April 8, 2025 • 49 mins
Today’s guest is Elena Armijo, a Master Certified Coach and former professional opera singer who specializes in executive and leadership coaching for high-performing clients. She is the founder of the C-Suite Collective, an executive coaching agency offering in-depth, customized programs for high performers, and, she is the host of The Collective Corner, a podcast where badass, inspiring, and compassionate conversations get to flourish.
In this conversation, we discuss the most pressing issues with clients and business leaders in 2025, and the way communities move forward during moments of crisis and conflict.
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Robert Kuang (00:00):
Music.
(00:06):
Welcome to side by side, a podcast whereI Robert Kuang take you inside
conversations with artists, creatives,healers and warriors taking the charge
in their transformational story.
Today's guest is Elena Armijo, a mastercertified coach and former professional
(00:26):
opera singer who specializes inexecutive and leadership coaching for
high performing clients.
She is the founder of the C suitecollective, an executive coaching agency
offering in depth, customized programsfor high performers, and she's the host
of the collective corner, a podcastwhere badass, inspiring and
compassionate conversations get toflourish.
(00:53):
issues with clients and business leaders in 2025 and the way
communities move forward during momentsof crisis and conflict. You can find
more side by side episodes at side byside podcast.podbean.com, and if you'd
like to connect with me about myservices, please visit www dot Robert
(01:17):
Kuang, home.com, it's a good time onside by side every time Elena comes
back, and hopefully there will be manymore. For long time listeners, Elena has
been on this podcast before, where wecaught up and talked about our life,
coaching, artistry, singing, what haveyou. And now she's back after a little
(01:41):
bit. So it's really great to see youagain. Elena,
Elena Armijo (01:44):
oh my gosh, thank you for having me. It's always such a joy to
come and talk to you. You're like, like,a warm hug every time
my whole nervous system relaxes when I'mwith you. So, oh, thank you. Thank you.
Because I know sometimes we really getinto the weeds with stuff. But I was
like, that's partially why we want agood space for that as well. And since
(02:06):
we last spoke, you know, LA has had someinteresting developments. So I'm always,
whenever I'm speaking to someone who Iknow is from LA or living in LA, I want
to say, like, let's catch up. How's LAand what have you seen and experienced
this year? Yeah, well, let's see. Ithink the place to start is I just
started my fourth year in LA, or maybeI'm coming up on the end of my third
(02:27):
year. I can't remember either way. Itstill feels very new to me what I've
been describing to people moving herefrom the East Coast. I lived, you know,
in the Brooklyn, Newark, New York areafor 14 years, and then my partner and I
relocated to LA in 2021 and what I'vebeen telling people is, I really have
been unsure if I love this city. Youknow, I've moved I grew up in New
(02:51):
Mexico. I lived in Seattle for threeyears during, you know, living, living
there during grad school. And I'm prettyquick to adjust to places, especially
being traveled through singing. Youknow, there were a lot of different
countries I visited and places that Iwas at temporarily, so I don't tend to
have a hard time grounding into a place.And for some reason, LA was difficult
(03:14):
for me. I've really been fighting notliking it here, and part of that was I'm
learning the New York mindset, when youbring it here and try to fit it in with
LA, it just does not to work. LA islike, we don't want that. We don't got
place for that here. And I get thatthat's it's really unfair to LA to bring
that mindset here. And yet, I was havinga hard time meeting people. I loved the
(03:36):
land like I love the nature, I love thewater, I love the space. There's so much
space here that we didn't have on theEast Coast, right? And still, there was
something inside me that was likenagging, is this my place? Is this where
we're going to be long term? And Icouldn't get a solid Yes. And then the
fires happened, and that to me, I didnot expect to fall in LA during the
(04:01):
fires, and that's actually whathappened. We watched people come
together in communities and support eachother, just like people did during, you
know, Sandy, Hurricane Sandy in NewYork, and other big events in different
cities. And I'm surprised that it tookthat, you know, a big event like that
(04:21):
for me to actually see the city. So Ithink that's probably all on me. It has
nothing to do with LA, if I'm beinghonest and more about my context and the
way I view things, but I I really got tosee a side of people that that people
don't often lead with here, you know,they don't lead with vulnerability. They
don't lead with connection andcommunity, or at least not out loud, in
(04:42):
circles. If you're not a part of thosecircles, it's very it's very community
oriented. If you're in communitycircles, it was really special to see
the whole city open up its heart andembrace just supporting people that were
affected by the fires. And that was itdidn't matter what income class you were
or.
Where you grew up, or what, you know,all the things that people were seeing
(05:03):
in the news that don't live here, peoplewere on the ground and they were
helping. And there's something aboutthat that just had me go, okay, I get
it. These, these can be My people,right? Like I and we tried various ways
to help as well. But there was, therewere certain times where we tried to
help that they had way too manyvolunteers. It would have been nothing
in the way. And so to me, again, thesewere just signals that there's a lot
(05:25):
more here to learn and to embrace.
Robert Kuang (05:28):
Yeah, thank you for sharing that, because not being LA right
now, although I did also recently make across country move. So I think that's
partially why I wanted to ask you aboutthat as well. People have a lot of doom
and gloom about both the fires and alsosometimes just la in general. Anyway,
whether it's the industries or the placeitself, actually somewhat similar to New
(05:51):
York, people talk about a certainjadedness in these big cities that
attract a lot of people, and veryaspirational people at that. So thank
you for sharing some of the communityexperiences rather than maybe, like,
more of, like, the headlines that peopletend to get first. Yeah,
Elena Armijo (06:06):
I just think, you know, at the end of the day, people are people,
and even in a bigger city, they reallyfind their humanity during times of
crisis. Yeah,
Robert Kuang (06:15):
absolutely. I'm curious what's been like a running theme in your
work that you've seen, let's say, maybein the last year, with the last few
months, certainly maybe we can startthere, particularly knowing that you
work with a lot of women, a lot ofpeople in leadership. Generally, when I
speak with coaches, there tends to belike, if the issue comes up with one
person, it tends to come up with a bunchof people around the same time. So
(06:38):
what's been like? The latest in your oneon ones and in your
Elena Armijo (06:42):
work, the latest flavor has been C suite executives that are
going through immense change. So I thinka lot of that has to do with our time
period in our country. We were in anelection year last year, so that hold
over from the change of government intothis year really impacts everyone in the
(07:03):
United States and really the globe, aswe're seeing now. So all of my leaders,
or people that are working on leadershipskills or expansion of how they lead or
who they want to be, in the face of ithas really changed course. And I would
say that it's less about developing askill and more about crisis mode and
(07:27):
resilience. And I really thought that wehad kind of gone through that, you know,
we definitely went through that back in2016 with George Floyd, and then we went
through it again with COVID in 2020 andI thought, man, we've really learned
resilience as leaders. And now I'mfinding this last year, that we're being
called to more. And, you know, there'sall kinds of reasons I think, I believe
(07:48):
that as a coach and a human myself, likemy own personal beliefs, but that's been
the theme for the year. Where can weground in quicker? Where can we bring
heart quicker? Where can we get the teammobilized together? Where community and
trust occur. Trust has been a really bigword in my space for the last year with
all of my clients, because a lot oftrust has been broken along the way. And
(08:10):
so while they're trying to lead thesebig movements or industries or
organizations, they're having to findways to source themselves quicker. And
that really is, I know it's a bit of acontext, but there, there is less time,
less physical hours, for them to do selfcare the way they might have done when
it's not crisis mode. So we're really ina lot of conversations about, what does
(08:32):
it look like to take care of yourselfduring crisis? That seems to be the
theme for the year so far.
Robert Kuang (08:38):
Thank you for being willing to share that, and to be kind of
clear about it, sometimes inconversation, we can spend a lot of time
our goal is to avoid certain things orto minimize certain things, but then the
conversation that we're having now iswe're in it now. You know, there's no
trying to avoid it or minimize it, it'shere. What's next? What's the next
(08:59):
decision? What's the next thing you gotto look at? Yeah, thank you for that
honesty about which
Elena Armijo (09:05):
is different seasons of leadership, right? Because it's not that
these clients haven't worked on otherthings in different years, or different
styles of coaching that they havebrought forward, but it's, I think I use
this analogy on a client call a coupleweeks ago where, you know, I said, if
you're the difference between a doctorwho works maybe in a hospital that is in
(09:25):
one wing that isn't crisis mode, versusa doctor that works in the ER and is
always in triage. What's the differenceof self care that those people need? How
do they train differently? What is theirmindset? What is their level of empathy
for themselves? When I use thatmetaphor, my client got really clear,
like, Oh, this is triage time. Thisisn't actually let me, let me do my
(09:46):
normal mode of operation where I wouldgo slower. Or want this to go
differently. We all want it to godifferently, but we are in triage. So
now what? Right? And that was a reallyuseful conversation for that client.
