November 27, 2025 • 47 mins
Choosing Possibility with Adam Bouse: Grounded Optimism, Self-Awareness, and Nature-Based Coaching
In this episode of the Two Piers Podcast, we talk with Adam Bouse, founder of Optimistic Coaching, about what it means to choose possibility in an uncertain world. Adam shares his path from emotional intelligence imbalance to becoming a coach who helps people build grounded optimism, deepen their self-awareness, and reconnect with nature as a source of resilience.
The conversation explores how optimism can be a disciplined practice rather than a personality trait, why understanding our own internal signals matters more than we realize, and how nature-based coaching opens up new ways of processing stress and finding clarity. Adam also talks about his own experiences with grief and how they shaped his understanding of resilience.
Listeners will come away with practical ideas for managing energy, building presence, and applying optimism in a realistic and meaningful way.
Topics Covered
• Adam’s origin story and his work with the EQI 2.0 assessment
• Balancing empathy and decision-making as part of emotional intelligence
• The philosophy behind Optimistic Coaching
• The difference between dispositional optimism, learned optimism, and toxic positivity
• Viktor Frankl’s concept of tragic optimism
• How cognitive biases and interoception influence perception
• The role of nature in regulating stress and shaping perspective
• Evidence-based benefits of forest bathing and nature exposure
• Practical ways to build resilience and grounded optimism
• Self-compassion, realistic expectations, and everyday presence
• How to connect with Adam and learn more about his work
About Adam Bouse
Adam Bouse is the founder of Optimistic Coaching, where he helps individuals explore possibilities, build resilience, and develop deeper self-awareness. He uses emotional intelligence assessment, grounded optimism, and nature-based coaching to support personal and professional growth. Adam offers a free 90-minute discovery session to help people gain clarity and explore next steps.
Learn more at https://optimisticcoaching.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Erica D'Eramo (00:05):
Hello and welcome to the Two Piers podcast. I'm
your host, Erica D'Eramo, andtoday we have guest Adam Bouse
joining us. Adam is the founderof optimistic coaching, where he
helps people move from feelingstuck to finding new
possibilities. He draws on morethan 15 years of leadership
experience and over 1000 hoursof coaching to guide clients in
(00:25):
navigating change and living amore grounded, fulfilling life
with a philosophy rooted inpositive psychology,
neuroscience and nature basedexperiences, Adam believes
everyone deserves the chance tothrive and discover the clarity,
connection and fulfillmentthey've been longing for. Adam's
here to talk to us today aboutstaying optimistic when there's
plenty of reason not to be andwe're so excited to have him on
(00:48):
the podcast.
Adam, thank you so much forjoining us.
Adam Bouse (01:03):
Thank you, Erica.
I'm really excited and lookingforward to the conversation with
you.
Erica D'Eramo (01:07):
I you know I typically a lot of our a lot of
our focus is on challenges,overcoming challenges,
navigating challengingworkplaces. And I just feel like
this optimistic framework thatyou, that you've been sharing
about, really resonated for me,and it's sort of a breath of
(01:27):
fresh air and a very differentway of thinking about things. So
I was really, really lookingforward to having this
conversation with you.
Adam Bouse (01:34):
I appreciate that.
Yeah, I think it's somethingthat can be maybe overly
simplistic in the way that wetalk about it. Of let's, you
know, pursue happiness and let'sfind our satisfaction. But I
think there's a deeper, richerstory to tell around optimism
and that it's all inclusive. Itdoesn't have to just be sunshine
and rainbows, but it's like, howdo we actually walk through the
(01:55):
hard stuff and maintain apositive outlook and have that
sense of optimism?
Erica D'Eramo (01:56):
Yeah, so I almost always open with kind of asking,
what's your origin story? What?
What brought you to this pointin your coaching journey and
your professional journey?
Adam Bouse (02:08):
Yeah, my origin story goes back probably 15
years by now, the 13, 14, 15years and I was working an
organization in Oklahoma, andjust part of the culture was six
months into being on staff, youtook an emotional intelligence
assessment. Now I'm a nerd likethat, and I love that kind of
stuff, assessments and tools andthings like that, and I took it,
(02:29):
and it was really powerful. It'scalled The EQI 2.0 and it gives
you this really intentionalprocess of understanding how
skillful you are at thesemeasurable, teachable, trainable
skills of emotionalintelligence. And there was a
lot to be like, excited aboutand to feel good about. But then
there was also this massiveimbalance that I discovered I
had, and the imbalance wasbetween empathy and decision
(02:51):
making. Turns out, I'm really,really good at empathizing and
understanding other people, butbecause of that, and this was I
was in my, you know, mid to late20s, pushing on 30, I was really
good at taking all thisinformation about how other
people are feeling and thinkingand what they're experiencing,
but oftentimes, when it came todecision making time, I would, I
would freeze because I was soworried about, well, how will
(03:12):
this impact other people and sothings like independence and
assertiveness just really,really low and in the basement.
So I, had the chance to workwith a coach on my specific
results, and just in that shortamount of time. It wasn't a very
long engagement, but it was areally cool opportunity to just
sort of synthesize lifeexperiences and talk about
nature versus nurture, andreally dig in and figure out,
(03:34):
like, okay, so it's not that Ineed to get rid of my empathy.
Empathy is a good thing, and Iwill, I will fight tooth and
nail for that belief. But how doI bring them into a balance?
Because I was over weighing orovervaluing data I was getting
from what other people wereexperiencing or what they might
grew up in life,experiences, whatever. It's a
potentially experience, so I wasthinking a lot of thoughts for
people, but not actually tuninginto what they were actually
experiencing. So all that to sayis I did a lot of work and
(03:55):
strength for me 100% and I canover rely on it. I can use it in
experienced a ton of growth,personally and professionally.
And when I got done, I said, Iwant to do that for people too,
like I want to be able to takethem through that assessment,
have those conversations andhelp them learn and grow. And so
I got certified, I was able totake my team at the time with
that through that assessment.
And I've been using thatassessment now for 12 years, not
(04:16):
always as a full part of my fullways that aren't actually
productive and helpful. So ittime job, sometimes on the side,
sometimes in differentnonprofits or organizations I've
been connected to. But that's,that's how I got started. It's
just this sense of like, oh, Iexperienced this new level of
self awareness, and I was ableto grow and develop. How do I
how do I do that for otherpeople? That's what I want
(05:03):
creates the shadow of like,well, I'm just stuck. I want
(05:58):
someone else to make thedecision, because I'm afraid of
upsetting people or making thewrong decision and having a
negative impact on other people,all the while kind of ignoring
how that's having a negativeimpact on me. So it was really
eye opening. I, you know, it's Ihaven't perfected it, something
that I still have to keep my eyeon, but it's something I've
(06:21):
definitely seen a ton of growthin starting with those first
coaching conversations about,hey, empathy is a really good
thing. How can you bring thatback into balance?
Erica D'Eramo (06:27):
Yeah, and shout out to EQI 2.0 so, yeah, big,
big fan of that assessment,actually, which is interesting,
because that is one of the fewassessments that there's really
good data behind some of the thethe outcomes and the
measurements around that. Thenthere's assessments out the
(06:49):
wazoo. And especially whenyou're in coaching, you kind of
see a lot of them. But EQ, I wasone of the ones that for a data
person, because I am sort ofstuck in that logic side of
things that I do love, that it'sreally, yeah, has the rigor
behind it. So how would youdescribe some of your philosophy
in this realm, when we talkabout optimistic coaching, like,
(07:10):
what? What does that mean?
Adam Bouse (07:12):
Yeah, I think you actually have to have a really
good to be a great coach. Youactually have to have a really
high belief in the potential ofpeople. Because, as you said,
like, I'm not here to fix you,I'm not here to solve your
problems. I'm actually here. Ilove the way that Jerry colonna,
he's someone that I see as acoaching mentor from a distance.
I don't know him personally, buthe sometimes is called the CEO
(07:36):
whisperer, and he's a coach, andhe runs his company, reboot.io,
if people want to check it out,but he describes coaching as
helping people become betterobservers of themselves. And so
I really, I really believe thatpeople are capable. I believe
that they have the resourcesthat they need in order to take
their next steps. So I reallystart from a place of like,
(07:57):
yeah, everyone is inherentlyworthy of belonging in the
conversation, in their ownpotential, in their growth. You
know, I use the word lovesometimes, which maybe isn't the
most professional thing in somecircles, but I believe everybody
is worthy of that love and thatbelonging. And so I really want
to just come from a place of Ibelieve in you and wherever you
(08:18):
are is okay, and I'm here tohelp you see yourself in the
world around you, maybe a littlebit more clearly based on your
own discovery, based on your ownobservations, based on your own
motivation. And when we tap intothat, we know from the science
and the research, but we alsoknow experientially, when people
take ownership of their owndevelopment and their own
growth. So so much more powerfulthan someone coming in and
(08:41):
saying, hey, you need to dothis. You need to do that. You
know there's, yeah, there's allkinds of research we could dig
into. But that's where I startfrom, just that place of
everyone belongs, everyone iscapable, and everyone deserves
the chance to figure out whatthriving looks like for them.
Erica D'Eramo (08:55):
So where does optimism come into play?
Adam Bouse (08:57):
Yeah, so optimism is something that I've been
thinking about for probably fiveor six years. And you know, I
think it started from just aplace of curiosity in the
research, hearing a talk orreading an article and going,
Oh, optimism. I haven't reallydug into the into the research
(09:20):
on that, what that means. And asI dug into it and I read around
it, Martin Seligman is, is oneof the great writers and fathers
of positive psychology, and hehas a book called Learned
Optimism, which is a greatprimer, a great way to get
started in understanding it. Themore I dug in, the more I
realized is that optimism reallyis, from my perspective, just
this cornerstone skill and alsojust a way of being that really
shapes what your experience isgoing to be like going forward.
(09:43):
So for me, the definition I use,the description I use for
optimism, is choosing to findpossibilities in an unknown
future. And I use thatdefinition because I think
sometimes people hear optimismand they go optimistic,
pessimistic, half glass, halffull. Glass, half empty. And.
Okay, I get it. It's one ofthose words that we've heard it
(10:06):
so many times, it kind of startsto lose its meaning, which is
why I've come up with thisdefinition about choosing to
find possibilities and unknownfuture. Because I believe, and
the research backs this up, isthat it's actually a skill. It's
something that you can develop.
It's in the EQI 2.0 right? It'sin there. That's something that
we can measure and we can teachand we can develop and we can
remeasure. And really it is thisskill that says, hey, you know
what? I'm going to activelychoose to believe that from
(10:26):
where I'm standing today,there's, there's an option,
there's an option, there's anoption, there's, there are
options. And I'm going toactively decide to look for the
options, look for thepossibilities, especially when I
don't know what's going tohappen, because if I know what's
going to happen, well then I'mnot it's not a practice of
optimism. It's certainty. Yeah,there are some things we can be
(10:48):
certain about, but there's somuch in life that we cannot be
certain about. Life is nothing,if not out of our control. And
so I see optimism as thisfundamental belief of, you know
what? I don't know what'scoming. I don't know how this is
going to play out, but I'm goingto choose to believe that I have
options.
