01:25:45):
that they've written.

Speaker 1 (01:25:46):
Yep.

Speaker 2 (01:25:47):
The mindset we chose for digital safety is actually a
resilience mindset. I have thepower to choose how I use social
media and what I focus on whenusing it. Affirmations have
science behind them. Sciencebased evidence on the power of

(01:26:07):
using affirmations, theyactually change or have effect
in the brain. The prefrontalcortex is actually involved.
When we use affirmations, we'reactually changing the way that
we take on what might otherwisebe considered threatening
information. So by usingaffirmations, it actually

(01:26:29):
changes the way we process aperceived threat. So being
trolled or bullied online isthreatening. And when we use
affirmations like this one thatI just read out to you, I have
the power to choose how I usesocial media and what I focus on
when using it. That actually isgonna change the way your brain
is perceiving these threats andbolster against it.

(01:26:52):
Yeah. Actually give you a filterthrough which to receive that
information. I would advise notreading the comments full stop,
but sometimes it's necessary.And so sometimes we need to have
the right mindset to approachthat.

Speaker 1 (01:27:06):
Yeah. I, just this week, I've been working with an
affirmation, or just areflective statement. There's a
particular guest that we hope tohave on this podcast that I've
been very excited about. Theywere kind of the beginning of my
mental health journey. It wouldbe, amazing benefit to the
audience to have this person on.

(01:27:28):
And, the truth is they have beendirectly super open, welcome,
receptive, and then I get handedoff to the staff, which has a
different orientation toscheduling and language and
communication. And I noticedthat as soon as I see the staff
member's email pop up, I getvery panicky because I have a

(01:27:49):
core belief somewhere thateveryone in my life is gonna
leave me, and so it's like, oh,we're not gonna get it. We're
gonna get abandoned. We're notit turns into this whole thing
in my nervous system. And so myaffirmation is, like, when I
feel the panicky feeling, justto breathe into it, to know it's
safe, and to trust that what'ssupposed to come will come.

(01:28:11):
And it's insane how well thatlittle moment break helps me get
back to normal and then helps merespond from an empowered place
rather than a victimized placeor a scarcity place, which if I
were to respond from thoseplaces would actually drive the

(01:28:32):
outcome that I fear.

Speaker 2 (01:28:34):
Absolutely. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:28:35):
So I just highlight that was something tangible for
me today. Well, I love this thisframework. I'm so eager to see
how it's received, how it willbe utilized. Do you guys intend
to be getting direct feedbackfrom folks so you're learning
how it's working?

Speaker 2 (01:28:54):
We are reaching out and asking for input from
counselors, and I've had severalconversations with counselors
who've so kindly given me theirtime to give their direct
feedback on what we've puttogether so far. And we have
absolutely tweaked and changedaccording to that feedback.

(01:29:15):
We've also been working directlywith the apolitical foundation
and sharing our work as we gowith them. And they've been so
kind as to also give us somegreat feedback. Mhmm.
And also from the perspective ofcouncils themselves, so the
staff working within theorganization of council, we've
been so lucky to haveconversations here with

(01:29:36):
governance managers, the CEOs,because it's a tricky area. You
know, here in Australia, whenyou take on a civic role, you
don't fall under any particularwork conditions or award as we
call it. So our electedpoliticians are kind of in no
man's land, so to speak. So theydon't fall under eligibility for

(01:29:59):
the things that you wouldnormally expect in a workplace.
Politicians here in Australia,they are in this unique space
and often they're quiteunderpaid for the amount of work
that they put in.
And so that financial securitypiece is something that we talk
about in the framework as well.This framework is really kind of
working to fill that gap, toshare with people the necessary

(01:30:21):
steps, not just that theindividual can take, but we also
have information in there forthe organizations themselves so
that they can dial up theprotective factors and turn down
the negative factors that mightbe at play just within those
organizational structures or theway that things are
communicated. So we're trying tocome at it in all different ways

(01:30:41):
and we, we can't do it in avacuum. We are a 100% seeking.
And, you know, and if any ofyour listeners would, would be
keen on having a conversationwith me and have thoughts to
reflect on, I'd be so grateful.

Speaker 1 (01:30:52):
How are you guys getting around that there's no
financial support for this workfor individuals? Is everyone
paying out of pocket at thispoint?