Robert Kuang (09:58):
For you, what's been like? The biggest. Illusion, or, let's say,
maybe false narrative, even if they weretrue, let's say once upon a time, but
now it's just simply, is not the caseanymore. Have you experienced anything
like that? Like almost a veil? Becausepeople have spoken about having that
experience since the pandemic,basically, of experience of veils being
lifted again and again, and having forus to confront certain things, right? So
(10:24):
I'm wondering if you've had flavors ofthat in your personal development or in
your work of like, oh, this narrativethat I believed in has basically been
dismantled, right?
Elena Armijo (10:35):
Yeah, I'll start with my work first, because I think that's the
clearest one I have access to. Iremember when I gave a presentation at
the acto Conference, which is abeautiful organization for coaches to do
training and community. And I signed upwith a dear colleague of mine, Liz, who
we went in and we trained some coacheson the concept. And this, this was
(10:58):
probably back, I'm trying to think thiswas back in 20, probably 2018 if I'm
guessing, and we brought the idea thatcontext cannot be separated from lived
experience. And at the time, that waskind of radical for the coaching
industry, because the coaching industrywas leaning heavily on context is the
thing to roll with and shift in clients.And there wasn't really any training out
(11:23):
there that honored lived experience sideby side with context. And so I remember
at the time how hard it felt to bringthat conversation forward and experiment
with it, and I didn't know what I wasdoing either. It's not like I had the
answers, right? Like I'm over theretrying to figure out, like, okay,
there's something here, but what is it?And now in 2025 you could not convince
(11:43):
me at all that these can be separated.They are one in the same. They are so
important to our humanity. They are soimportant in the coaching world and how
we address our clients somatically andthrough more diverse conversations. And
they create so much empathy and healingin the coaching container. And, yeah, I
(12:05):
think that's a big, a big shift in 2018I wasn't sure, and now I'm like, Whoa. I
can't even believe that was aconversation back in 2018 so I think
that's one thing that I would say hasdrastically shifted. I think,
personally, I've really been playingwith this conversation in my personal
life, and this is deeply through mypartner. You know, a lot of the work
we're doing in our in our relationship,we've been together nine years, and man,
(12:29):
the span of that nine years looks sodifferent from where we started to where
we are, which I imagine most people say.But one of the things that I have been
really that, like the cloud has beenlifted from my eyes, is a lot of the
ideology around the feminism movementand what it's caused in men and
(12:50):
disconnection in men, and how women arenot actually having a conversation about
who we can be responsible for, thethings that we require and ask of men In
relationships, and I'm speaking from aheteronormative approach, but I imagine
there's a lot of identity crossover thatexists in other relationships as well,
which is, again, a brand new thing I'mexploring, but I'm really curious where
(13:14):
this concept of people, but especiallyour men that we're seeing who have High
suicidal rates and are very lonely anddepressed, especially in the
heterosexual arena, like, what can womenactually be responsible for in that
conversation? And it's tricky, right?Because women are still getting
(13:34):
oppressed as well. We see that in in ourgovernment. We see that in everyday
life. We there's still a lot of thingsthat that women have to account for,
safety and, you know, being being awareof things that are happening to them,
but for the people that have done work,and especially the, I would say, people
now, and both outside of just men andwomen, people that are aware and have
(13:58):
worked on themselves and have grown andhave done conscious work in those
relationships, where can you actuallypush the boundary of being heard and
listened to and held and connected? AndI'm super interested in that, because,
you know my partner, I'm very, verylucky. He's done a lot of work, and he
is a safe place to explore thatconversation. And I realize that's a
(14:18):
privilege, and not everybody has accessto that, but it's been really eye
opening to me to see where women areperpetuating things with each other and
with that then spill out intoconversations. And you know that that
can get even more existential when Ithink about women creating life, and if
they're the people that give life andare the mothers of the earth, you know
(14:39):
what's what's actually going on. It kindof feels like a conversation in 2018
it's like new and cloudy and notdistinguished, but I'm curious about it,
and I wonder if in another 10 years,we'll be having a different
conversation. Yeah,
Robert Kuang (14:51):
I wanted to go back to the work part that you mentioned first,
because they were both so powerful tome, but I always Yeah, so with context
for listeners, it. People talk about itin different ways, but I always think of
it as your frame of reference, or likeyou said, your lived experience, your
internal narratives and your beliefs allshape your context, which influence how
(15:13):
you choose to respond to certain thingsand the choices you make, right? And I
always struggled with that, because Isaw so much power in saying that's just
a context. That's just your context,right? But I always it was very
difficult to not make it feel like apersonal issue when I knew there was no
structural possibility about beautifullysaid, Yes, does that make sense? So I
(15:37):
knew, like, you know, for example, thehospital you work at the company you
work for, there are certain things youhave to be clear about, right? And so
within coaching, we think of infinitepossibilities, but there are times where
I feel like in order to do that shift, Ihad to dis identify from myself, which
was just not possible. But also forpeople who have tried for any reason,
(15:59):
it's a deeply painful experience, right?Extremely painful. Yeah, yeah. It's like
a lifelong failed experiment, or it canleave you feeling that way, yes.
Elena Armijo (16:07):
And I actually think it's why we're, we're, we're losing some
people to coaching, right? Like, meaninglike people don't even want to entertain
coaching is when they don't see the theability to find themselves in a
different story or context that theywant to try on without leaving
themselves behind, then some people arejust out. They're out of the
conversation. And that, to me, is reallysad, because it could go another way.
(16:31):
Yeah,
Robert Kuang (16:31):
absolutely. And I've tried to hold the both and multiple things are
true, has been something of trying tocultivate, but harder to kind of
articulate sometimes, like you'retalking about and then second part about
relationship of people of differentgenders and things like that, obviously,
that's an ongoing conversation. It'ssomething that's deeply impacted me and
(16:53):
my relationships for sure. So I guess myoverall question is, you know, I'm
curious what you've seen, what's changedfor particularly women in leadership
over the years, how women in leadershipsee kind of these issues, gender based
issues, and things like that. And Idon't know if there's been change over
the past few years, or just some thingsthat you feel like is more important now
(17:15):
about that, I think
Elena Armijo (17:16):
there has been change, which is good news. I think if we look
at an older generation, let's say the80s or the 90s, of women that were in
leadership positions, so C suite roles,senior vice presidents, senior managing
directors, like top of theirprofessions, right? Typically, there
weren't many of them. So there weren't,weren't a lot in the room to begin with,
(17:37):
my perception, which, again, can just bemy lens, is that a lot of women from
that era had to be a certain way to getthere. So there was, again, kind of what
we're talking about in the coachingconversation, where there was a
distancing of themselves that had tohappen to take on more traditional
leadership skills that would be valuedto get in the room. So kudos to those
(18:00):
ladies, right? Because without themgoing first, there would be no
opportunity now for what we've seenshift. I really, I really want to
acknowledge that generation. And therewas a bit of an over swing, which is
what all happens in anything we'retrying to change, right? And what ended
up happening is, in those spaces, allall of a sudden, those women had to
(18:20):
experience some of the same issues thatother leaders had in those positions
that they'd never had an opportunity tobe confronted with and with the
overswing. We saw top down leadership.We saw women on women being really hard
on each other. We saw women being moreand more disconnected from their
emotional center and not bringingemotions into the workplace. Because,
(18:44):
again, it was a survival technique. It'show they got there. It was, it was what
was having them win, right? So when theover swing happened, I think we really
saw some of that breakdown of what I'mtalking about, connection emotional
leadership, connection to men or peoplein those spaces that they were working
with. So what I love about where we'reat now is we have women that are in
(19:04):
those spaces that have done a lot ofwork around who they are, what they
believe emotionally, what are theyfeeling? They're not making their
feelings wrong, but they're also notnecessarily just leading with feelings
right, which, again, the oldergeneration was in an either or
conversation about that, yeah, yeah, forsure. And which, you know, I get, it was
(19:28):
really hard. I think,
Robert Kuang (19:29):
you know men too, for sure. It's win or lose, black and white,
yeah, all
Elena Armijo (19:33):
of that, right? And I think where we're at now is we're
starting to see a lot more nuance inspaces like, I think about one of the
teams I work with, man, they're justsuch a cool leadership team. There's
like there's 12 of them on theleadership team. There so much diversity
on this team, with all the identitymarkers you could think of exist on this
team. And what I really love about thatis that there's an opportunity in that.