Erica D'Eramo (11:06):
It's so interesting to hear you frame it
that way, because, on the onehand, I mean, I don't know that
many people would describe me asoverly optimistic, because I'm
an engineer, right? I'm alwayslooking for, how could this go
wrong? And yet, I also feel likeI am one of the people in life
(11:27):
where when I come up against abarrier or a roadblock, I'm
like, okay, but there's got,there's got to be a way right,
like, how maybe we go right,maybe we go left, but there's,
let's just get creative. There'sgot to be some options here. And
I have seen that that's notalways, not not everyone has
(11:48):
that same ethos of, kind of,what? So what do we do now?
Like, okay, not this, but maybesomething else, like, what? What
are the possibilities here? AndI don't know that I've ever
thought about it as optimism,necessarily. And the whole
glass, half empty glass, halffull thing has always made me
laugh. Because when I was kid, Iwas like, But wait, which one's
(12:09):
a good one and which one's thebad one? Because to me, I'm
like, the glass is only halfempty. Isn't that good? Which
maybe goes to show, like, justthat engineering orientation was
built in pretty early. But theidea that optimism is not
necessarily just Pollyannathinking or kind of this toxic
(12:30):
positivity of like it'll allwork out in the end, totally. It
might not all work out in theend, but there even then,
there's still options. You willalways have options in one way.
Adam Bouse (12:41):
Yeah, absolutely.
And I think you get to a reallyimportant point is that, like,
there is this sense of like, oh,that we think about optimistic
people being the ones who are,like, full of energy, and like,
they're going to run throughwalls and nothing can stop them.
And I think, okay, maybe that isa flavor of optimism. But I
think we have to make adistinction between
dispositional optimism and moreof a learned optimism, or what I
like to call it, a groundedoptimism. Dispositional optimism
(13:03):
is essentially this sort ofpersonality trait, this
characteristic that may havesome connection back to our DNA,
where we tend to believe thatyeah, things are going to work
out, right? I think there arepeople who have that
disposition. There are alsopeople who have the disposition
of Yeah, I'm pretty sure that'snot going to work, right. So we
might call that a dispositionalpessimism. And I don't know that
(13:23):
we need to put labels on good,bad, like people are the way
that people are right. What I'mglad for it too. Yeah, right. We
need those voices. We need totest, we need to push and
challenge and have these debatesabout what is and isn't
possible. But I think what I'mmost interested in is really
sitting down with people andhelping them lean into this idea
of I can see reality clearly. Ican see the challenges and the
(13:47):
risks and the gaps and theneeds, and it doesn't make me
quit. It doesn't make me giveup. I can actually choose, this
is the definition, right. I canchoose to believe that there are
possibilities. I may not knowwhat the possibilities are, but
I'm going to remain open to theidea that there are
possibilities, and I want to gofind them.
Erica D'Eramo (14:08):
Yeah, I I never want to be dismissive of
people's experience or pain. Andso when people say like, I have
no options, it's, you know, Iwant to receive that and hear
that and acknowledge the pain orfrustration or hopelessness in
that. I also think, like, youknow, there's been a lot of
writing done by people likeViktor Frankl about how, you
(14:30):
know, even when it looks likethere are no options, no it is
the bleakest it could possiblybe, there is still choice in how
we show up that day, how we putone foot in front of the other,
and that the loss of hope, orthe loss to loss of, you know,
visibility of any options at allcan that, in and of itself, can
(14:57):
actually be what becomes fatal,right? Can be such a determining
factor. And you know, NelsonMandela wrote a lot about this
as well. So there are somereally incredible folks
throughout history who haveexplored, even when we our
physical environment has beenlimited so extremely, like,
(15:21):
there's still options about howwe relate to it and how we
decide to engage with hope.
So...
Adam Bouse (15:26):
Yeah, there's two things that come to mind for me,
and that one is, is that ViktorFrankl literally calls it tragic
optimism. Like, that's thephrase he uses in the book man
search for me, and he calls itTragic Optimism. Gosh, and if
that's not a story that compelsyou to believe that, like, we do
still have some agency in how weshow up now again, we could this
(15:49):
is the second thing it bringsup, is this idea of toxic
positivity, which I kind ofagain describe as this sense of
like, everything will always andonly be okay, and we should
always and only talk about thethings that are going well. And
it's like, Well, I understandthe impulse, because sometimes
the world is overwhelming andhard and scary, and so sometimes
it feels like the best choice isjust push that aside and just
(16:09):
focus on the good stuff that maywork, that may be necessary at
times, but in terms as a likelife philosophy or a strategy
for how to really haveresilience and endure hardship,
I think we all know that doesn'twork. It doesn't work because it
just makes the pain and theanguish get louder and louder
and louder until it forces us tostop and face it. You know, I'll
(16:33):
be vulnerable here and even saythis, that I'm in a grief
journey myself. My wife passedaway nine months ago, and she
died from a rapid brain disease.
And so me and my kids, we are ina season where we are still
trying to figure out which wayis up, and how do we move
forward. And some days are okay,and other days I'm flat on a
couch. And for me, I had toreally slow down and think, can
(16:55):
I still talk about positivityand optimism? Because this is
the work I was doing before shegot sick. And Stacy was a person
who who gave me so muchinspiration for the work that
I'm doing, but I had to reallyslow down and think about it,
and what I realized is, is thatI, I I've always believed that
optimism was a sense of choosingto find possibilities in an
unknown future. It's not like Ijust came up with that because
(17:16):
I've gone through this horrificloss, and I've always had this
sense that positivity wasn'tjust sunshine and rainbows, but
it's the sense of, how do I stayopen, how do I stay soft? And
one of the phrases that I'vebeen using more recently, I
thought about it, or in theearly days of the year, and I've
brought it back recently, isjust, how do I stay in a place
of being tender, not bitter? Andfor me, this is optimism. It's
(17:37):
waking up every day, and it'seating breakfast like that is
okay. I I'm not going to solveall the world's problems. I'm
clearly not going to be able tobring my wife back. I don't know
how to really navigate solo,widowed parenting with three
teenage Age. Age ish, boys 11 to17. I don't actually know how to
do that, but simply showing upevery day and trying is an act
(18:00):
of positive mindset and is anact of optimism.
Erica D'Eramo (18:06):
Right, we just need to take one. It's just
that, like most finite amountthat we can see in front of us,
it doesn't need to be years andin the future that we need to be
looking at like, what is thatone step that we put in front of
the other each day?
Adam Bouse (18:24):
Yeah, yeah. And really embracing that sense of
unknown, right? There's a lot inour world, and there's a lot in
our marketing and ouradvertising, and there's apps,
and there's technology thattells us we can figure it all
out, we can optimize, we canmaximize, we can biohack, we can
do all the things. And sometimesthose things are really good.
It's not, for me, it's not it'snot binary. It's not like
(18:45):
they're all good or they're allbad, like, that's the hard part.
Is they're good and they'rehelpful and they're terrible,
all at the same time. You know,I'm not the first one to make
this observation after a loss,is that life is really precious,
and you really don't the nextday will bring and so for me,
standing up at my first workshopafter a nine month break and
(19:05):
saying, Hey everybody, todaywe're going to talk about
practicing positivity, but firstI have to let you know that my
wife died like that's me notknowing how that's going to go,
how they're going to receivethat. If I can get through that
first workshop, that's me sayingI don't know how this is going
to go, but I think it's worthtrying.
Erica D'Eramo (19:21):
Yeah, there's that level of like openness and
almost curiosity, not curiosityas like a driving force, but
just that remaining open thatjust feels like such a common
thread, and not needing to havethe answers and not needing to
have the certainty of it. And Iguess that's kind of this big
(19:42):
piece around optimism isprobably a lot easier when we
have a lot of the data thatthings are going to work out
okay and and when we don't, thenwhat? Right? That's, that's when
it really comes when push comesto shove. So what I. What are
some of the areas that you arefinding yourselves really
(20:05):
delving into right now, withoptimism, pessimism coaching?
Adam Bouse (20:10):
Yeah, I mean, I think so. I've mentioned a
couple of these briefly, butmaybe a little bit more detail,
like this, idea of seeingreality clearly is so important
not overestimating how difficultsomething is and not
underestimating how difficultsomething is like if we have a
skewed perspective, either outof self protection or, you know,
naiveness, we're alreadystarting out by holding back on
(20:34):
the idea that we can, we can getwhere we want to go, right?
There's a really fascinatingstudy around having people look
at a hill and estimate how steepthe hill is. And they brought in
just some average people off thestreet, not athletes, not people
who are climbing mountainsregularly, but they just said,
Hey, how steep is this hill? Andthey were all way off, like,
way, way, way off, right? Thenthey brought in a group of cross
(20:57):
country runners, and they said,How steep Do you think this hill
is? And they were right. Theywere accurate, right. So there's
something to say aboutexperience, about our ability to
accurately estimate thesteepness of a hill, and I think
there's some applicability tothat, of if we've done something
before, we might have a bettersense of how hard or challenging
something might be. But here'sthe interesting part, send those
(21:17):
cross cross country runners outfor a run. Get them tired, put
them back in front of anotherhill, and their ability to
assess the steepness of the hilldisappears. Wow, just by being
tired. So like, for everybodylistening, do you feel tired
right now? And just make theconnection to like, how hard
(21:38):
things feel right now doesn'tmean that they're not hard, but
your fatigue plays a role inboth your ability to do the hard
work as well as your ability toaccurately assess how hard is
this going to be.
Erica D'Eramo (21:51):
It's funny, I sometimes will ask clients,
like, if you were a house plant,how would you be doing right
now? And and now, I'm thinkingof, kind of just how those base
needs, about fatigue, bloodsugar, stressors, sensory
inputs, like all of thosethings, are probably diminishing
our ability to see thingsclearly. But it's that self
(22:14):
awareness too setting yourselfup for success, or at least
knowing your limitations on howaccurately or perceiving things,
that's right, that you can thenuse, and I this came to mind
earlier, but I think thatthere's something so, I guess,
(22:35):
powerful in equipping peoplewith the trust to be able to
understand their perceptions ofthings, and that the top what I
call like, that Pollyannasyndrome, or that toxic
positivity of like, it'll all befine. It'll work out in the face
of no data, one way or anotheris almost the opposite, right?
(22:56):
It's almost like, just ignorewhat's around you and trust, and
that's a very different message.