Speaker 2 (01:31:02):
Individual counselors here in Australia will have some
small amount of professionaldevelopment budget. It's not
huge. And we have had somecounselors be able to use that
for our services. A lot of thetimes though, I will say that
the council has approved thatexpenditure more for conflict

(01:31:23):
coaching or, particularly ifsomeone's coming up against a
code of conduct complaint whereit's a little more at the spicy
end of things. But we have alsohad clients come through for our
coaching around the well-beingfrom that professional
development budget.
We offer some of our productsand services directly through
council. So we're actuallycontracted by the organizations

(01:31:45):
themselves to provide support.And then, yes, we've had many
counselors self fund to do ourprograms. Yeah. Kudos to them.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:31:53):
I mean, it's an issue that we're solving for as well.
And it sounds like our conditionin the states is better, but
only in certain places wheremany equivalent commissioners,
city council members, staterepresentatives, they will have
a budget for professionaldevelopment or an EAP or a
council budget where they canallocate funds for this work,

(01:32:16):
and so many do. But it'sentirely up to the community
itself. There's no requirement.And so very often, those most in
need are from communities thatare economically disadvantaged
and don't have that ability, andso it's something that we've
been working on as well as howto make sure that this support

(01:32:37):
is available to everyone basedon need, not simply those who
can afford it based on therelative affluence of their
communities.
So I was I was curious aboutthat, and that's why we started
our foundation. So we haveprivate donors that do things
like help fund the podcast, sowe can get information to
everybody, but also allow us tooffer free or subsidized service

(01:32:59):
to some communities. But thosedollars are limited. Right?
There's only so many donors whoget this right now

Speaker 2 (01:33:04):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:33:05):
In our experience. So it's interesting to hear how
others are addressing that. Ireally appreciate it.

Speaker 2 (01:33:10):
Yeah. Sure.

Speaker 1 (01:33:12):
So I wanna kinda shift back into your experience.
But before I do, is thereanything in the sphere of
delivering of mental well-beingcoaching to, not just
politicians, but public servantsthat you think would be
important to touch on that wehaven't touched on?

Speaker 2 (01:33:27):
You know, remembering that that we're all human, you
know, like, maybe I haven'trepeated that enough in the
conversation today. Thedefinition of performance is
very much the individual's goalsbeing addressed and met and
supporting them to achieve thegoals that they set out for
their counselor term. Becausethat's what matters most, right?

(01:33:49):
That the sustainability of ourleaders, you know, we've elected
them because we need leaders andwe elected these particular
leaders because we have beliefin them. And then when they get
in that role, it's important tous to see them supported through
that whole election cycle sothat they are working for the
citizens in a really positiveway.

(01:34:13):
I know you have personalexperience, Skippy, as being an
elected leader and I don't, butfrom the outside looking in, I
just think that the amount ofeffort that I see most
counselors put in the passionthat they have

Speaker 1 (01:34:29):
so much

Speaker 2 (01:34:29):
and the fact that we as as citizens have elected to
get them there, it isheartbreaking for me. And I know
for Emma and yourself and, youknow, so many other people
working in this space, whenwe're seeing these people who,
who have great intentions,almost actively being cut down,
you know, whether it is onsocial media or, you know, the

(01:34:51):
working conditions that they'reput under. So I guess I just
wanna finish off by saying, youknow, this is absolutely the
heart led work that we're doing.You know, this is this is really
meaningful for us and we're init because we care and we care
about, you know, the human sideof politics.

Speaker 1 (01:35:07):
And you said something that really struck a
chord with me earlier, which iswhen you're acting outside of
your integrity, it leads tostress. And in the way that we
talk about and define mentalhealth, to be mentally healthy
is the state of being aligned,connected, and safe with self,
others, and environment.Beautiful. And anything that

(01:35:30):
draws us away from that, thatdisconnects us, that has us
feeling unsafe, whether that'sbetween our ears or in our home
because of an online attack orbecause of a story not enough or
because we've been doxxed andthere's someone at our door,
leads to the presentation of thesymptoms of mental health
challenge. And that starts withstress to overwhelm to anxiety,

(01:35:54):
but it can go right up thatpath.
And so we can't disconnect thehumanity from the performance.

Speaker 2 (01:36:04):
Exactly. Well said. That's it.

Speaker 1 (01:36:07):
It's absolutely a myth because you cannot perform
at your best when you're beingdehumanized because you don't
have access to those parts ofyour brain or your emotion that
are required for making complexdecisions amongst many different
interest groups, which is thedefinition of democratic
politics. You can't do it.Correct. Just highlight that.

Speaker 2 (01:36:25):
Yes. Thank you for doing that so so articulately.
That's beautiful. Yeah. Wellsaid.