(20:00):
At room now to have all voices heard,emotion be present, but logic and
reasoning be present as well.Accountability be present. Because this
is another thing that I've been I'vebeen looking at a lot as a woman, is
what does accountability look like forus if we were taught that not having it
was okay and we could get to the topthrough other means. So I'm really
(20:22):
excited about the shift that I see inthose spaces, because they're playing
and through playing, there's innovationand creativity, and there's more
possibility than we've ever had forpeople to feel seen and heard and be
seen and heard, but to experience whatthat creates at a high level, so I don't
know where it's going to take us. Ithink there's a big backlash happening
(20:44):
for that right now. I think people arescared, because what we're my my belief
is, what's happening in our country isit's the last stand of the old power,
right? It's the last resistance to thetraditional way of leading, getting
scared and going, No, we want it to bethe way it always was. And I just, I
(21:05):
think there's so many more people thatknow it can go differently now that it's
just a much, a much richer conversation.I
Robert Kuang (21:13):
love your connection. You're connecting between play and
innovation, because that's such a that'ssuch a cool thing to tap into, if you
can in, you know, coaching, or in clientwork and whatnot, and also just in
yourself. Sometimes I think it's justthe way we've been conditioned. We tend
to think the best solutions tend to havethe most challenge, perhaps, or is the
most challenging for us. But sometimesit's, how can we get the most support,
(21:37):
right? How can we have fun? How can wehave safety and pleasure and even
comfort, which is not really always thepriority inside of like coaching
conversations. If you've tried everypossible possibility that you can
imagine, it may be time to sit down anddrop all of that and play and imagine an
experiment. Or one of my favorites thesedays, is to talk to somebody, talk to
(22:01):
somebody with a different perspective,yeah, yeah,
Elena Armijo (22:05):
yeah. And I really mean that, like, I love that. You said that,
but let's highlight that, talk tosomebody with a different perspective,
and talk to listen, right? And I don'tmean I'm not saying, like, you know, I
would consider myself a moderateliberal. I am not a far left liberal,
probably more moderate in general thananything. And when I talk to my liberal
(22:26):
friends, I'm like, when's the last timeyou sat down with somebody who's a
Republican and actually listened tothem? Right? I think that's and it goes
for both sides of the street. Sincewe're kind of in a binary country, even
though the independent party is reallytrying to have a voice in the middle,
that, to me, is what we've lost inunity, is listening and being able to
come to the table and respect the otherside while keeping our beliefs and
(22:49):
creating a solution for all. When I,when I talk about deib Right now, I've
been, you know, my roots have been indei be work for a while now, especially
in the coaching world. And I have alwayssaid all means, all that means all. That
means every single person, whether youlike them or not, whether you think that
they are evil or light. All means all soif, if we really believe that, who are
(23:13):
we going to be about it from that, thatstandpoint, and sometimes people just
get so afraid that they forget that theyforget that they want to they can expand
and have a different conversation. Whatdo
Robert Kuang (23:23):
you think? And this is one where I was like, There's no right
answer, totally. But what do you thinkis the best way to move forward when
there is a lack of agreement?
Elena Armijo (23:32):
I think that we are about to see the biggest revolution of what
happens when people can put down theirarmor and get to humanity again. I don't
know, you know, I don't know what it'sgonna look like. I think it might be
really hard before it's really good, butI do believe it will be really good. I
think we're gonna have to go through alot, and a lot of pain is going to
(23:53):
emerge before people can actually bringforward the most authentic version of
their voice to be a collective. So Iactually think that's the solution. Is,
what would it take to be a collectiveinstead of what group wins, what group
doesn't? How we make it fair foreverybody? I think fair is a good
(24:13):
conversation, but the but the higherlevel conversation is, how do we all
live together and be a community? Sothere's been community that's been lost.
I don't have a specific way that goes. Ithink it can be created from many
different ways. If that's thecommitment, yeah, but I don't hear that
being the commitment. In our country,there's lots of other commitments
floating around, but a commitment tounity and cult cultural community seems
(24:38):
to be missing right now. So that wouldbe where I point everybody is, what? If
that was the highest commitment, thenwhat? Yeah,
Robert Kuang (24:46):
when you say, be vulnerable with each other, I also hear
maybe dropping the ego a little bit.There have been often this happens all
the time that comes up in coaching,which is, we get caught up in
situations, arguments or discourse. Isthat is more built on ego than actually,
you know, anyone having a positiveoutcome out of it. You know, it's not
(25:07):
even about sometimes more willing tofollow the ego and just ignore the pain
that is causing us and everyone aroundus. Yeah. So definitely very much
aligned with you about what doesinclusivity look like? What does unity
and safety look like? What does a strongnation look like? We're having to have
some very tough conversations aroundthat everyone is complicit in some ways.
(25:31):
So So in thinking about, you know,disagreements and agreements that just
come up as a part of life, I'm curiousfor you, what are some important points
in your life where you were maybe facedwith a no or had to say no. How do you
know when to say yes or no? Thinkingback to those moments of No, I
Elena Armijo (25:50):
think it always comes back to my values, which can be tricky,
right? Because you can convince yourselfyour value is anything in the world like
your values are, you know, integrity andlove and those are my values, but when
they're used as a weapon, that's whereit gets a bit sticky, right? So when
I've had to say no to something,honestly, it's the collective mindset
(26:10):
I'm thinking recently of something withmy company, where, where I was thinking
about moving it forward into somethingelse. Or I should say, it's not my
company. It's actually the collectivecompany, the TCC, we recently have
expanded, and now we all, we are allowners or the partners that have chosen
in our owners and are becoming a truecollective, which is what it was born to
(26:31):
do. It was always meant to be that way.And the thing I noticed is that when
there was a disagreement in the spaceabout who we are, what we're going to
be. The place that had me say no andkeep moving was when there was a
detriment to more people, to the entirecollective. So again, if the commitment
is the collective right, then it washolding that commitment through some
(26:55):
really tough conversations. And that'snot easy, because there's pain, and
people get hurt. And as a leader, youknow, did some wonky stuff around like
armoring up and being defensive myself.And I learned a lot that that I still
really trusted the vision and and I'mstill trusting that. I don't know we'll
see where we end up, right? But that's,that's the path I chose. And what I
(27:19):
notice is, as long as I can rememberthat my way is not the right way, but
it's a way that I choose, then more canarise. But if I'm choosing it because my
way is the right way, or I need you toagree with my way, to change your mind
(27:40):
or your opinion, or your livedexperience, that's my telltale sign that
my ego is involved. And this is notactually a conversation that's useful
for the commitment. Yeah, so I thinkI've been that's kind of been my check
in with myself. And then, I mean, mostrecently, you know, I have ADHD and I
(28:02):
didn't know that. Yeah, I Well, Ididn't. I'm 44 and I didn't know it till
I was like 40 I just, I'm learning aboutit too. And and one of the things that I
know about my ADHD is that if I don'tactually take care of myself, which
sometimes looks like slowing my braindown. Sometimes it looks like letting my
brain run right like going out for awalk and listening to a podcast and
(28:26):
listening to the birds and talking to mydogs and doing all the things at once
like that. Sometimes that can be reallyfueling for me, and sometimes meditation
and slowing down, which I hatemeditation, I got to just be honest,
like I do it and I and I commit to it 60minutes a day right now for the last
like seven weeks, and man, it's astruggle to get on that map. For me, I'm
(28:47):
not one of these people that loves itand enjoys it and can sit there when I'm
in it. I I understand the benefit for mysoul and the connection with spirit, and
when I miss it, I can tell that I'vemissed it because I'm not clear of
focus, but I don't love it, so evensomething like that, right as an example
of where am I willing to choose fromcommitment, instead of enrolling myself
(29:11):
to love everything about what I see orwhat I believe? Yeah,
Robert Kuang (29:15):
interesting. That's very like neutral, detached of you, almost
like I don't have to love it, but I'mcommitted to it, and I know why I'm
doing it. Basically, yeah, I'm clear.Yeah. There's almost like, you know, not
to get too woo, woo. But there wasalmost like, then your emotions can be
whatever it needs to be. You're alreadyclear, right?