And for me, like, that's notwhen people say, like, I'm sure
it'll all work out. That's notsoothing at all. It's just sort
of detaching me from what I'mperceiving. And it almost feels
gaslighty, right? Like, what areyou perceiving? Okay, how
accurate is that? What otherinformation is out there, but
(23:19):
that's more empowering than thesort of just ignore what you're
seeing. And so I love that youkind of bring it back to our
perception. And the, I don'twant to say the flaws in our
perception, but how ourperception is influenced by our
context.
Adam Bouse (23:39):
Absolutely, yeah. I mean, there's a very long
catalog on all the differentways that we can experience
cognitive distortion andcognitive biases. And I'm not
advocating that we all go outand memorize all of those so
that we can disassemble themlike they're going to happen,
right? But just being aware thatwe can't always trust our
thinking so helpful, like, ifnothing else, right? I may not
know about the about all of thedifferent biases that can exist,
(24:04):
and we could rattle off a bunchof them right now, but at the
end of the day, if I just go,hey, you know what? My mind
isn't always accurate. It'susually pretty certain, but my
brain wants to be certain, butit's it's less concerned with
accuracy. It wants to keep mesafe and alive, right? That's
what my brain wants. And sosometimes, when I in this per
this is personal. This is in myown work with my own anxiety. Is
(24:25):
really just having aconversation with that anxiety
and saying, Hey, sounds likeyou're really scared about
something right now. What areyou scared of? Because sometimes
we feel that in our bodies,because our mind body is a
system. It's all connected.
They're not these two differentwarring factions, even though it
can feel like that, but our mindand body are working in concert
to keep us safe and to keep usalive. And sometimes when those
physical symptoms come up, I askmyself, Hey, what's going on? I
(24:49):
may not have a cognitivethought, a narrative, a story
going on yet, but my body'spicked up on something, and so
sometimes it is really justabout slowing down. And like you
said. Getting curious of Huh? Iwonder what I feel like is at
risk right now? That's aquestion that I'll use in
coaching conversations. Ifsomeone's stuck, or they're
afraid to take that next step,or they're resistant to the idea
(25:10):
of change altogether, eventhough they're in a coaching
conversation. So hopefully theywant to be in some mode of
change. What do you feel like isat risk right now? What's the
thing? Is it a relationship? Isit a sense of identity? Is it
control? Is it money? Likethere's 1000 things that we are
all trying to manage and juggleat all times, and when we go
(25:30):
through a change, or we'retrying to overcome some kind of
a challenge, it's so easy forour mind body system to go, oh,
there's a risk we better slowdown.
Erica D'Eramo (25:43):
Yep, it's, yeah, the lion in the grass, right?
Like, and this is, it'sinteresting, because I'll often
say, like, let's shine out. Youknow, it's like the monster
under the bed. Sometimes, let'swe sense it's there, but if we
shine a light on it, hey, itmight, it might be a raccoon,
right? I'm not saying it's safe,but at least then we can do
something with it, and we canassess, like, How dangerous is
(26:05):
this? Do I need to go get aseries of rabies shots? Like,
you know, we can do somethingwith it. And it may just be an
old pair of sneakers that wemisinterpreted, but shining a
light under it, and that can bestrange for people, and they're
like, Well, I don't want to lookat the risk like, I don't want
to stare the bad thing in theface, but it doesn't take it out
(26:26):
of the situation, if it's ifwe're still operating in
response to a fear around it.
Adam Bouse (26:32):
Yeah, absolutely.
There's a neuroscientist thatI've become aware of in recent
years. His name is Dr. JeromeLubbe, and he talks about the
Enneagram, if listeners arefamiliar with the Enneagram, but
he talks about it from theperspective of a neuroscientist,
which is fascinating. And heuses the language when you are
feeling a threat, a risk, whenyou have that sense of anxiety
or uncertainty. The question heasks is, is this a bear, or is
(26:55):
it a deadline?
Erica D'Eramo (26:58):
Right? Like this email is not actually trying to
kill me.
Adam Bouse (27:03):
That's right, that's right, but our brain is looking
at any risk as a potential lifethreatening risk. Yeah, and
there are real there are realrisks that we do need to attend
to, but it's helpful if we cansort out which ones are actually
worth giving that time andenergy and attention to, from a
mind, body system perspective,versus the ones where we go, oh,
(27:23):
actually, that's a false alarm.
Erica D'Eramo (27:24):
Yeah. Or the difference too, between a, you
know, there, think there's evenbeen some research done around
like test taking and perceivingour own fear or own
physiological responses to it,and how we interpret those and
do we see ourselves as thegazelle that's about to be
(27:44):
attacked by a lion, or do we seeourselves as an as the lion
who's also activated becausethey're about to go try to get
their dinner? But it's not thesame threat, right? Like, okay,
if you miss dinner day after dayafter day, yes, you're going to
be looking at a problem, but inthe moment, this is more of a
opportunity, achievement, riskthat you're going after, you
(28:07):
know, presenting in front of acrowd. Yeah, no one is going to,
you know, take you away andthrow you in jail if you don't
present. What? Well, debatable,but, but I think that, like,
ultimately, you just want to doreally well, that's what it's
tied to a goal. Or I'm doingreally well, and we're trying to
achieve that goal, but we ourbrains, can't always tell the
(28:28):
difference.
Adam Bouse (28:29):
Yeah, and I think there's something too to be said
about just our awareness of whatis going on inside of our body.
Our body is part of a meaningmaking machine, and we're trying
to constantly interpret ourenvironment and our
relationships and what we'rehearing and seeing, and the big,
fancy, technical term for thiswould be interoception, what's
going on inside of my body,right with my pulse, with my
(28:51):
with my breath rate, with thebutterflies in the stomach, my
toes curling up, my leg mightlike do I have a sense of what's
going on, not just physically,in terms of where I'm looking or
getting hot, but like, what'sgoing on inside of my body? And
there's, again, there's anotherreally cool study where they
went to a stock market and theylooked at the traders on the
floor, and they wanted to figureout, how can we predict who were
(29:13):
the most successful tradersgoing to be? It wasn't
academics, it wasn't their pay,it wasn't their gender, it
wasn't how long they'd been inthe job. The number one
predictive factor of whether ornot someone be successful in the
stock trading floor was theirinteroceptive skills. Can they
pay attention to what's going oninside of their body and use
(29:33):
that as a data point to helpthem make more effective
decisions?
Erica D'Eramo (29:39):
I love talking about interoception. I mean,
that is well, and I'm also ayoga teacher on the side, too,
so like proprioception andinteroception is my jam. But I
agree that so often we are socaught up in the moment. I talk
about it, like being on the topof the waves, you know, that we
can't actually, we're in thechurn. We can't actually tell,
like, a my heart rate just wentup. My pulse just went up. I'm
(30:03):
activated. I'm sweating. Lisafelt so since we're sharing,
I've written down already, likeJerome Lubbe, I'm gonna look
into some of these folks, butLisa Feldman, Barrett is another
first. Okay.
Adam Bouse (30:14):
She's the best. I was gonna bring her up, but I
didn't.
Erica D'Eramo (30:18):
Oh, you. Let me do it. Thank you. She's, I think
she's got a TED talk out therethat's, you know, definitely I
her book how emotions are madeis not, it's not a quick read if
you love to nerd out about thestuff like, It will be
fascinating about how our brainsinterpret, you know, like,
emotions are not just this thingthat exists. It is our brain
(30:41):
interpreting our context aroundus, interpreting our
physiological responses, andthen putting a label on it and
calling it a thing. And shetalks about how, like, our
brain's purpose is not to think,you know, we all think our brain
is there to think, to make ushappy, to navigate decisions.
No, our brain is not concernedwith that. It just wants to keep
(31:02):
us alive. It wants allostasis.
It wants to send the chemicalsto the right places so that we
can either run away or hide orwhatever. But it's not actually
that concerned with, are youhappy? So we have to go a little
higher order.
Adam Bouse (31:16):
Yeah, if people want, uh, that book is amazing.
It's on my shelf, right backhere, on the pile with all the
other emotions research books,if some if people want an
accessible book that she haswritten Seven and a Half Lessons
about the Brain.
Erica D'Eramo (31:33):
Yes!
Adam Bouse (31:34):
It's a great one, she's got an audio book version
of that too. And again, I don'tthink everyone has to become a
neuro, you know, specialist. Iam not a doctor. I don't play
one on the internet, but I lovethis stuff because it helps me
understand more of how does thisall work? Like and I'm gesturing
I know we're on a podcast. I'mgesturing to my whole my whole
body, because what I know fromraising kids, but then also
having 1000s of coachingsessions with adults, is that
(31:54):
when we don't know what to dowith what we're feeling, life
gets a lot more challenging,because we end up just the
temptation is to just shut itdown, right? I don't know what
that is. I don't know. I don'tlike feeling this way, and so I
just want to get rid of it. Andagain, I think there are moments
and times when we have to dothat. That is a, yeah, it's a
necessary survival skill incertain circumstances. But
(32:14):
humans were not designed,developed, created, built. Why
are we not evolved to the pointwhere we're supposed to stay in
those hyper, aroused, emotional,anxiety driven survival moments,
and that's where we run into allkinds of critical, challenging
chronic problems, both in termsof mental health and physical
health, which, again, to bringit full circle, this is why I
(32:37):
think it's so important to teachand talk and train around
concepts of optimism andresilience. I see optimism is
one of the core practices ofresilience, yeah, but being able
to say, hey, you know what,things are really hard and
really challenging, seeing thatclearly now I can face it, and
if I can face it, you can figureout a way through it. And it
(32:59):
doesn't mean it's easy, and itdoesn't mean that it's an
algorithm that you just plug inand say the right things and do
the right breathing, andeverything will be fine. There's
a lot of tools that can bereally helpful, but I think we
have to start from a place of Ihave some choices here, and they
may be only internal choicesthat nobody else can see.
Erica D'Eramo (33:15):
Yeah.
Adam Bouse (33:16):
But if I can practice these things where I
believe in myself, I see myselfas resourceful, whereas I see
that I have choices, and how Ishow up, and what I say, who I
spend time with, those thingsare going to start to have a
real compounding effect on myoverall well being.
Erica D'Eramo (33:31):
Yeah, yeah, that's really that is really
powerful, and it does bring itfull circle. And I have this
deep yearning question about atopic we have not yet talked
about, which is nature basedcoaching,
Adam Bouse (33:50):
Yeah!
Erica D'Eramo (33:50):
What is that and how does it fit in your
framework?