Speaker 1 (01:36:30):
So one of the things that you mentioned to me before
this interview is the progressthat you have made in I I don't
wanna say overcoming because itmakes it sound like there's
something wrong, but in workingwith your predispositions for
people pleasing and forperfectionism. Yeah. And these
are things that I hear all thetime from public servants. So I

(01:36:55):
think this will be veryrelatable, and I'd love to kind
of wind down by talking a littlebit about that experience. It
doesn't have to be super long,but how did you work with that?
What were some of the techniquesor approaches that you've found?
And after their application orduring their application,
because it's likely a practicethat's ongoing, how have you

(01:37:18):
found that's affected your work?

Speaker 2 (01:37:20):
Multiple ways. One thing that I started doing was
saying no. Seems simple, but I'mjust even getting a little
breathless thinking about it.When you want to please others
and you want to be doing a greatjob all the time, you say yes a
lot. And you often say yes tothe detriment of your own

(01:37:42):
energy, your closer intimaterelationships, you know, your
close family, friends becauseyou're pleasing so many people
and it spreads you thin.
So I started with the practiceof saying no, and it was,
challenging and yeah, Idisappointed people. Maybe I
missed a few opportunities aswell through saying no, but

(01:38:03):
ultimately I feel like I'm a lotbetter human for saying no to
certain people at certain timesand to certain projects at
certain times. I'm more vitaland it means the things that I
do really care about get waymore time and attention. So
that's definitely been pivotalfor me.

Speaker 1 (01:38:20):
And when you began the practice of saying no, did
you say no to everything, tocertain things? How did you
determine what got to know?

Speaker 2 (01:38:29):
I started listening to my intuition more. So I
started deliberately pausing andI learned this from a coach.

Speaker 1 (01:38:37):
I

Speaker 2 (01:38:37):
mean, it's not like I didn't know the practice of
pausing before answering. Imean, that's one of the things
we learn in the mindfulnesspractice, but what she did is
sort of just frame up for methat you really need to take a
physical pause. So what Istarted practicing is taking a
step, a half step back from theperson. So that gave me physical

(01:38:58):
space. And I immediately droppedinto how I felt in my body
because as I said, I'm veryconnected to my body, my
intuition and the way our brainis set up, you'll feel before
you get the thought.
And so I started to notice thaticky feeling inside me and

(01:39:20):
listening to it. And so then shegave me some great little
phrases to use. So thank you forasking me that I'll get back to
you. Thank you for asking methat. I'm gonna take a little
more time to think about it.
That's an interesting point youmake. I need to think about it a
little more, or I reallyappreciate that. Can I look in

(01:39:43):
my diary and I'll make adecision? So it seems simple,
but gosh, it made a differenceto me because I would be like,
yeah. Yeah.
Amazing. Let's do it. Orabsolutely. Or yes, I can do
that. You name the time and I'llbe there.
And it's just giving away powerand energy and time that, you

(01:40:04):
know, we don't have. I mean,when you're, when you've got
multiple balls in the air,you're a civic leader, you're,
have a home life, a personallife, and you're probably
working too. I mean, there'sgotta be a moment to pause and
reflect. And so those littlephrases that that particular
coach gave me, I startedimplementing them and then I
really would actually take amoment to think about it. And,

(01:40:27):
yeah, usually get back to themwith a no, if I had that icky
feeling inside me.

Speaker 1 (01:40:31):
And when you delivered the no, did you use
any particular phrasing that washelpful?

Speaker 2 (01:40:36):
I didn't apologize. So that was the second stage.
Stop apologizing. And I stilluse that all the time.

Speaker 1 (01:40:44):
Do you explain the reason? Is that allowed? I'm,
I'm just very curious becausepeople really have trouble with
noes and I've received noes thatfrustrated me. I've also
received noes where I've beenlike, hell, yeah. Good for you.
Like, I I wanna say no that way.Right? So there's a there's an
art to this. Are yeah. Otherthan the non apologizing, are

(01:41:05):
there any other specifics thatyou put into your notes?

Speaker 2 (01:41:08):
I think acknowledging the person, thanking the person,
and then I don't necessarilyexplain myself.

Speaker 1 (01:41:15):
Yeah. Very cool.