Elena Armijo (29:33):
Yeah, which was a big deal for me, because there's parts of myself
that I don't love that I've been tryingto change for my whole life, instead of
just letting them exist and be okay,right? Sure, yeah, we also that's part
of a practice of that is, Can I, can itjust be okay that I don't love it,
Robert Kuang (29:49):
right? Sometimes that's very freeing. Yeah, I
Elena Armijo (29:52):
felt so it certainly gave me the the innovation that I needed to
take it on, because before. In my life,I needed to love it, to do it. And that
was just like a losing game. I was nevergoing to get on the mat from that place.
Robert Kuang (30:07):
That's so true, because, you know, it's almost like, what am I
doing this for? What do I get out of it,which is such a transactional way of us
thinking about our daily lives and whatwe choose to do, right? But also, like
an hour, holy cow, I know. I don't know.For someone who's like, I'm in deep
struggle. I was like, two hours a day,babe, I don't know. Maybe you're not
Elena Armijo (30:30):
that's true. Somebody was like, You need to be on the map for
three hours. I would be absolutely not.So
Robert Kuang (30:41):
absolutely, yeah. And is it just curious? Is it like, seated, or
are you someone who's like, you know,like a walking meditation? Is
meditation?
Elena Armijo (30:48):
Oh, yeah, no, seated. It has to be seated and focused, because
otherwise my brain will focus on otherthings, right, walking around. So, so
for me, it's seated, yeah,
Robert Kuang (30:57):
but it's also so true, you know, my partner has ADHD, and, you
know, sometimes it's like, what are thekids say? Bed, bed, rot, whatever. Brain
rot. Oh, yeah. They're like, I need to,like, I don't want to, like, engage with
something intellectual right now.Please, let me give me my bubble. And
then other times, their way of restingis like, I'm gonna knit like, three hats
(31:18):
this weekend. And it is genuinelyrelaxing. Yeah, you know what? I mean.
It's just like thing and and it's justallowing noticing your rhythm and
actually being okay with it in someways, like I've noticed
Elena Armijo (31:31):
that's beautifully said, because I really feel like it's not only
being with your rhythm, it's allowingyour rhythm to be great, like, I'll, I
won't say crazy, it's not crazy, butdifferent. Yeah, right. Like I craved
for it to be consistent for so long,because then it meant I I could control
it, and I knew who I was and I wasconsistent for other people. And only
(31:51):
recently have I been like, this is notgoing to be consistent, and that can be
okay, and as long as I honor whatevershows up in the moment, you know, in
alignment with my values and not, youknow, being a crappy person in the
world, that that's more loving to methan trying to make myself a certain way
to to adhere to, like the norm, thecenter norm. I'm
Robert Kuang (32:11):
curious because you are. You're a vocalist. You're an opera
singer. Yeah, even the way you speak, Ican hear it when I was editing our last
podcast conversation. Oh yeah, you hadthe most even breathing of my life, and
it was audible. That's literally justthe waves. I was like, Oh my gosh, this
person has practiced breathing, evenbreathing for a long time. Yeah. Like,
(32:34):
you were just so good with that. And inany case, you know, I think right now,
I've noticed, particularly for, let'ssay younger folks, but lots of people,
you know, there's a fear of speakingout. There's already a fear about
censorship, let's say that's been comingup more and more, yeah. But then
traditionally, historically, speakingout, public speaking has always been,
like a pretty nervy thing for mostpeople, right? And so I wanted to ask
(32:59):
you, just like, I suppose, tips andtricks or just like your perspective
around how can people get comfortablewith speaking up? You know, the thing
is, even when they don't want to,because another consequence of not
speaking up is just completedisengagement. If no one speaks up in a
group session, nothing happens exactly.
Elena Armijo (33:17):
Well, the tips and tricks are nervous system regulations. So when
I used to get on stage, I used tosqueeze my hands and dig my nails into
my hands, because it reminded me that Iwas alive, or that I could feel my hands
and that I was there before I took astep on stage. Same thing when I was
actually on the stage, speaking orsinging, I would feel my feet. It was
(33:40):
constant, like sending breath to myfeet, and all of that was just resetting
my nervous system to be able to groundit into the ground physically wherever I
was. Because when I get nervous, I tendto lift out of my body and come from
just my head and disconnect from mybody. So I think the first step is
noticing, what does your body actuallydo when you're afraid? Because
(34:01):
everybody's body is different, and youmight need different things. But if
you're disconnecting just some ways toactually ground your body again, if
you're feeling too heavy in your body,then we need to do the opposite. We need
to actually, like, send the beam oflight up through your head, right to the
to the universe, or different differentmodalities that have you lift your body
(34:21):
out of the ground instead of sinkinginto the ground. So I think the tips and
tricks are different based on whatyou're doing. I think Breath, breath, to
me, is the most magical thing we have onthis earth, outside of herbs for
medicine or Western medicine or food,any of that can support us in our
nervous system. But breath is the onething you have that you have instantly
(34:44):
attainable to you while you're living,and breath cleans out so much, it cleans
your blood, your blood, literally inyour body, the blood oxygen cleans
itself out when you're breathing. Andmost of us don't know this, but you tend
to walk around using only 20% of yourbreath. Capacity as a human so it's only
people like singers or athletes orpeople that are needing more breath to
(35:08):
create something that understand or getthe awareness that there's so much more
breath available to us than we know,because you don't actually need a lot of
breath to live walking around every dayin life. So I would say to people that
are nervous around speaking out, explorehow much breath you actually have to
ground your body or to expand yourlungs, or to do square breathing or
(35:32):
tactical breathing from the military toreset your nervous system. Because
breath is key in any sort ofvocalization. It's actually the thing
that makes your vocal cords work. It'snot your vocal cords, right? It's the
breath that's going through your vocalcords that makes them ring and sing and
speak. So So breath is really magical,and I don't think it's enough credit.
(35:56):
You know, in the world, I
Robert Kuang (35:58):
think I've had about the same amount of conversations with
vocalists, as I do with like, likeBuddhist or meditation teacher about
breathing because they're both they'reboth super vital, because there's
something about the musculature of likewe're in our body, but I think there's,
like, an intangible spirit as it'sattached to our voice, and what we think
and feel is such an important part of usto to nurture. And yet, I see, you know,
(36:25):
you know, my partner is teaching inuniversity now, and there's just a lot
of disengagement as a result of justpeople not using their voice. I think
opera and singing is one breakthrough.And I've also heard, you know, for
collaboration, learning how tocollaborate and have those skills do
some chamber music. So again, the artsand humanities for me, you know, find
(36:46):
the breakthrough chair. Yeah? Well,yeah, I
Elena Armijo (36:48):
wanted to answer the second part of your question, because I
think it's really an important which isthe speaking out, right? Yeah, when
we're afraid. So the the way that I havebeen thinking about this question is
that it's exactly what you said. Notspeaking out costs you your dignity and
your soul in the long run, right? Ifyou're swallowing something or you're
(37:08):
you're staying small to stay safe. Onone hand, there is a physical safety
aspect of not dying, like speaking outand not dying. So I think you got to
choose who you're going to be in thisworld, and what that will cost your soul
when you are taking your last breath inlife. And that's a tall order. It's a
large ask, and it's a privilege to askfor some you know, for those of us that
(37:33):
that have the ability to even do that, Iwas recently on a call with my coach. I
think this was like, in January, rightafter the elections, and I was like,
spinning out. I was like, this is goingto get bad, and people are going to get
deported, and people are going to getput in prison and disappear, and people
are going to like, like, it's just goingto it's going to get really, really bad,
which is my way of processing, the waythat my my brain, not my body, likes to
(38:00):
work is to think of the worst scenarioso I can be prepared. That's my version
of safety, right? It's not necessarilyhealthy, but that's that's what I do
when I'm afraid. What I had in myconversation with her was, okay, let's
play the worst scenario out. My businessis taken from me. I'm imprisoned. All my
rights are taken away. I'm living as aservant to this to the government, like,
(38:22):
let's just play that scene out for asecond while. I don't wish that for
anybody. You know. The question that sheasked me, which I think was really
brilliant to work with me in my fear,was, Well, who else would be in that
room? And when I thought about who elsewould be in that room beside me, like
all of the people in history who havebeen imprisoned or locked up or murdered
(38:44):
or their lives taken away for what theybelieve. I was like, oh, that's actually
the company that I would want to be atcompany with. Like, I'd want to be
sitting in a jail cell with thosepeople. And if, you know, if, if that
leads to death, you know, can that be aso be it conversation from commitment
and courage, and again, I I strugglewith this conversation publicly, because
(39:06):
it's a bit of a martyrdom complex aswell, and I can easily dip into
martyrdom. I don't think that's what I'mtrying to say, but, but it certainly
helped me ground in my commitment and myvalues to go, Okay, I'm clear. I'm clear
where I sit, yeah, without the fight andthe rage, and it doesn't mean that I
would fight and hurt other people, but Icertainly won't silence my voice.