Adam Bouse (33:56):
Yeah. So again, this starts from a place of just
personal curiosity. I love howin academia, sometimes they call
their researchers. Will calltheir research, they'll call it
me search, because they'rereally just trying to feel
called out right? All the goodstuff comes from a place like,
if you're not curious about it,why would you dig into it? So
I've always loved nature. It'sbeen a lifelong thing, starting
(34:18):
way back when I was a kid, tooka trip out west. You know, I've
just really I find a sense ofpeace and grounding when I spend
time outdoors. I think back tothe pandemic, and it was a
really hard and challenging timefor a lot of people. But I
wasn't the only person that thatwas like, Hey, I'm going to go
for a walk, I'm going to gooutside. I'm going to go to a
state park or a national park. Ineed to be near water. Because
(34:40):
instinctively, I think we allknow that being outdoors is good
for us, and again, mountains andmountains of research to back
this up, green space, forestaccess, looking out the window
in a hospital and improvementrates after surgery. Like
there's so much data about howgood nature is for us, visually,
experientially. Yeah, but then acouple of years ago, I
(35:02):
discovered this corner of theinternet where there's a bunch
of people just sitting aroundtalking about nature coaching.
And I was like, What is naturecoaching? Am I like, am I am I
like, really encouraging mytomatoes? Like, am I am I
hugging trees? Like, what are wedoing here? What is this? And I
discovered that this really richevidence based philosophy exists
(35:25):
where people say, You know what,human beings aren't just in
nature. We are part of nature.
And so what we actually shouldbe doing is we should be help
facilitating connection tonature so that we're spending
more time out there, where wehave evolved to survive, and we
should also see ourselves aspart of nature, from a
(35:45):
perspective of all of theclimate change that is
happening. And what's ourresponsibility as coaches who
are working for the well beingof humans, to create awareness
of and connection to the giantecosystems that we're all a part
of and contributing to, whetherwe realize it or not. So I've
dug in. I've done a lot ofreading. You know, there are all
(36:06):
kinds of things on Tiktok nowabout forest bathing, which
comes from Japan in the 1980sthe term is Shinrin Yoku. And
actually, just a month ago, Ifinished up my certification,
and so I am now a certifiedforest bathing guide.
Erica D'Eramo (36:24):
Congratulations.
Adam Bouse (36:25):
Thank you. We can dive in and talk more about
that, but essentially, for meand my practice as a coach, I'm
just looking for opportunities.
Hey, can we have this coachingsession outside so that nature
can be a co facilitator of thecoaching conversation? Again,
nature's not going to fix yourproblems for you, but it's going
to be there as a resource tohelp you see and understand
yourself and the world aroundyou in a fresh way.
Erica D'Eramo (36:48):
It's also just such a reorientation, too,
right? Of like the broader whenwe're just sitting in a closed
room with no windows, we feellike the our problems feel like
the biggest problems and andthey feel they can feel so
overwhelming when just taking alook at the river or watching
(37:09):
the bald eagle, for me, is sosuch a reminder of like The just
infinite expanse of experienceand complexity and
interconnectedness out therethat kind of just helps to
reorientate my my challenges andmy place in this world. And
(37:32):
yeah...
Adam Bouse (37:33):
Yeah, absolutely the I've talked about this in
therapy for sure, but like, I gointo nature, I go through a walk
through a state park, and mymain thought is, all of this
exists and it has nothing to dowith me, like I didn't make it
happen. I'm not responsible. Imean, I am responsible for it at
a certain level, but I didn'tmake this happen. I didn't
orchestrate it. I didn't plantthese trees. I'm not giving them
(37:53):
sunlight. Like the world doesnot revolve around me. And it's
a very comforting thought that Idon't have to be responsible for
everything, and it gives mepermission to slow down, to
catch my breath. Now, again, inthe research around forest
bathing, spend three hours in aforest really intentionally
slowing down, not on a hike, nottrying to accomplish something,
(38:13):
but just slowly meandering andsoaking things in through your
senses there are, there'sevidence that suggests you know
decreased blood pressure,increased immune system
response, like, and these thingslast for weeks just from a
single forest bathing experiencewhere the whole goal is, hey,
like, just look, just here, justlisten, just smell, yeah. And
(38:34):
it's a really powerful thingthat is accessible to all of us.
And there are some spaces rightwhere it may be harder to get
to, green spaces you may nothave a part you may not have a
park, you may not have you'relocked in a concrete jungle, so
to speak. But again, I choose tobelieve there are possibilities,
get up, get a plant. There'seven evidence that looking at a
(38:56):
picture of a forest on yourcomputer, yeah, I know mindfully
can give you a sense of reliefand calm, and more often than
not, I think when we get stuck,it's because we're taking the
same way of thinking that wegot. It's Albert Einstein's
famous quote, right? You cannotsolve a problem at the same
(39:20):
level in which it was created.
You need to get to a differentlevel. You need to experience
life in a different way to beable to solve that problem. And
from for my money, one of thequickest ways to do that is to
get up from your desk and gotake a 20 minute walk shift. The
way that you relate to thatproblem.
Erica D'Eramo (39:31):
I do love going for a walk. The other thing I
love doing, and this is gonnasound really well, I don't know,
maybe not to you sound weird andnerdy, but I love hanging out
with my chickens in the backyardand just watching them, the
little dinosaurs that they are,like living their little chicken
lives and wandering around andfinding joy and the little grub
that they found or whatever. Imean, it does so much
(39:55):
restoration for me and gets meout of my head so quickly that
it's just. And I need toremember that. So thanks for the
reminder. The walk is good, andso is the chicken viewing. I
call it chicken TV.
Adam Bouse (40:06):
Bonus points, don't, don't take your earbuds, don't
take your phone, right? Like, Ithink we can do that. I went for
a walk this morning. I listenedto an audio book. There's no
judgment, right? And there aredays where I go, man, I've got
nothing in me. I've got noenergy. I don't feel like I can
really accomplish anythingtoday. You know what I can do is
I can put one foot in front ofthe other, and I can take a 20
(40:27):
minute walk in my neighborhood,and I'm not going to listen to
anything because I don't havethe energy to listen to
something. And you know what?
There have literally been daysin the past year where that was
the one thing I accomplished,and again, in therapy, we've
talked about this highperformer, driven, motivated. I
own my own business now, likethere's lots of reasons why I
(40:47):
should be Go, go, go, go, go,go. And one of the questions my
therapist offered to me was,Adam, you really, you're really
focused on being capable rightnow. Can you be capable of doing
less?
Erica D'Eramo (41:01):
Yeah? Yeah, well, yeah, that that is a thing a lot
of people do struggle with andare afraid of their many of your
because then there's a sense ofloss of control, right? If I'm
not motoring, maybe I'm adrift.
If I'm not reacting, maybe Iwill get maybe I will miss
(41:25):
something. And, yeah, that isreally powerful and almost
stoic, in a way, in terms of,like, the challenge, setting the
challenge as it is to dosometimes the challenge is to do
less, to just exist, to be.
Adam Bouse (41:39):
Yeah, one more nerdy study to mention, yeah, bring
it. There's a study. I can'tremember all the I'm not going
to get this exactly right, butyou'll get this the gist of it.
Here. They put people in a room.
It's a blank room. There's achair and there's a table and
there's a little buzzer.
Erica D'Eramo (41:53):
Oh, my God, I think I know which one you're
talking about, which I talkabout a lot.
Adam Bouse (41:57):
They put people in a room. They say, Hey, you're
gonna sit here for 15 minutes.
No phone, nothing to do. Justsit here for 15 minutes. I'm
minutes. There's also thislittle buzzer here that'll give
you a little electrical shock,and you can touch it or not
touch it, but it's totally up toyou. And some insane number of
people like they touch thebutton. And there was actually
even one participant I miss.
(42:17):
This is me being judgmental andpotentially sexist, but I
believe it was. I'm pretty sureit was a guy. There was a guy
who was like, correct we touchedit like 170 times or something
ridiculous. Just like the pointthe researchers, I believe, are
trying to make is, is we'rereally uncomfortable spending
time by ourselves in our ownheads, and sometimes we'll
(42:37):
actually take pain in order toavoid that.
Erica D'Eramo (42:40):
Yeah, I Well, and I work with a lot of
neurodiverse clients, and I amalso diagnosed ADHD, and I
think, like just acknowledgingit out loud that that sitting
with your own thoughts, boredommight be physical, almost like
physically painful for you,people will actually opt for
physical pain rather thanboredom. So now that we
(43:02):
understand that, like now, whatnow do we? How do we show
ourselves some compassion thereand set you up for success?
Adam Bouse (43:09):
That's absolutely right. And again, I don't think
that the the goal here is to atreat everyone as the same.
Neurodiversity is real.
Neurodiversity is the norm,actually,
Erica D'Eramo (43:18):
Right! Yeah!
Adam Bouse (43:20):
And so therefore, it's really about what's good
for you. What's healthy is goodfor you. Yeah, and that's such a
simple question. And I could belike, oh, like, you know, Reese
cups every day. That's good forme, maybe, maybe not. I don't
know. But, you know, on the Ican think, two weeks ago, I had
a day where I just didn't feellike I could do anything, and I
was like, Okay, I'm gonna go fora walk by the river, and I'm
(43:42):
going to do a little bit ofmeditation, and then I'm just
going to binge watch whatever Iwant to binge watch whatever.
Those are good things for me.
I'm not doing that every day,but I know in that moment where
I'm like, hey, you know what?
Today's a 60% day. I've only got60% to give. I could give it to
work. I could give it to anotherblog post. I could give it 30
note emails trying to get thenext client. I could do all of
(44:04):
those things. Could I havepushed through maybe? And I
think it's counter cultural, andI feel like I've given myself
permission to do things that arecounter cultural, mostly as an
experiment. Can I pull this off?
I'm gonna do some things thatare good for me, and then we'll
see where I'm at after that.
Erica D'Eramo (44:23):
I love that. It's a reminder for me coming into
the weekend about how I need toreframe things as I approach
some downtime, and what that'sgoing to look like for me. But
for our listeners, though, whomight want to reach out and
maybe connect with you and hearmore about nature based
coaching, or optimisticcoaching. How do people find
(44:47):
you?
Adam Bouse (44:48):
I appreciate that optimism.coach is the website,
all the normal social spaces,LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook,
all those things, and I do likeagain. And in a spirit of in a
spirit of creativity andcuriosity and generosity, I
offer anybody that wants one a90 minute discovery session like
(45:10):
no no strings attached, no cost.
Because again, I overuse themetaphor. I haven't used it
today, but now I'm going to, Ioveruse the metaphor of planting
seeds, and I really feel likethat's what most of my job is.
Is is like, I'm a I'm a seedplanter. I help people put seeds
in the ground, and we don't knowwhat's going to grow, but I
believe optimistically thatthere are possibilities in those
seeds. So let's plant some seedsand see what comes of it.
(45:32):
Sometimes I do a discoverysession, somebody has a huge
breakthrough, and they go on,and I could not be happier.
Sometimes they go, Oh, I'veplanted the seeds. But they
didn't. They didn't, like, bloomyet. I'm like, Yeah, we usually
don't see seeds turn into fruitin the same day, so this might
take some time, and we worktogether, but at the end of the
day, that's what I want to Iwant to help people learn and
grow. I want to I want them tohelp them feel grounded, and I
(45:55):
want them to be able to findpossibilities that matter to
them, not what society tells youyou should have, not the
possibilities that are just thesort of path of least
resistance. But what is it youactually want? What is it you
want to be doing? Who do youwant to be and how do you want
to be? Let's go find thosepossibilities.