Speaker 2 (01:41:17):
Because it's not really relevant. You know, if
they want an explanation, I willchoose whether I'm brutally
honest or I give a morediscerning answer. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:41:28):
At least in the beginning, maybe it still
happens if you still have thatshortness of breath. If you
still have that little bit ofinternal panic of, oh God, I'm
letting someone down. I'm notgoing to do it. I've got FOMO,
whatever it is. How do you treatyourself?
What do you do to alleviate thator release that feeling in
yourself?

Speaker 2 (01:41:46):
Mhmm. I remind myself by saying no to that thing, that
I'm saying yes to so many otherthings. Yes. I'm saying yes, 1st
and foremost, to myself. Andthat's really powerful because I
think as a perfectionist, as apeople pleaser, it's not about
us.
It's about everybody else allthe time. And that's not such a

(01:42:08):
great place to be operatingfrom. To operate from a place of
deep self awareness is reallypowerful and you can only do
that when you start to put thoseboundaries in place, start to
take that time to really knowhow you are in the world, what
really matters to you and whereyour skill set lies. And the
more that you can say yes to thethings that really mean

(01:42:29):
something to you, that you areactually naturally and through
learning good at, then that's alot of yeses just in a different
direction. So I remind myselfthat all the time.

Speaker 1 (01:42:41):
Amen to that. Couple of quick hitters that just kind
of caught my attention. Curiousabout you reference humor a lot.
You reference it in your bio.You talk about being a kitchen
comedian.
And if I'm being honest, wehaven't done a lot of no. I'm
not going to ask you to do that.But but we haven't been laughing
a lot on this podcast, andsometimes we do. We have it a

(01:43:03):
little bit. But how does humorcome into your work?
Do you allow it to do that?

Speaker 2 (01:43:09):
Yeah. Look, you know, I'm probably being a lot more
polished on this podcast thanyou would get if we were
catching up outside of this. AndI'm just being really honest
with the listeners on that. I doreally value my professionalism.
And so I am definitely crossingmy t's and dotting my i's on
this podcast and I'mintentionally showing up like
that.
I'm a 100% being authentic in myanswers, But, you know, if we

(01:43:32):
were to hang out outside of thepodcast, I love to laugh at
myself. I love to find the humorin all things because I think it
is an absolutely fantasticantidote for the stress and, you
know, the the big things thatare happening in our world,
which, you know, we can't ignoreand and do impact and play on my
mind. So, yeah, I love to laugh,and, I do have a a pretty, you

(01:43:58):
know, sometimes just a bit moreof a bar room humor than maybe
what I'm gonna bring to thepodcast today.

Speaker 1 (01:44:05):
We'll get her on again and we'll,

Speaker 2 (01:44:09):
we'll see that. Swearing, you know, like, well
used swearing is with one of mymy greatest delights. And in
Australia, it's quite okay toswear.

Speaker 1 (01:44:21):
Well, you guys use words that we don't approve of
socially here.

Speaker 2 (01:44:26):
And I I've really, watched myself today.

Speaker 1 (01:44:31):
Some of the most interesting, most well known
clients that you guys haveworked with, could you share a
couple, obviously not individualnames, but, I've seen some some
pretty impressive stuff and Ilike to think that when people
see that, they go, oh, I coulddo that too.

Speaker 2 (01:44:48):
The best people that I've I've worked with are
probably people that no one is,ever gonna know because there
are individual counselors in,you know, regional areas in
Australia that have justimpressed me no end with with
their incredible leadership.

Speaker 1 (01:45:01):
Fair enough. And then you mentioned earlier that you
are starting organizationally toget braver. And I wonder what,
what was the insecure voice?

Speaker 2 (01:45:14):
For me, I have no political experience except for
having personal interest inpolitics and, other social
issues. So I guess moving from acorporate coaching and then, and
also my healthcare background, Iguess there was like a little
bit of an imposter syndrome, youknow, who am I to speak about
political well-being? I feellike I'm over that now. I feel

(01:45:35):
like, you know, we were talkingabout humans and I'm well
qualified to talk about humans.And so that was a big part.
What am I doing? I'm trying toget more vocal about my passion
for this on platforms, you know,like LinkedIn and and those kind
of places. Speaking to you todaywas a huge thing where I had to
go, yep. I can do this.

Speaker 1 (01:45:55):
I sure can. You did.

Speaker 2 (01:45:58):
Yay. Emma and I are speaking next year at, local
government conference here inAustralia, which we're really
excited about. And we've justbeen reaching out left, right,
and center to anyone who willlisten to us to speak about
this. So, yeah, that's how I'mgetting braver. Also putting
this framework out into theworld like it is a lot of hours

(01:46:20):
behind the scenes, Emma and Iworking away, bringing our minds
together.
And we did a soft launch of itat a well-being webinar where we
launched this framework, just asuper soft launch. And so we had
an audience there mostly of thestaff within the council
organizations. So the CEOs likeCEOs or the general managers.