Robert Kuang (39:27):
No, absolutely not. It's so interesting. I've never heard someone
talk about envision who else might be inthat scenario with you, even if it's a
crisis scenario, it's just another wayto get outside of yourself, and you're
also like your bubble of fear for aminute already about imagining something
in the future, perhaps right, and toground yourself and like what the
(39:48):
reality would be. The reality is, ifyou're going through a crisis, there are
many, many people who are experiencingthe same thing, and therefore you are
not alone. Things can happen out ofthat. So thank you for sharing that. I
have a, I guess, not easy, another onethat I know people sometimes like to
dodge or but these, you know,conversations around money and finance
(40:10):
and material resources, like, it's a,it's pretty important for coaches to
navigate that with, you know, in ourwork, I'm curious lately, because it's,
it always happens around times ofuncertainty. What conversations look
like right now for people around moneyand finances and just overall, kind of
(40:30):
just curious about your perspectivearound that right now? Yeah,
Elena Armijo (40:34):
I'll speak from the lens of being a coach rather than my clients,
because I think clients, depending ontheir industry and where they are, they
might be in different conversationsaround that, but in general, as a coach,
the way that I've approached money, andI think has been a really successful way
to approach it, is that the work works,and if I trust my work, then everything
(40:55):
else will fall in line. So it is a bigtrust piece with me, in my in the
building, in my business. And I launchedmy business in 2015 so this is actually
my 20, my 10 year anniversary. That'sright, as a coach. And so when I
launched, I just, I just did the work. Itook as many calls as I could, I coached
(41:15):
as often as I could. I remember charging$5 for a cup of coffee when I first
started coaching versus where I am now.I'm at the top of the market as what
coaches make. I would say I'm definitelyin the top, like 3% of what coaches make
in the world. What I notice is that weare in a business that no matter what's
happening in the world, coaches areneeded. So there is some privilege in
(41:38):
that, right. Not all jobs are like that.And I really believe that no matter if
times are good or times are bad or timesare in between, coaching is a good
industry to be in if you can reallytrust the work works. So that's that's
number one. Number two is diversify. Imeet a lot of coaches who want to go
down a road with one niche, and while Icompletely respect and honor that that
(42:03):
might be who you love to work with metoo. I have my my lane that I love to
operate in, I'm always looking todiversify my business, because I believe
just in any business diversification,just like I believe in communities and
collective and different voices androoms makes it a much more stable and
(42:25):
innovative and creative practice inbusiness. So what that looks like for me
is looking at ways I can partner withpeople that are other coaches in the
world. It looks like all different typesof clients I don't I still have sliding
scale slots for people that I love towork with and can't necessarily afford
me. I love working with innovators andcreative people. I love working in
(42:48):
industries I don't necessarily agreewith, right? Like that's another way to
diversify my portfolio. As a coach and Ilove I've just started recently to get
interested in boards and investing inbusinesses I believe in. So I think you
got to think multi dimensionally when itcomes to the energetics of money.
(43:10):
Because if it's just transactional, likewe were talking about everything else
today, it's a it's a very limited gamethat you're playing with the energy of
money. And I've always believed that. Ithink I've been pretty lucky, because my
father instilled some good money habitsfrom when I was young, and then through
my own growth, I've been able to expandwhat money means to me and what the
(43:32):
energetics of it are, and I've beenallowed to play with it from that lens.
So not everybody has that opportunity,but you you can look at how you're
holding money and the diversification ofwhat you do have, whether it's $5 or
more, and see what you can create withit.
Robert Kuang (43:52):
I think it's such an important conversation inside of
coaching, conversations about like, theway you spend money, the way you make
money and the way you save money, theseare all such important ways to look at
yourself and the way you're being and asmuch as there are, you know, like we
mentioned earlier, there are realitiesand structural things in place. But I do
(44:14):
try to remind people that prices anddollar values are man made. They always
have been. And the other thing is, youknow, like a positive profit margin can
look like many different numbers, and itcan still be a positive outcome compared
to the way it was before. So you don'tnecessarily, it's not necessarily a
(44:36):
failure to say you didn't hit anexorbitant profit margin, right? But,
but also, there's a lot ofintentionality behind why it may be
meaningful to aim for a positive goallike that, even if it's in terms of
materials. Because then you get to I donotice, you know, even if people are
saying like, ah, you know, it doesn'tdefine who I am when they find big
(44:59):
financial success. Yes, I do notice theway they choose to use money is quite
different, and I think that's also veryimportant, and that can alter the
future, you know? So one of the thingsthat you mentioned, that you mentioned
just now, is about like, who you workwith, and finding the right
collaborators and things like that. Soyou have a long running, ongoing podcast
(45:20):
where you spoken with a lot of creativeminds, including yours truly, and also
you run. You are part of this collectiveright, where you do, like group
engagements and things like that. So I'mjust curious, what have been some of
your maybe favorite guests or podcastmoments that were like light bulb
(45:40):
moments for you, I know sometimes I havethose, but also just some of your
favorite collaborators.
Elena Armijo (45:47):
Oh my gosh, that's such a big question. I love all my podcast
guests because they all teach mesomething. So I will start there. Like,
I don't have a favorite that would bereally hard to pick, because I think the
people that I invite on the show arereally innovative, disruptive,
courageous. That's why they're on theshow, right? Because of who they are. So
(46:10):
I learn every time I do it, it's why Ikeep doing it. Like I I'm pretty sure,
like, maybe I have, like, maybe 100people that listen to my podcast. So
it's not like, you know, a ton of peoplethat are listening all the time, but I
love doing it. I love the conversations,and I I always learn something. So I
hope that, I hope whoever's listeninggets something for themselves when they
(46:31):
listen. It's a, it's a service basedthing for me. So that's why I do it. And
then the collaborators that I love, man,I just, I love coaches that are, that
are good coaches. You know, I'msurrounded by some of the best coaches
in the industry, and I am so gratefulfor that. I think of everybody who's a
part of the collective who said yes tothis crazy idea that we still don't have
(46:54):
any idea if it's gonna work. You know,we're still, we're still experimenting
away and trying to build a brand and abusiness. And they just are so willing
to say yes and play and create. And,man, I feel so lucky. I really do that.
I get to be surrounded by these people.And I mean, I could list all of their
(47:16):
names. There's not a single one of themthat I don't treasure and love and adore
and respect, and it's just so much fun.That's the thing I really want to say,
is, even if the business itself doesn'tgenerate something that's, you know, a
ten million company in the future, thekey is the people. And as a coach,
(47:38):
collaboration has me not being out therealone, which I think is is awful in any
profession, and it's what entrepreneursand solopreneurs deal with a lot. Yeah.
So it was such a gift to be able tocreate a community where we could just
be together and be a brain trust calleach other up and say, like, Hey, I'm
struggling with this client, or hey, Igot this really cool contract, and I'm
(48:00):
thinking so and so and so might be greaton it. And what do you think that part
is fun? And I think that that that we ascoaches need more of that, and they're
everybody's too busy to create it,right? So it's, like, always a dream,
and nobody does it and and I'm glad thatTCC exists for that reason.