Erica D'Eramo (46:11):
Yeah. Well, we will definitely be linking to
your site on in the show notesand to some of the ways that
people can connect with you. Ireally appreciate you sharing
your experiences, thevulnerability and some of your
wisdom today. Thank you so much.
Adam, it's really just been anhonor.
Adam Bouse (46:32):
No, it's been great.
I really enjoy the conversation.
Erica, and yeah, you keep doinggood work too, because I know
you're doing it.
Erica D'Eramo (46:39):
Yeah, my fellow neuroscience nerd and all keep
the recommendations coming. Ilove it. And for the folks who
would love to see a summary ofthis or catch those links,
definitely head over to ourwebsite or the show notes, and
we will see you next episode.
Thanks for listening.
Hello and welcome to the Two Piers podcast. I'm
your host, Erica D'Eramo, andtoday we have guest Adam Bouse
joining us. Adam is the founderof optimistic coaching, where he
helps people move from feelingstuck to finding new
possibilities. He draws on morethan 15 years of leadership
experience and over 1000 hoursof coaching to guide clients in
(00:25):
navigating change and living amore grounded, fulfilling life
with a philosophy rooted inpositive psychology,
neuroscience and nature basedexperiences, Adam believes
everyone deserves the chance tothrive and discover the clarity,
connection and fulfillmentthey've been longing for. Adam's
here to talk to us today aboutstaying optimistic when there's
plenty of reason not to be andwe're so excited to have him on
(00:48):
the podcast.
Adam, thank you so much forjoining us.
Adam Bouse (01:03):
Thank you, Erica.
I'm really excited and lookingforward to the conversation with
you.
Erica D'Eramo (01:07):
I you know I typically a lot of our a lot of
our focus is on challenges,overcoming challenges,
navigating challengingworkplaces. And I just feel like
this optimistic framework thatyou, that you've been sharing
about, really resonated for me,and it's sort of a breath of
(01:27):
fresh air and a very differentway of thinking about things. So
I was really, really lookingforward to having this
conversation with you.
Adam Bouse (01:34):
I appreciate that.
Yeah, I think it's somethingthat can be maybe overly
simplistic in the way that wetalk about it. Of let's, you
know, pursue happiness and let'sfind our satisfaction. But I
think there's a deeper, richerstory to tell around optimism
and that it's all inclusive. Itdoesn't have to just be sunshine
and rainbows, but it's like, howdo we actually walk through the
(01:55):
hard stuff and maintain apositive outlook and have that
sense of optimism?
Erica D'Eramo (01:56):
Yeah, so I almost always open with kind of asking,
what's your origin story? What?
What brought you to this pointin your coaching journey and
your professional journey?
Adam Bouse (02:08):
Yeah, my origin story goes back probably 15
years by now, the 13, 14, 15years and I was working an
organization in Oklahoma, andjust part of the culture was six
months into being on staff, youtook an emotional intelligence
assessment. Now I'm a nerd likethat, and I love that kind of
stuff, assessments and tools andthings like that, and I took it,
(02:29):
and it was really powerful. It'scalled The EQI 2.0 and it gives
you this really intentionalprocess of understanding how
skillful you are at thesemeasurable, teachable, trainable
skills of emotionalintelligence. And there was a
lot to be like, excited aboutand to feel good about. But then
there was also this massiveimbalance that I discovered I
had, and the imbalance wasbetween empathy and decision
(02:51):
making. Turns out, I'm really,really good at empathizing and
understanding other people, butbecause of that, and this was I
was in my, you know, mid to late20s, pushing on 30, I was really
good at taking all thisinformation about how other
people are feeling and thinkingand what they're experiencing,
but oftentimes, when it came todecision making time, I would, I
would freeze because I was soworried about, well, how will
(03:12):
this impact other people and sothings like independence and
assertiveness just really,really low and in the basement.
So I, had the chance to workwith a coach on my specific
results, and just in that shortamount of time. It wasn't a very
long engagement, but it was areally cool opportunity to just
sort of synthesize lifeexperiences and talk about
nature versus nurture, andreally dig in and figure out,
(03:34):
like, okay, so it's not that Ineed to get rid of my empathy.
Empathy is a good thing, and Iwill, I will fight tooth and
nail for that belief. But how doI bring them into a balance?
Because I was over weighing orovervaluing data I was getting
from what other people wereexperiencing or what they might
grew up in life,experiences, whatever. It's a
potentially experience, so I wasthinking a lot of thoughts for
people, but not actually tuninginto what they were actually
experiencing. So all that to sayis I did a lot of work and
(03:55):
strength for me 100% and I canover rely on it. I can use it in
experienced a ton of growth,personally and professionally.
And when I got done, I said, Iwant to do that for people too,
like I want to be able to takethem through that assessment,
have those conversations andhelp them learn and grow. And so
I got certified, I was able totake my team at the time with
that through that assessment.
And I've been using thatassessment now for 12 years, not
(04:16):
always as a full part of my fullways that aren't actually
productive and helpful. So ittime job, sometimes on the side,
sometimes in differentnonprofits or organizations I've
been connected to. But that's,that's how I got started. It's
just this sense of like, oh, Iexperienced this new level of
self awareness, and I was ableto grow and develop. How do I
how do I do that for otherpeople? That's what I want
(05:03):
creates the shadow of like,well, I'm just stuck. I want
(05:58):
someone else to make thedecision, because I'm afraid of
upsetting people or making thewrong decision and having a
negative impact on other people,all the while kind of ignoring
how that's having a negativeimpact on me. So it was really
eye opening. I, you know, it's Ihaven't perfected it, something
that I still have to keep my eyeon, but it's something I've
(06:21):
definitely seen a ton of growthin starting with those first
coaching conversations about,hey, empathy is a really good
thing. How can you bring thatback into balance?
Erica D'Eramo (06:27):
Yeah, and shout out to EQI 2.0 so, yeah, big,
big fan of that assessment,actually, which is interesting,
because that is one of the fewassessments that there's really
good data behind some of the thethe outcomes and the
measurements around that. Thenthere's assessments out the
(06:49):
wazoo. And especially whenyou're in coaching, you kind of
see a lot of them. But EQ, I wasone of the ones that for a data
person, because I am sort ofstuck in that logic side of
things that I do love, that it'sreally, yeah, has the rigor
behind it. So how would youdescribe some of your philosophy
in this realm, when we talkabout optimistic coaching, like,
(07:10):
what? What does that mean?
Adam Bouse (07:12):
Yeah, I think you actually have to have a really
good to be a great coach. Youactually have to have a really
high belief in the potential ofpeople. Because, as you said,
like, I'm not here to fix you,I'm not here to solve your
problems. I'm actually here. Ilove the way that Jerry colonna,
he's someone that I see as acoaching mentor from a distance.
I don't know him personally, buthe sometimes is called the CEO
(07:36):
whisperer, and he's a coach, andhe runs his company, reboot.io,
if people want to check it out,but he describes coaching as
helping people become betterobservers of themselves. And so
I really, I really believe thatpeople are capable. I believe
that they have the resourcesthat they need in order to take
their next steps. So I reallystart from a place of like,
(07:57):
yeah, everyone is inherentlyworthy of belonging in the
conversation, in their ownpotential, in their growth. You
know, I use the word lovesometimes, which maybe isn't the
most professional thing in somecircles, but I believe everybody
is worthy of that love and thatbelonging. And so I really want
to just come from a place of Ibelieve in you and wherever you
(08:18):
are is okay, and I'm here tohelp you see yourself in the
world around you, maybe a littlebit more clearly based on your
own discovery, based on your ownobservations, based on your own
motivation. And when we tap intothat, we know from the science
and the research, but we alsoknow experientially, when people
take ownership of their owndevelopment and their own
growth. So so much more powerfulthan someone coming in and
(08:41):
saying, hey, you need to dothis. You need to do that. You
know there's, yeah, there's allkinds of research we could dig
into. But that's where I startfrom, just that place of
everyone belongs, everyone iscapable, and everyone deserves
the chance to figure out whatthriving looks like for them.
Erica D'Eramo (08:55):
So where does optimism come into play?
Adam Bouse (08:57):
Yeah, so optimism is something that I've been
thinking about for probably fiveor six years. And you know, I
think it started from just aplace of curiosity in the
research, hearing a talk orreading an article and going,
Oh, optimism. I haven't reallydug into the into the research
(09:20):
on that, what that means. And asI dug into it and I read around
it, Martin Seligman is, is oneof the great writers and fathers
of positive psychology, and hehas a book called Learned
Optimism, which is a greatprimer, a great way to get
started in understanding it. Themore I dug in, the more I
realized is that optimism reallyis, from my perspective, just
this cornerstone skill and alsojust a way of being that really
shapes what your experience isgoing to be like going forward.
(09:43):
So for me, the definition I use,the description I use for
optimism, is choosing to findpossibilities in an unknown
future. And I use thatdefinition because I think
sometimes people hear optimismand they go optimistic,
pessimistic, half glass, halffull. Glass, half empty. And.
Okay, I get it. It's one ofthose words that we've heard it
(10:06):
so many times, it kind of startsto lose its meaning, which is
why I've come up with thisdefinition about choosing to
find possibilities and unknownfuture. Because I believe, and
the research backs this up, isthat it's actually a skill. It's
something that you can develop.
It's in the EQI 2.0 right? It'sin there. That's something that
we can measure and we can teachand we can develop and we can
remeasure. And really it is thisskill that says, hey, you know
what? I'm going to activelychoose to believe that from
(10:26):
where I'm standing today,there's, there's an option,
there's an option, there's anoption, there's, there are
options. And I'm going toactively decide to look for the
options, look for thepossibilities, especially when I
don't know what's going tohappen, because if I know what's
going to happen, well then I'mnot it's not a practice of
optimism. It's certainty. Yeah,there are some things we can be
(10:48):
certain about, but there's somuch in life that we cannot be
certain about. Life is nothing,if not out of our control. And
so I see optimism as thisfundamental belief of, you know
what? I don't know what'scoming. I don't know how this is
going to play out, but I'm goingto choose to believe that I have
options.
Erica D'Eramo (11:06):
It's so interesting to hear you frame it
that way, because, on the onehand, I mean, I don't know that
many people would describe me asoverly optimistic, because I'm
an engineer, right? I'm alwayslooking for, how could this go
wrong? And yet, I also feel likeI am one of the people in life
(11:27):
where when I come up against abarrier or a roadblock, I'm
like, okay, but there's got,there's got to be a way right,
like, how maybe we go right,maybe we go left, but there's,
let's just get creative. There'sgot to be some options here. And
I have seen that that's notalways, not not everyone has
(11:48):
that same ethos of, kind of,what? So what do we do now?