(01:46:40):
And so that was a big dealbecause there is a tension point
there between councilors andcouncil staff, you know, the
people who work within theorganisation and the elected
body. So, yeah, that would, thatwas interesting how that was
received and, I feel it wasreceived positively.
And I also feel that I'm excitedto get braver, to keep having

(01:47:02):
this conversation with peoplewithin the organizations. I
think sometimes it's, it's mynatural place to speak to the
individual counselors, theindividual person, but to
explain it to others and forothers who might have influence
over a counselor's well-being,you know, that's, that's a
delicate conversation.

Speaker 1 (01:47:23):
Yeah. Beautiful. Well, I'm so glad and grateful
that you guys are getting outthere more and more that you are
introducing this framework, thatyou're raising awareness, that
you're holding events. This isthe work that it will take, and
the world will be better forwhat you are doing. So I just
wanna offer a genuine, heartfeltthank you for that.

(01:47:46):
And if people want to return thefavor and reach out to you or
find you or learn more about youand locale learning and all that
you're doing in the framework,where can they do that?

Speaker 2 (01:47:59):
Yeah. Absolutely. So, I would love to connect on
LinkedIn. My handle is AnnaMiley Coaching, and that's the
same on Instagram. On ourwebsite, which is
www.localearning.com.au, we dohave some free mindfulness

(01:48:23):
recordings that your listenerscould access if they would so
like to.
They set up specifically to take5 minutes in a busy day in the
life of a civic leader, soplease feel free to to jump in
and and access those recordingsas well and a bunch of other
free resources that we havethere for people as well.

Speaker 1 (01:48:44):
Amazing. And final question, same for every guest,
which is our audience are theproverbial humans in the arena
as you know very well. And so ifyou could leave them with just
one thing, one quote, one link,one program, one idea, one
thought, one anything that wouldbest resource them to be a

(01:49:05):
vector, personal vector, forhealing our politics, what would
it be?

Speaker 2 (01:49:10):
I would say remind yourself every day of your
purpose.

Speaker 1 (01:49:16):
If

Speaker 2 (01:49:16):
you can get up and you can have that sticky note on
the mirror or wherever it worksfor you to remind yourself of
your purpose, to remind yourselfwhy you're here and putting in
the effort that you're puttingin. I think that would be just
incredibly powerful and reallyup level the general energy and
culture of of our politics.

Speaker 1 (01:49:35):
Beautiful place to end, Anna Miley. Locale
Learning, thank you so much foryour time today from the other
side of the world. Bless theInternet. And, thank you for
what you do.

Speaker 2 (01:49:46):
Yeah. Thank you so much, Skippy, for having me. I'm
deeply, deeply grateful for theopportunity.

Speaker 1 (01:49:52):
Thank you so much for joining us today. If you wanna
put what you've heard here todayinto practice, sign up for our
newsletter, the leader'shandbook, where each month
you'll receive just one emailwith a curated selection of the
most useful tools and practicesdiscussed on this podcast today
and over the course of the lastmonth. Delivered in simple how

(01:50:14):
to worksheets, videos, and audioguides, so you and your teams
can try and test these out inyour own life and see what best
serves you. And lastly, if youwanna be a vector for healing
our politics, if you wanna doyour part, take out your phone
right now and share this podcastwith 5 colleagues you care
about. Send a simple text, dropa line, and leave the ball in

(01:50:38):
their court because the truth isthe more those around you do
their work, the better it willshow show up in your life, in
your community, and in yourworld.
Have a beautiful day. TheHealing Hour Politics podcast is

(01:50:58):
brought to you by the ElectedLeaders Collective, the first
leading and most highlyrecognized name in mental
health, well-being, andperformance coaching for elected
leaders and public servantsdesigned specifically for you.
Now don't be fooled by the name.The Elected Leaders Collective
is not just for elected leaders.It is for all public servants,

(01:51:24):
staffers, volunteers,government, nonprofit, whole
organizations, this is for you.
If you are filled with passionfor improving your community and
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if you find yourself bangingyour head against that same
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(01:51:47):
arguing with colleagues who aresupposed to be on your team, and
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(01:52:08):
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and kindness necessary torespond to threats, improve
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