Robert Kuang (48:17):
Yeah, yeah, everyone talks about it, but sometimes, who's gonna go
through the discomfort of like, growingit, right? Yeah,
Elena Armijo (48:24):
right. It takes a lot of energy, and I'm just grateful that
people were willing,
Robert Kuang (48:29):
yeah, yeah, absolutely. And knowing quite a few people in that
group crew, certainly people shouldcheck out your space as much as
possible. So thank you so much for yourtime today, and I certainly just took up
every minute. No, I love it, just likeso fun asking you with these kind of
somewhat serious questions I'm certainlygonna put where people can find you in
(48:49):
the episode description, but realquickly, while we're here, where can
people find you specifically, and alsomaybe the collective as well.
Elena Armijo (48:56):
Yeah, you can find both myself and the collective on LinkedIn,
also our websites. Elena army ho calm ismy personal website, and then the c dash
suite collective.com is the collectivewebsite. And I mean, we're around, you
can find us anywhere. Just, yeah, justgo look for us, and we'll reach back out
for
Robert Kuang (49:13):
sure. Thank you so much for your time today, Elena, it's always
a pleasure to dive in. Thank you.
Music.
(00:06):
Welcome to side by side, a podcast whereI Robert Kuang take you inside
conversations with artists, creatives,healers and warriors taking the charge
in their transformational story.
Today's guest is Elena Armijo, a mastercertified coach and former professional
(00:26):
opera singer who specializes inexecutive and leadership coaching for
high performing clients.
She is the founder of the C suitecollective, an executive coaching agency
offering in depth, customized programsfor high performers, and she's the host
of the collective corner, a podcastwhere badass, inspiring and
compassionate conversations get toflourish.
(00:53):
issues with clients and business leaders in 2025 and the way
communities move forward during momentsof crisis and conflict. You can find
more side by side episodes at side byside podcast.podbean.com, and if you'd
like to connect with me about myservices, please visit www dot Robert
(01:17):
Kuang, home.com, it's a good time onside by side every time Elena comes
back, and hopefully there will be manymore. For long time listeners, Elena has
been on this podcast before, where wecaught up and talked about our life,
coaching, artistry, singing, what haveyou. And now she's back after a little
(01:41):
bit. So it's really great to see youagain. Elena,
Elena Armijo (01:44):
oh my gosh, thank you for having me. It's always such a joy to
come and talk to you. You're like, like,a warm hug every time
my whole nervous system relaxes when I'mwith you. So, oh, thank you. Thank you.
Because I know sometimes we really getinto the weeds with stuff. But I was
like, that's partially why we want agood space for that as well. And since
(02:06):
we last spoke, you know, LA has had someinteresting developments. So I'm always,
whenever I'm speaking to someone who Iknow is from LA or living in LA, I want
to say, like, let's catch up. How's LAand what have you seen and experienced
this year? Yeah, well, let's see. Ithink the place to start is I just
started my fourth year in LA, or maybeI'm coming up on the end of my third
(02:27):
year. I can't remember either way. Itstill feels very new to me what I've
been describing to people moving herefrom the East Coast. I lived, you know,
in the Brooklyn, Newark, New York areafor 14 years, and then my partner and I
relocated to LA in 2021 and what I'vebeen telling people is, I really have
been unsure if I love this city. Youknow, I've moved I grew up in New
(02:51):
Mexico. I lived in Seattle for threeyears during, you know, living, living
there during grad school. And I'm prettyquick to adjust to places, especially
being traveled through singing. Youknow, there were a lot of different
countries I visited and places that Iwas at temporarily, so I don't tend to
have a hard time grounding into a place.And for some reason, LA was difficult
(03:14):
for me. I've really been fighting notliking it here, and part of that was I'm
learning the New York mindset, when youbring it here and try to fit it in with
LA, it just does not to work. LA islike, we don't want that. We don't got
place for that here. And I get thatthat's it's really unfair to LA to bring
that mindset here. And yet, I was havinga hard time meeting people. I loved the
(03:36):
land like I love the nature, I love thewater, I love the space. There's so much
space here that we didn't have on theEast Coast, right? And still, there was
something inside me that was likenagging, is this my place? Is this where
we're going to be long term? And Icouldn't get a solid Yes. And then the
fires happened, and that to me, I didnot expect to fall in LA during the
(04:01):
fires, and that's actually whathappened. We watched people come
together in communities and support eachother, just like people did during, you
know, Sandy, Hurricane Sandy in NewYork, and other big events in different
cities. And I'm surprised that it tookthat, you know, a big event like that
(04:21):
for me to actually see the city. So Ithink that's probably all on me. It has
nothing to do with LA, if I'm beinghonest and more about my context and the
way I view things, but I I really got tosee a side of people that that people
don't often lead with here, you know,they don't lead with vulnerability. They
don't lead with connection andcommunity, or at least not out loud, in
(04:42):
circles. If you're not a part of thosecircles, it's very it's very community
oriented. If you're in communitycircles, it was really special to see
the whole city open up its heart andembrace just supporting people that were
affected by the fires. And that was itdidn't matter what income class you were
or.
Where you grew up, or what, you know,all the things that people were seeing
(05:03):
in the news that don't live here, peoplewere on the ground and they were
helping. And there's something aboutthat that just had me go, okay, I get
it. These, these can be My people,right? Like I and we tried various ways
to help as well. But there was, therewere certain times where we tried to
help that they had way too manyvolunteers. It would have been nothing
in the way. And so to me, again, thesewere just signals that there's a lot
(05:25):
more here to learn and to embrace.
Robert Kuang (05:28):
Yeah, thank you for sharing that, because not being LA right
now, although I did also recently make across country move. So I think that's
partially why I wanted to ask you aboutthat as well. People have a lot of doom
and gloom about both the fires and alsosometimes just la in general. Anyway,
whether it's the industries or the placeitself, actually somewhat similar to New
(05:51):
York, people talk about a certainjadedness in these big cities that
attract a lot of people, and veryaspirational people at that. So thank
you for sharing some of the communityexperiences rather than maybe, like,
more of, like, the headlines that peopletend to get first. Yeah,
Elena Armijo (06:06):
I just think, you know, at the end of the day, people are people,
and even in a bigger city, they reallyfind their humanity during times of
crisis. Yeah,
Robert Kuang (06:15):
absolutely. I'm curious what's been like a running theme in your
work that you've seen, let's say, maybein the last year, with the last few
months, certainly maybe we can startthere, particularly knowing that you
work with a lot of women, a lot ofpeople in leadership. Generally, when I
speak with coaches, there tends to belike, if the issue comes up with one
person, it tends to come up with a bunchof people around the same time. So
(06:38):
what's been like? The latest in your oneon ones and in your
Elena Armijo (06:42):
work, the latest flavor has been C suite executives that are
going through immense change. So I thinka lot of that has to do with our time
period in our country. We were in anelection year last year, so that hold
over from the change of government intothis year really impacts everyone in the
(07:03):
United States and really the globe, aswe're seeing now. So all of my leaders,
or people that are working on leadershipskills or expansion of how they lead or
who they want to be, in the face of ithas really changed course. And I would
say that it's less about developing askill and more about crisis mode and
(07:27):
resilience. And I really thought that wehad kind of gone through that, you know,
we definitely went through that back in2016 with George Floyd, and then we went
through it again with COVID in 2020 andI thought, man, we've really learned
resilience as leaders. And now I'mfinding this last year, that we're being
called to more. And, you know, there'sall kinds of reasons I think, I believe
(07:48):
that as a coach and a human myself, likemy own personal beliefs, but that's been
the theme for the year. Where can weground in quicker? Where can we bring
heart quicker? Where can we get the teammobilized together? Where community and
trust occur. Trust has been a really bigword in my space for the last year with
all of my clients, because a lot oftrust has been broken along the way. And
(08:10):
so while they're trying to lead thesebig movements or industries or
organizations, they're having to findways to source themselves quicker. And
that really is, I know it's a bit of acontext, but there, there is less time,
less physical hours, for them to do selfcare the way they might have done when
it's not crisis mode. So we're really ina lot of conversations about, what does
(08:32):
it look like to take care of yourselfduring crisis? That seems to be the
theme for the year so far.