Like, okay, not this, but maybesomething else, like, what? What
are the possibilities here? AndI don't know that I've ever
thought about it as optimism,necessarily. And the whole
glass, half empty glass, halffull thing has always made me
laugh. Because when I was kid, Iwas like, But wait, which one's
(12:09):
a good one and which one's thebad one? Because to me, I'm
like, the glass is only halfempty. Isn't that good? Which
maybe goes to show, like, justthat engineering orientation was
built in pretty early. But theidea that optimism is not
necessarily just Pollyannathinking or kind of this toxic
(12:30):
positivity of like it'll allwork out in the end, totally. It
might not all work out in theend, but there even then,
there's still options. You willalways have options in one way.
Adam Bouse (12:41):
Yeah, absolutely.
And I think you get to a reallyimportant point is that, like,
there is this sense of like, oh,that we think about optimistic
people being the ones who are,like, full of energy, and like,
they're going to run throughwalls and nothing can stop them.
And I think, okay, maybe that isa flavor of optimism. But I
think we have to make adistinction between
dispositional optimism and moreof a learned optimism, or what I
like to call it, a groundedoptimism. Dispositional optimism
(13:03):
is essentially this sort ofpersonality trait, this
characteristic that may havesome connection back to our DNA,
where we tend to believe thatyeah, things are going to work
out, right? I think there arepeople who have that
disposition. There are alsopeople who have the disposition
of Yeah, I'm pretty sure that'snot going to work, right. So we
might call that a dispositionalpessimism. And I don't know that
(13:23):
we need to put labels on good,bad, like people are the way
that people are right. What I'mglad for it too. Yeah, right. We
need those voices. We need totest, we need to push and
challenge and have these debatesabout what is and isn't
possible. But I think what I'mmost interested in is really
sitting down with people andhelping them lean into this idea
of I can see reality clearly. Ican see the challenges and the
(13:47):
risks and the gaps and theneeds, and it doesn't make me
quit. It doesn't make me giveup. I can actually choose, this
is the definition, right. I canchoose to believe that there are
possibilities. I may not knowwhat the possibilities are, but
I'm going to remain open to theidea that there are
possibilities, and I want to gofind them.
Erica D'Eramo (14:08):
Yeah, I I never want to be dismissive of
people's experience or pain. Andso when people say like, I have
no options, it's, you know, Iwant to receive that and hear
that and acknowledge the pain orfrustration or hopelessness in
that. I also think, like, youknow, there's been a lot of
writing done by people likeViktor Frankl about how, you
(14:30):
know, even when it looks likethere are no options, no it is
the bleakest it could possiblybe, there is still choice in how
we show up that day, how we putone foot in front of the other,
and that the loss of hope, orthe loss to loss of, you know,
visibility of any options at allcan that, in and of itself, can
(14:57):
actually be what becomes fatal,right? Can be such a determining
factor. And you know, NelsonMandela wrote a lot about this
as well. So there are somereally incredible folks
throughout history who haveexplored, even when we our
physical environment has beenlimited so extremely, like,
(15:21):
there's still options about howwe relate to it and how we
decide to engage with hope.
So...
Adam Bouse (15:26):
Yeah, there's two things that come to mind for me,
and that one is, is that ViktorFrankl literally calls it tragic
optimism. Like, that's thephrase he uses in the book man
search for me, and he calls itTragic Optimism. Gosh, and if
that's not a story that compelsyou to believe that, like, we do
still have some agency in how weshow up now again, we could this
(15:49):
is the second thing it bringsup, is this idea of toxic
positivity, which I kind ofagain describe as this sense of
like, everything will always andonly be okay, and we should
always and only talk about thethings that are going well. And
it's like, Well, I understandthe impulse, because sometimes
the world is overwhelming andhard and scary, and so sometimes
it feels like the best choice isjust push that aside and just
(16:09):
focus on the good stuff that maywork, that may be necessary at
times, but in terms as a likelife philosophy or a strategy
for how to really haveresilience and endure hardship,
I think we all know that doesn'twork. It doesn't work because it
just makes the pain and theanguish get louder and louder
and louder until it forces us tostop and face it. You know, I'll
(16:33):
be vulnerable here and even saythis, that I'm in a grief
journey myself. My wife passedaway nine months ago, and she
died from a rapid brain disease.
And so me and my kids, we are ina season where we are still
trying to figure out which wayis up, and how do we move
forward. And some days are okay,and other days I'm flat on a
couch. And for me, I had toreally slow down and think, can
(16:55):
I still talk about positivityand optimism? Because this is
the work I was doing before shegot sick. And Stacy was a person
who who gave me so muchinspiration for the work that
I'm doing, but I had to reallyslow down and think about it,
and what I realized is, is thatI, I I've always believed that
optimism was a sense of choosingto find possibilities in an
unknown future. It's not like Ijust came up with that because
(17:16):
I've gone through this horrificloss, and I've always had this
sense that positivity wasn'tjust sunshine and rainbows, but
it's the sense of, how do I stayopen, how do I stay soft? And
one of the phrases that I'vebeen using more recently, I
thought about it, or in theearly days of the year, and I've
brought it back recently, isjust, how do I stay in a place
of being tender, not bitter? Andfor me, this is optimism. It's
(17:37):
waking up every day, and it'seating breakfast like that is
okay. I I'm not going to solveall the world's problems. I'm
clearly not going to be able tobring my wife back. I don't know
how to really navigate solo,widowed parenting with three
teenage Age. Age ish, boys 11 to17. I don't actually know how to
do that, but simply showing upevery day and trying is an act
(18:00):
of positive mindset and is anact of optimism.
Erica D'Eramo (18:06):
Right, we just need to take one. It's just
that, like most finite amountthat we can see in front of us,
it doesn't need to be years andin the future that we need to be
looking at like, what is thatone step that we put in front of
the other each day?
Adam Bouse (18:24):
Yeah, yeah. And really embracing that sense of
unknown, right? There's a lot inour world, and there's a lot in
our marketing and ouradvertising, and there's apps,
and there's technology thattells us we can figure it all
out, we can optimize, we canmaximize, we can biohack, we can
do all the things. And sometimesthose things are really good.
It's not, for me, it's not it'snot binary. It's not like
(18:45):
they're all good or they're allbad, like, that's the hard part.
Is they're good and they'rehelpful and they're terrible,
all at the same time. You know,I'm not the first one to make
this observation after a loss,is that life is really precious,
and you really don't the nextday will bring and so for me,
standing up at my first workshopafter a nine month break and
(19:05):
saying, Hey everybody, todaywe're going to talk about
practicing positivity, but firstI have to let you know that my
wife died like that's me notknowing how that's going to go,
how they're going to receivethat. If I can get through that
first workshop, that's me sayingI don't know how this is going
to go, but I think it's worthtrying.
Erica D'Eramo (19:21):
Yeah, there's that level of like openness and
almost curiosity, not curiosityas like a driving force, but
just that remaining open thatjust feels like such a common
thread, and not needing to havethe answers and not needing to
have the certainty of it. And Iguess that's kind of this big
(19:42):
piece around optimism isprobably a lot easier when we
have a lot of the data thatthings are going to work out
okay and and when we don't, thenwhat? Right? That's, that's when
it really comes when push comesto shove. So what I. What are
some of the areas that you arefinding yourselves really
(20:05):
delving into right now, withoptimism, pessimism coaching?
Adam Bouse (20:10):
Yeah, I mean, I think so. I've mentioned a
couple of these briefly, butmaybe a little bit more detail,
like this, idea of seeingreality clearly is so important
not overestimating how difficultsomething is and not
underestimating how difficultsomething is like if we have a
skewed perspective, either outof self protection or, you know,
naiveness, we're alreadystarting out by holding back on
(20:34):
the idea that we can, we can getwhere we want to go, right?
There's a really fascinatingstudy around having people look
at a hill and estimate how steepthe hill is. And they brought in
just some average people off thestreet, not athletes, not people
who are climbing mountainsregularly, but they just said,
Hey, how steep is this hill? Andthey were all way off, like,
way, way, way off, right? Thenthey brought in a group of cross
(20:57):
country runners, and they said,How steep Do you think this hill
is? And they were right. Theywere accurate, right. So there's
something to say aboutexperience, about our ability to
accurately estimate thesteepness of a hill, and I think
there's some applicability tothat, of if we've done something
before, we might have a bettersense of how hard or challenging
something might be. But here'sthe interesting part, send those
(21:17):
cross cross country runners outfor a run. Get them tired, put
them back in front of anotherhill, and their ability to
assess the steepness of the hilldisappears. Wow, just by being
tired. So like, for everybodylistening, do you feel tired
right now? And just make theconnection to like, how hard
(21:38):
things feel right now doesn'tmean that they're not hard, but
your fatigue plays a role inboth your ability to do the hard
work as well as your ability toaccurately assess how hard is
this going to be.
Erica D'Eramo (21:51):
It's funny, I sometimes will ask clients,
like, if you were a house plant,how would you be doing right
now? And and now, I'm thinkingof, kind of just how those base
needs, about fatigue, bloodsugar, stressors, sensory
inputs, like all of thosethings, are probably diminishing
our ability to see thingsclearly. But it's that self
(22:14):
awareness too setting yourselfup for success, or at least
knowing your limitations on howaccurately or perceiving things,
that's right, that you can thenuse, and I this came to mind
earlier, but I think thatthere's something so, I guess,
(22:35):
powerful in equipping peoplewith the trust to be able to
understand their perceptions ofthings, and that the top what I
call like, that Pollyannasyndrome, or that toxic
positivity of like, it'll all befine. It'll work out in the face
of no data, one way or anotheris almost the opposite, right?
(22:56):
It's almost like, just ignorewhat's around you and trust, and
that's a very different message.
And for me, like, that's notwhen people say, like, I'm sure
it'll all work out. That's notsoothing at all. It's just sort
of detaching me from what I'mperceiving. And it almost feels
gaslighty, right? Like, what areyou perceiving? Okay, how
accurate is that? What otherinformation is out there, but
(23:19):
that's more empowering than thesort of just ignore what you're
seeing. And so I love that youkind of bring it back to our
perception. And the, I don'twant to say the flaws in our
perception, but how ourperception is influenced by our
context.
Adam Bouse (23:39):
Absolutely, yeah. I mean, there's a very long
catalog on all the differentways that we can experience
cognitive distortion andcognitive biases. And I'm not
advocating that we all go outand memorize all of those so
that we can disassemble themlike they're going to happen,
right? But just being aware thatwe can't always trust our
thinking so helpful, like, ifnothing else, right? I may not
know about the about all of thedifferent biases that can exist,
(24:04):
and we could rattle off a bunchof them right now, but at the
end of the day, if I just go,hey, you know what? My mind
isn't always accurate. It'susually pretty certain, but my
brain wants to be certain, butit's it's less concerned with
accuracy. It wants to keep mesafe and alive, right? That's
what my brain wants. And sosometimes, when I in this per
this is personal. This is in myown work with my own anxiety. Is
(24:25):
really just having aconversation with that anxiety
and saying, Hey, sounds likeyou're really scared about
something right now. What areyou scared of? Because sometimes
we feel that in our bodies,because our mind body is a
system. It's all connected.