Robert Kuang (08:38):
Thank you for being willing to share that, and to be kind of
clear about it, sometimes inconversation, we can spend a lot of time
our goal is to avoid certain things orto minimize certain things, but then the
conversation that we're having now iswe're in it now. You know, there's no
trying to avoid it or minimize it, it'shere. What's next? What's the next
(08:59):
decision? What's the next thing you gotto look at? Yeah, thank you for that
honesty about which
Elena Armijo (09:05):
is different seasons of leadership, right? Because it's not that
these clients haven't worked on otherthings in different years, or different
styles of coaching that they havebrought forward, but it's, I think I use
this analogy on a client call a coupleweeks ago where, you know, I said, if
you're the difference between a doctorwho works maybe in a hospital that is in
(09:25):
one wing that isn't crisis mode, versusa doctor that works in the ER and is
always in triage. What's the differenceof self care that those people need? How
do they train differently? What is theirmindset? What is their level of empathy
for themselves? When I use thatmetaphor, my client got really clear,
like, Oh, this is triage time. Thisisn't actually let me, let me do my
(09:46):
normal mode of operation where I wouldgo slower. Or want this to go
differently. We all want it to godifferently, but we are in triage. So
now what? Right? And that was a reallyuseful conversation for that client.
Robert Kuang (09:58):
For you, what's been like? The biggest. Illusion, or, let's say,
maybe false narrative, even if they weretrue, let's say once upon a time, but
now it's just simply, is not the caseanymore. Have you experienced anything
like that? Like almost a veil? Becausepeople have spoken about having that
experience since the pandemic,basically, of experience of veils being
lifted again and again, and having forus to confront certain things, right? So
(10:24):
I'm wondering if you've had flavors ofthat in your personal development or in
your work of like, oh, this narrativethat I believed in has basically been
dismantled, right?
Elena Armijo (10:35):
Yeah, I'll start with my work first, because I think that's the
clearest one I have access to. Iremember when I gave a presentation at
the acto Conference, which is abeautiful organization for coaches to do
training and community. And I signed upwith a dear colleague of mine, Liz, who
we went in and we trained some coacheson the concept. And this, this was
(10:58):
probably back, I'm trying to think thiswas back in 20, probably 2018 if I'm
guessing, and we brought the idea thatcontext cannot be separated from lived
experience. And at the time, that waskind of radical for the coaching
industry, because the coaching industrywas leaning heavily on context is the
thing to roll with and shift in clients.And there wasn't really any training out
(11:23):
there that honored lived experience sideby side with context. And so I remember
at the time how hard it felt to bringthat conversation forward and experiment
with it, and I didn't know what I wasdoing either. It's not like I had the
answers, right? Like I'm over theretrying to figure out, like, okay,
there's something here, but what is it?And now in 2025 you could not convince
(11:43):
me at all that these can be separated.They are one in the same. They are so
important to our humanity. They are soimportant in the coaching world and how
we address our clients somatically andthrough more diverse conversations. And
they create so much empathy and healingin the coaching container. And, yeah, I
(12:05):
think that's a big, a big shift in 2018I wasn't sure, and now I'm like, Whoa. I
can't even believe that was aconversation back in 2018 so I think
that's one thing that I would say hasdrastically shifted. I think,
personally, I've really been playingwith this conversation in my personal
life, and this is deeply through mypartner. You know, a lot of the work
we're doing in our in our relationship,we've been together nine years, and man,
(12:29):
the span of that nine years looks sodifferent from where we started to where
we are, which I imagine most people say.But one of the things that I have been
really that, like the cloud has beenlifted from my eyes, is a lot of the
ideology around the feminism movementand what it's caused in men and
(12:50):
disconnection in men, and how women arenot actually having a conversation about
who we can be responsible for, thethings that we require and ask of men In
relationships, and I'm speaking from aheteronormative approach, but I imagine
there's a lot of identity crossover thatexists in other relationships as well,
which is, again, a brand new thing I'mexploring, but I'm really curious where
(13:14):
this concept of people, but especiallyour men that we're seeing who have High
suicidal rates and are very lonely anddepressed, especially in the
heterosexual arena, like, what can womenactually be responsible for in that
conversation? And it's tricky, right?Because women are still getting
(13:34):
oppressed as well. We see that in in ourgovernment. We see that in everyday
life. We there's still a lot of thingsthat that women have to account for,
safety and, you know, being being awareof things that are happening to them,
but for the people that have done work,and especially the, I would say, people
now, and both outside of just men andwomen, people that are aware and have
(13:58):
worked on themselves and have grown andhave done conscious work in those
relationships, where can you actuallypush the boundary of being heard and
listened to and held and connected? AndI'm super interested in that, because,
you know my partner, I'm very, verylucky. He's done a lot of work, and he
is a safe place to explore thatconversation. And I realize that's a
(14:18):
privilege, and not everybody has accessto that, but it's been really eye
opening to me to see where women areperpetuating things with each other and
with that then spill out intoconversations. And you know that that
can get even more existential when Ithink about women creating life, and if
they're the people that give life andare the mothers of the earth, you know
(14:39):
what's what's actually going on. It kindof feels like a conversation in 2018
it's like new and cloudy and notdistinguished, but I'm curious about it,
and I wonder if in another 10 years,we'll be having a different
conversation. Yeah,
Robert Kuang (14:51):
I wanted to go back to the work part that you mentioned first,
because they were both so powerful tome, but I always Yeah, so with context
for listeners, it. People talk about itin different ways, but I always think of
it as your frame of reference, or likeyou said, your lived experience, your
internal narratives and your beliefs allshape your context, which influence how
(15:13):
you choose to respond to certain thingsand the choices you make, right? And I
always struggled with that, because Isaw so much power in saying that's just
a context. That's just your context,right? But I always it was very
difficult to not make it feel like apersonal issue when I knew there was no
structural possibility about beautifullysaid, Yes, does that make sense? So I
(15:37):
knew, like, you know, for example, thehospital you work at the company you
work for, there are certain things youhave to be clear about, right? And so
within coaching, we think of infinitepossibilities, but there are times where
I feel like in order to do that shift, Ihad to dis identify from myself, which
was just not possible. But also forpeople who have tried for any reason,
(15:59):
it's a deeply painful experience, right?Extremely painful. Yeah, yeah. It's like
a lifelong failed experiment, or it canleave you feeling that way, yes.
Elena Armijo (16:07):
And I actually think it's why we're, we're, we're losing some
people to coaching, right? Like, meaninglike people don't even want to entertain
coaching is when they don't see the theability to find themselves in a
different story or context that theywant to try on without leaving
themselves behind, then some people arejust out. They're out of the
conversation. And that, to me, is reallysad, because it could go another way.
(16:31):
Yeah,
Robert Kuang (16:31):
absolutely. And I've tried to hold the both and multiple things are
true, has been something of trying tocultivate, but harder to kind of
articulate sometimes, like you'retalking about and then second part about
relationship of people of differentgenders and things like that, obviously,
that's an ongoing conversation. It'ssomething that's deeply impacted me and
(16:53):
my relationships for sure. So I guess myoverall question is, you know, I'm
curious what you've seen, what's changedfor particularly women in leadership
over the years, how women in leadershipsee kind of these issues, gender based
issues, and things like that. And Idon't know if there's been change over
the past few years, or just some thingsthat you feel like is more important now
(17:15):
about that, I think
Elena Armijo (17:16):
there has been change, which is good news. I think if we look
at an older generation, let's say the80s or the 90s, of women that were in
leadership positions, so C suite roles,senior vice presidents, senior managing
directors, like top of theirprofessions, right? Typically, there
weren't many of them. So there weren't,weren't a lot in the room to begin with,
(17:37):
my perception, which, again, can just bemy lens, is that a lot of women from
that era had to be a certain way to getthere. So there was, again, kind of what
we're talking about in the coachingconversation, where there was a
distancing of themselves that had tohappen to take on more traditional
leadership skills that would be valuedto get in the room. So kudos to those
(18:00):
ladies, right? Because without themgoing first, there would be no
opportunity now for what we've seenshift. I really, I really want to
acknowledge that generation. And therewas a bit of an over swing, which is
what all happens in anything we'retrying to change, right? And what ended
up happening is, in those spaces, allall of a sudden, those women had to
(18:20):
experience some of the same issues thatother leaders had in those positions
that they'd never had an opportunity tobe confronted with and with the
overswing. We saw top down leadership.We saw women on women being really hard
on each other. We saw women being moreand more disconnected from their
emotional center and not bringingemotions into the workplace. Because,
(18:44):
again, it was a survival technique. It'show they got there. It was, it was what
was having them win, right? So when theover swing happened, I think we really
saw some of that breakdown of what I'mtalking about, connection emotional
leadership, connection to men or peoplein those spaces that they were working
with. So what I love about where we'reat now is we have women that are in
(19:04):
those spaces that have done a lot ofwork around who they are, what they
believe emotionally, what are theyfeeling? They're not making their
feelings wrong, but they're also notnecessarily just leading with feelings
right, which, again, the oldergeneration was in an either or
conversation about that, yeah, yeah, forsure. And which, you know, I get, it was
(19:28):
really hard. I think,
Robert Kuang (19:29):
you know men too, for sure. It's win or lose, black and white,
yeah, all
Elena Armijo (19:33):
of that, right? And I think where we're at now is we're
starting to see a lot more nuance inspaces like, I think about one of the
teams I work with, man, they're justsuch a cool leadership team. There's
like there's 12 of them on theleadership team. There so much diversity
on this team, with all the identitymarkers you could think of exist on this
team. And what I really love about thatis that there's an opportunity in that.