They're not these two differentwarring factions, even though it
can feel like that, but our mindand body are working in concert
to keep us safe and to keep usalive. And sometimes when those
physical symptoms come up, I askmyself, Hey, what's going on? I
(24:49):
may not have a cognitivethought, a narrative, a story
going on yet, but my body'spicked up on something, and so
sometimes it is really justabout slowing down. And like you
said. Getting curious of Huh? Iwonder what I feel like is at
risk right now? That's aquestion that I'll use in
coaching conversations. Ifsomeone's stuck, or they're
afraid to take that next step,or they're resistant to the idea
(25:10):
of change altogether, eventhough they're in a coaching
conversation. So hopefully theywant to be in some mode of
change. What do you feel like isat risk right now? What's the
thing? Is it a relationship? Isit a sense of identity? Is it
control? Is it money? Likethere's 1000 things that we are
all trying to manage and juggleat all times, and when we go
(25:30):
through a change, or we'retrying to overcome some kind of
a challenge, it's so easy forour mind body system to go, oh,
there's a risk we better slowdown.
Erica D'Eramo (25:43):
Yep, it's, yeah, the lion in the grass, right?
Like, and this is, it'sinteresting, because I'll often
say, like, let's shine out. Youknow, it's like the monster
under the bed. Sometimes, let'swe sense it's there, but if we
shine a light on it, hey, itmight, it might be a raccoon,
right? I'm not saying it's safe,but at least then we can do
something with it, and we canassess, like, How dangerous is
(26:05):
this? Do I need to go get aseries of rabies shots? Like,
you know, we can do somethingwith it. And it may just be an
old pair of sneakers that wemisinterpreted, but shining a
light under it, and that can bestrange for people, and they're
like, Well, I don't want to lookat the risk like, I don't want
to stare the bad thing in theface, but it doesn't take it out
(26:26):
of the situation, if it's ifwe're still operating in
response to a fear around it.
Adam Bouse (26:32):
Yeah, absolutely.
There's a neuroscientist thatI've become aware of in recent
years. His name is Dr. JeromeLubbe, and he talks about the
Enneagram, if listeners arefamiliar with the Enneagram, but
he talks about it from theperspective of a neuroscientist,
which is fascinating. And heuses the language when you are
feeling a threat, a risk, whenyou have that sense of anxiety
or uncertainty. The question heasks is, is this a bear, or is
(26:55):
it a deadline?
Erica D'Eramo (26:58):
Right? Like this email is not actually trying to
kill me.
Adam Bouse (27:03):
That's right, that's right, but our brain is looking
at any risk as a potential lifethreatening risk. Yeah, and
there are real there are realrisks that we do need to attend
to, but it's helpful if we cansort out which ones are actually
worth giving that time andenergy and attention to, from a
mind, body system perspective,versus the ones where we go, oh,
(27:23):
actually, that's a false alarm.
Erica D'Eramo (27:24):
Yeah. Or the difference too, between a, you
know, there, think there's evenbeen some research done around
like test taking and perceivingour own fear or own
physiological responses to it,and how we interpret those and
do we see ourselves as thegazelle that's about to be
(27:44):
attacked by a lion, or do we seeourselves as an as the lion
who's also activated becausethey're about to go try to get
their dinner? But it's not thesame threat, right? Like, okay,
if you miss dinner day after dayafter day, yes, you're going to
be looking at a problem, but inthe moment, this is more of a
opportunity, achievement, riskthat you're going after, you
(28:07):
know, presenting in front of acrowd. Yeah, no one is going to,
you know, take you away andthrow you in jail if you don't
present. What? Well, debatable,but, but I think that, like,
ultimately, you just want to doreally well, that's what it's
tied to a goal. Or I'm doingreally well, and we're trying to
achieve that goal, but we ourbrains, can't always tell the
(28:28):
difference.
Adam Bouse (28:29):
Yeah, and I think there's something too to be said
about just our awareness of whatis going on inside of our body.
Our body is part of a meaningmaking machine, and we're trying
to constantly interpret ourenvironment and our
relationships and what we'rehearing and seeing, and the big,
fancy, technical term for thiswould be interoception, what's
going on inside of my body,right with my pulse, with my
(28:51):
with my breath rate, with thebutterflies in the stomach, my
toes curling up, my leg mightlike do I have a sense of what's
going on, not just physically,in terms of where I'm looking or
getting hot, but like, what'sgoing on inside of my body? And
there's, again, there's anotherreally cool study where they
went to a stock market and theylooked at the traders on the
floor, and they wanted to figureout, how can we predict who were
(29:13):
the most successful tradersgoing to be? It wasn't
academics, it wasn't their pay,it wasn't their gender, it
wasn't how long they'd been inthe job. The number one
predictive factor of whether ornot someone be successful in the
stock trading floor was theirinteroceptive skills. Can they
pay attention to what's going oninside of their body and use
(29:33):
that as a data point to helpthem make more effective
decisions?
Erica D'Eramo (29:39):
I love talking about interoception. I mean,
that is well, and I'm also ayoga teacher on the side, too,
so like proprioception andinteroception is my jam. But I
agree that so often we are socaught up in the moment. I talk
about it, like being on the topof the waves, you know, that we
can't actually, we're in thechurn. We can't actually tell,
like, a my heart rate just wentup. My pulse just went up. I'm
(30:03):
activated. I'm sweating. Lisafelt so since we're sharing,
I've written down already, likeJerome Lubbe, I'm gonna look
into some of these folks, butLisa Feldman, Barrett is another
first. Okay.
Adam Bouse (30:14):
She's the best. I was gonna bring her up, but I
didn't.
Erica D'Eramo (30:18):
Oh, you. Let me do it. Thank you. She's, I think
she's got a TED talk out therethat's, you know, definitely I
her book how emotions are madeis not, it's not a quick read if
you love to nerd out about thestuff like, It will be
fascinating about how our brainsinterpret, you know, like,
emotions are not just this thingthat exists. It is our brain
(30:41):
interpreting our context aroundus, interpreting our
physiological responses, andthen putting a label on it and
calling it a thing. And shetalks about how, like, our
brain's purpose is not to think,you know, we all think our brain
is there to think, to make ushappy, to navigate decisions.
No, our brain is not concernedwith that. It just wants to keep
(31:02):
us alive. It wants allostasis.
It wants to send the chemicalsto the right places so that we
can either run away or hide orwhatever. But it's not actually
that concerned with, are youhappy? So we have to go a little
higher order.
Adam Bouse (31:16):
Yeah, if people want, uh, that book is amazing.
It's on my shelf, right backhere, on the pile with all the
other emotions research books,if some if people want an
accessible book that she haswritten Seven and a Half Lessons
about the Brain.
Erica D'Eramo (31:33):
Yes!
Adam Bouse (31:34):
It's a great one, she's got an audio book version
of that too. And again, I don'tthink everyone has to become a
neuro, you know, specialist. Iam not a doctor. I don't play
one on the internet, but I lovethis stuff because it helps me
understand more of how does thisall work? Like and I'm gesturing
I know we're on a podcast. I'mgesturing to my whole my whole
body, because what I know fromraising kids, but then also
having 1000s of coachingsessions with adults, is that
(31:54):
when we don't know what to dowith what we're feeling, life
gets a lot more challenging,because we end up just the
temptation is to just shut itdown, right? I don't know what
that is. I don't know. I don'tlike feeling this way, and so I
just want to get rid of it. Andagain, I think there are moments
and times when we have to dothat. That is a, yeah, it's a
necessary survival skill incertain circumstances. But
(32:14):
humans were not designed,developed, created, built. Why
are we not evolved to the pointwhere we're supposed to stay in
those hyper, aroused, emotional,anxiety driven survival moments,
and that's where we run into allkinds of critical, challenging
chronic problems, both in termsof mental health and physical
health, which, again, to bringit full circle, this is why I
(32:37):
think it's so important to teachand talk and train around
concepts of optimism andresilience. I see optimism is
one of the core practices ofresilience, yeah, but being able
to say, hey, you know what,things are really hard and
really challenging, seeing thatclearly now I can face it, and
if I can face it, you can figureout a way through it. And it
(32:59):
doesn't mean it's easy, and itdoesn't mean that it's an
algorithm that you just plug inand say the right things and do
the right breathing, andeverything will be fine. There's
a lot of tools that can bereally helpful, but I think we
have to start from a place of Ihave some choices here, and they
may be only internal choicesthat nobody else can see.
Erica D'Eramo (33:15):
Yeah.
Adam Bouse (33:16):
But if I can practice these things where I
believe in myself, I see myselfas resourceful, whereas I see
that I have choices, and how Ishow up, and what I say, who I
spend time with, those thingsare going to start to have a
real compounding effect on myoverall well being.
Erica D'Eramo (33:31):
Yeah, yeah, that's really that is really
powerful, and it does bring itfull circle. And I have this
deep yearning question about atopic we have not yet talked
about, which is nature basedcoaching,
Adam Bouse (33:50):
Yeah!
Erica D'Eramo (33:50):
What is that and how does it fit in your
framework?
Adam Bouse (33:56):
Yeah. So again, this starts from a place of just
personal curiosity. I love howin academia, sometimes they call
their researchers. Will calltheir research, they'll call it
me search, because they'rereally just trying to feel
called out right? All the goodstuff comes from a place like,
if you're not curious about it,why would you dig into it? So
I've always loved nature. It'sbeen a lifelong thing, starting
(34:18):
way back when I was a kid, tooka trip out west. You know, I've
just really I find a sense ofpeace and grounding when I spend
time outdoors. I think back tothe pandemic, and it was a
really hard and challenging timefor a lot of people. But I
wasn't the only person that thatwas like, Hey, I'm going to go
for a walk, I'm going to gooutside. I'm going to go to a
state park or a national park. Ineed to be near water. Because
(34:40):
instinctively, I think we allknow that being outdoors is good
for us, and again, mountains andmountains of research to back
this up, green space, forestaccess, looking out the window
in a hospital and improvementrates after surgery. Like
there's so much data about howgood nature is for us, visually,
experientially. Yeah, but then acouple of years ago, I
(35:02):
discovered this corner of theinternet where there's a bunch
of people just sitting aroundtalking about nature coaching.
And I was like, What is naturecoaching? Am I like, am I am I
like, really encouraging mytomatoes? Like, am I am I
hugging trees? Like, what are wedoing here? What is this? And I
discovered that this really richevidence based philosophy exists
(35:25):
where people say, You know what,human beings aren't just in
nature. We are part of nature.
And so what we actually shouldbe doing is we should be help
facilitating connection tonature so that we're spending
more time out there, where wehave evolved to survive, and we
should also see ourselves aspart of nature, from a
(35:45):
perspective of all of theclimate change that is
happening. And what's ourresponsibility as coaches who
are working for the well beingof humans, to create awareness
of and connection to the giantecosystems that we're all a part
of and contributing to, whetherwe realize it or not. So I've
dug in. I've done a lot ofreading. You know, there are all
(36:06):
kinds of things on Tiktok nowabout forest bathing, which
comes from Japan in the 1980sthe term is Shinrin Yoku. And
actually, just a month ago, Ifinished up my certification,
and so I am now a certifiedforest bathing guide.
Erica D'Eramo (36:24):
Congratulations.
Adam Bouse (36:25):
Thank you. We can dive in and talk more about
that, but essentially, for meand my practice as a coach, I'm
just looking for opportunities.
Hey, can we have this coachingsession outside so that nature
can be a co facilitator of thecoaching conversation? Again,
nature's not going to fix yourproblems for you, but it's going
to be there as a resource tohelp you see and understand
yourself and the world aroundyou in a fresh way.
Erica D'Eramo (36:48):
It's also just such a reorientation, too,
right? Of like the broader whenwe're just sitting in a closed
room with no windows, we feellike the our problems feel like
the biggest problems and andthey feel they can feel so
overwhelming when just taking alook at the river or watching
(37:09):
the bald eagle, for me, is sosuch a reminder of like The just
infinite expanse of experienceand complexity and
interconnectedness out therethat kind of just helps to
reorientate my my challenges andmy place in this world. And
(37:32):
yeah...
Adam Bouse (37:33):
Yeah, absolutely the I've talked about this in
therapy for sure, but like, I gointo nature, I go through a walk
through a state park, and mymain thought is, all of this
exists and it has nothing to dowith me, like I didn't make it
happen. I'm not responsible. Imean, I am responsible for it at
a certain level, but I didn'tmake this happen. I didn't
orchestrate it. I didn't plantthese trees. I'm not giving them
(37:53):
sunlight. Like the world doesnot revolve around me. And it's
a very comforting thought that Idon't have to be responsible for
everything, and it gives mepermission to slow down, to
catch my breath. Now, again, inthe research around forest
bathing, spend three hours in aforest really intentionally
slowing down, not on a hike, nottrying to accomplish something,
(38:13):
but just slowly meandering andsoaking things in through your
senses there are, there'sevidence that suggests you know
decreased blood pressure,increased immune system
response, like, and these thingslast for weeks just from a
single forest bathing experiencewhere the whole goal is, hey,
like, just look, just here, justlisten, just smell, yeah. And
(38:34):
it's a really powerful thingthat is accessible to all of us.
And there are some spaces rightwhere it may be harder to get
to, green spaces you may nothave a part you may not have a
park, you may not have you'relocked in a concrete jungle, so
to speak. But again, I choose tobelieve there are possibilities,
get up, get a plant. There'seven evidence that looking at a
(38:56):
picture of a forest on yourcomputer, yeah, I know mindfully
can give you a sense of reliefand calm, and more often than
not, I think when we get stuck,it's because we're taking the
same way of thinking that wegot. It's Albert Einstein's
famous quote, right? You cannotsolve a problem at the same
(39:20):
level in which it was created.
You need to get to a differentlevel. You need to experience
life in a different way to beable to solve that problem. And
from for my money, one of thequickest ways to do that is to
get up from your desk and gotake a 20 minute walk shift. The
way that you relate to thatproblem.
Erica D'Eramo (39:31):
I do love going for a walk. The other thing I
love doing, and this is gonnasound really well, I don't know,
maybe not to you sound weird andnerdy, but I love hanging out
with my chickens in the backyardand just watching them, the
little dinosaurs that they are,like living their little chicken
lives and wandering around andfinding joy and the little grub
that they found or whatever. Imean, it does so much
(39:55):
restoration for me and gets meout of my head so quickly that
it's just. And I need toremember that. So thanks for the
reminder. The walk is good, andso is the chicken viewing. I
call it chicken TV.
Adam Bouse (40:06):
Bonus points, don't, don't take your earbuds, don't
take your phone, right? Like, Ithink we can do that. I went for
a walk this morning. I listenedto an audio book. There's no
judgment, right? And there aredays where I go, man, I've got
nothing in me. I've got noenergy. I don't feel like I can
really accomplish anythingtoday. You know what I can do is
I can put one foot in front ofthe other, and I can take a 20
(40:27):
minute walk in my neighborhood,and I'm not going to listen to
anything because I don't havethe energy to listen to
something. And you know what?
There have literally been daysin the past year where that was
the one thing I accomplished,and again, in therapy, we've
talked about this highperformer, driven, motivated. I
own my own business now, likethere's lots of reasons why I
(40:47):
should be Go, go, go, go, go,go. And one of the questions my
therapist offered to me was,Adam, you really, you're really
focused on being capable rightnow. Can you be capable of doing
less?
Erica D'Eramo (41:01):
Yeah? Yeah, well, yeah, that that is a thing a lot
of people do struggle with andare afraid of their many of your
because then there's a sense ofloss of control, right? If I'm
not motoring, maybe I'm adrift.
If I'm not reacting, maybe Iwill get maybe I will miss
(41:25):
something. And, yeah, that isreally powerful and almost
stoic, in a way, in terms of,like, the challenge, setting the
challenge as it is to dosometimes the challenge is to do
less, to just exist, to be.
Adam Bouse (41:39):
Yeah, one more nerdy study to mention, yeah, bring
it. There's a study. I can'tremember all the I'm not going
to get this exactly right, butyou'll get this the gist of it.
Here. They put people in a room.
It's a blank room. There's achair and there's a table and
there's a little buzzer.
Erica D'Eramo (41:53):
Oh, my God, I think I know which one you're
talking about, which I talkabout a lot.
Adam Bouse (41:57):
They put people in a room. They say, Hey, you're
gonna sit here for 15 minutes.
No phone, nothing to do. Justsit here for 15 minutes. I'm
minutes. There's also thislittle buzzer here that'll give
you a little electrical shock,and you can touch it or not
touch it, but it's totally up toyou. And some insane number of
people like they touch thebutton. And there was actually
even one participant I miss.
(42:17):
This is me being judgmental andpotentially sexist, but I
believe it was. I'm pretty sureit was a guy. There was a guy
who was like, correct we touchedit like 170 times or something
ridiculous. Just like the pointthe researchers, I believe, are
trying to make is, is we'rereally uncomfortable spending
time by ourselves in our ownheads, and sometimes we'll
(42:37):
actually take pain in order toavoid that.
Erica D'Eramo (42:40):
Yeah, I Well, and I work with a lot of
neurodiverse clients, and I amalso diagnosed ADHD, and I
think, like just acknowledgingit out loud that that sitting
with your own thoughts, boredommight be physical, almost like
physically painful for you,people will actually opt for
physical pain rather thanboredom. So now that we
(43:02):
understand that, like now, whatnow do we? How do we show
ourselves some compassion thereand set you up for success?
Adam Bouse (43:09):
That's absolutely right. And again, I don't think
that the the goal here is to atreat everyone as the same.
Neurodiversity is real.
Neurodiversity is the norm,actually,
Erica D'Eramo (43:18):
Right! Yeah!
Adam Bouse (43:20):
And so therefore, it's really about what's good
for you. What's healthy is goodfor you. Yeah, and that's such a
simple question. And I could belike, oh, like, you know, Reese
cups every day. That's good forme, maybe, maybe not. I don't
know. But, you know, on the Ican think, two weeks ago, I had
a day where I just didn't feellike I could do anything, and I
was like, Okay, I'm gonna go fora walk by the river, and I'm
(43:42):
going to do a little bit ofmeditation, and then I'm just
going to binge watch whatever Iwant to binge watch whatever.
Those are good things for me.
I'm not doing that every day,but I know in that moment where
I'm like, hey, you know what?
Today's a 60% day. I've only got60% to give. I could give it to
work. I could give it to anotherblog post. I could give it 30
note emails trying to get thenext client. I could do all of
(44:04):
those things. Could I havepushed through maybe? And I
think it's counter cultural, andI feel like I've given myself
permission to do things that arecounter cultural, mostly as an
experiment. Can I pull this off?
I'm gonna do some things thatare good for me, and then we'll
see where I'm at after that.
Erica D'Eramo (44:23):
I love that. It's a reminder for me coming into
the weekend about how I need toreframe things as I approach
some downtime, and what that'sgoing to look like for me. But
for our listeners, though, whomight want to reach out and
maybe connect with you and hearmore about nature based
coaching, or optimisticcoaching. How do people find
(44:47):
you?
Adam Bouse (44:48):
I appreciate that optimism.coach is the website,
all the normal social spaces,LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook,
all those things, and I do likeagain. And in a spirit of in a
spirit of creativity andcuriosity and generosity, I
offer anybody that wants one a90 minute discovery session like
(45:10):
no no strings attached, no cost.
Because again, I overuse themetaphor. I haven't used it
today, but now I'm going to, Ioveruse the metaphor of planting
seeds, and I really feel likethat's what most of my job is.
Is is like, I'm a I'm a seedplanter. I help people put seeds
in the ground, and we don't knowwhat's going to grow, but I
believe optimistically thatthere are possibilities in those
seeds. So let's plant some seedsand see what comes of it.
(45:32):
Sometimes I do a discoverysession, somebody has a huge
breakthrough, and they go on,and I could not be happier.
Sometimes they go, Oh, I'veplanted the seeds. But they
didn't. They didn't, like, bloomyet. I'm like, Yeah, we usually
don't see seeds turn into fruitin the same day, so this might
take some time, and we worktogether, but at the end of the
day, that's what I want to Iwant to help people learn and
grow. I want to I want them tohelp them feel grounded, and I
(45:55):
want them to be able to findpossibilities that matter to
them, not what society tells youyou should have, not the
possibilities that are just thesort of path of least
resistance. But what is it youactually want? What is it you
want to be doing? Who do youwant to be and how do you want
to be? Let's go find thosepossibilities.
Erica D'Eramo (46:11):
Yeah. Well, we will definitely be linking to
your site on in the show notesand to some of the ways that
people can connect with you. Ireally appreciate you sharing
your experiences, thevulnerability and some of your
wisdom today. Thank you so much.
Adam, it's really just been anhonor.
Adam Bouse (46:32):
No, it's been great.
I really enjoy the conversation.
Erica, and yeah, you keep doinggood work too, because I know
you're doing it.
Erica D'Eramo (46:39):
Yeah, my fellow neuroscience nerd and all keep
the recommendations coming. Ilove it. And for the folks who
would love to see a summary ofthis or catch those links,
definitely head over to ourwebsite or the show notes, and
we will see you next episode.
Thanks for listening.
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