(20:00):
At room now to have all voices heard,emotion be present, but logic and
reasoning be present as well.Accountability be present. Because this
is another thing that I've been I'vebeen looking at a lot as a woman, is
what does accountability look like forus if we were taught that not having it
was okay and we could get to the topthrough other means. So I'm really
(20:22):
excited about the shift that I see inthose spaces, because they're playing
and through playing, there's innovationand creativity, and there's more
possibility than we've ever had forpeople to feel seen and heard and be
seen and heard, but to experience whatthat creates at a high level, so I don't
know where it's going to take us. Ithink there's a big backlash happening
(20:44):
for that right now. I think people arescared, because what we're my my belief
is, what's happening in our country isit's the last stand of the old power,
right? It's the last resistance to thetraditional way of leading, getting
scared and going, No, we want it to bethe way it always was. And I just, I
(21:05):
think there's so many more people thatknow it can go differently now that it's
just a much, a much richer conversation.I
Robert Kuang (21:13):
love your connection. You're connecting between play and
innovation, because that's such a that'ssuch a cool thing to tap into, if you
can in, you know, coaching, or in clientwork and whatnot, and also just in
yourself. Sometimes I think it's justthe way we've been conditioned. We tend
to think the best solutions tend to havethe most challenge, perhaps, or is the
most challenging for us. But sometimesit's, how can we get the most support,
(21:37):
right? How can we have fun? How can wehave safety and pleasure and even
comfort, which is not really always thepriority inside of like coaching
conversations. If you've tried everypossible possibility that you can
imagine, it may be time to sit down anddrop all of that and play and imagine an
experiment. Or one of my favorites thesedays, is to talk to somebody, talk to
(22:01):
somebody with a different perspective,yeah, yeah,
Elena Armijo (22:05):
yeah. And I really mean that, like, I love that. You said that,
but let's highlight that, talk tosomebody with a different perspective,
and talk to listen, right? And I don'tmean I'm not saying, like, you know, I
would consider myself a moderateliberal. I am not a far left liberal,
probably more moderate in general thananything. And when I talk to my liberal
(22:26):
friends, I'm like, when's the last timeyou sat down with somebody who's a
Republican and actually listened tothem? Right? I think that's and it goes
for both sides of the street. Sincewe're kind of in a binary country, even
though the independent party is reallytrying to have a voice in the middle,
that, to me, is what we've lost inunity, is listening and being able to
come to the table and respect the otherside while keeping our beliefs and
(22:49):
creating a solution for all. When I,when I talk about deib Right now, I've
been, you know, my roots have been indei be work for a while now, especially
in the coaching world. And I have alwayssaid all means, all that means all. That
means every single person, whether youlike them or not, whether you think that
they are evil or light. All means all soif, if we really believe that, who are
(23:13):
we going to be about it from that, thatstandpoint, and sometimes people just
get so afraid that they forget that theyforget that they want to they can expand
and have a different conversation. Whatdo
Robert Kuang (23:23):
you think? And this is one where I was like, There's no right
answer, totally. But what do you thinkis the best way to move forward when
there is a lack of agreement?
Elena Armijo (23:32):
I think that we are about to see the biggest revolution of what
happens when people can put down theirarmor and get to humanity again. I don't
know, you know, I don't know what it'sgonna look like. I think it might be
really hard before it's really good, butI do believe it will be really good. I
think we're gonna have to go through alot, and a lot of pain is going to
(23:53):
emerge before people can actually bringforward the most authentic version of
their voice to be a collective. So Iactually think that's the solution. Is,
what would it take to be a collectiveinstead of what group wins, what group
doesn't? How we make it fair foreverybody? I think fair is a good
(24:13):
conversation, but the but the higherlevel conversation is, how do we all
live together and be a community? Sothere's been community that's been lost.
I don't have a specific way that goes. Ithink it can be created from many
different ways. If that's thecommitment, yeah, but I don't hear that
being the commitment. In our country,there's lots of other commitments
floating around, but a commitment tounity and cult cultural community seems
(24:38):
to be missing right now. So that wouldbe where I point everybody is, what? If
that was the highest commitment, thenwhat? Yeah,
Robert Kuang (24:46):
when you say, be vulnerable with each other, I also hear
maybe dropping the ego a little bit.There have been often this happens all
the time that comes up in coaching,which is, we get caught up in
situations, arguments or discourse. Isthat is more built on ego than actually,
you know, anyone having a positiveoutcome out of it. You know, it's not
(25:07):
even about sometimes more willing tofollow the ego and just ignore the pain
that is causing us and everyone aroundus. Yeah. So definitely very much
aligned with you about what doesinclusivity look like? What does unity
and safety look like? What does a strongnation look like? We're having to have
some very tough conversations aroundthat everyone is complicit in some ways.
(25:31):
So So in thinking about, you know,disagreements and agreements that just
come up as a part of life, I'm curiousfor you, what are some important points
in your life where you were maybe facedwith a no or had to say no. How do you
know when to say yes or no? Thinkingback to those moments of No, I
Elena Armijo (25:50):
think it always comes back to my values, which can be tricky,
right? Because you can convince yourselfyour value is anything in the world like
your values are, you know, integrity andlove and those are my values, but when
they're used as a weapon, that's whereit gets a bit sticky, right? So when
I've had to say no to something,honestly, it's the collective mindset
(26:10):
I'm thinking recently of something withmy company, where, where I was thinking
about moving it forward into somethingelse. Or I should say, it's not my
company. It's actually the collectivecompany, the TCC, we recently have
expanded, and now we all, we are allowners or the partners that have chosen
in our owners and are becoming a truecollective, which is what it was born to
(26:31):
do. It was always meant to be that way.And the thing I noticed is that when
there was a disagreement in the spaceabout who we are, what we're going to
be. The place that had me say no andkeep moving was when there was a
detriment to more people, to the entirecollective. So again, if the commitment
is the collective right, then it washolding that commitment through some
(26:55):
really tough conversations. And that'snot easy, because there's pain, and
people get hurt. And as a leader, youknow, did some wonky stuff around like
armoring up and being defensive myself.And I learned a lot that that I still
really trusted the vision and and I'mstill trusting that. I don't know we'll
see where we end up, right? But that's,that's the path I chose. And what I
(27:19):
notice is, as long as I can rememberthat my way is not the right way, but
it's a way that I choose, then more canarise. But if I'm choosing it because my
way is the right way, or I need you toagree with my way, to change your mind
(27:40):
or your opinion, or your livedexperience, that's my telltale sign that
my ego is involved. And this is notactually a conversation that's useful
for the commitment. Yeah, so I thinkI've been that's kind of been my check
in with myself. And then, I mean, mostrecently, you know, I have ADHD and I
(28:02):
didn't know that. Yeah, I Well, Ididn't. I'm 44 and I didn't know it till
I was like 40 I just, I'm learning aboutit too. And and one of the things that I
know about my ADHD is that if I don'tactually take care of myself, which
sometimes looks like slowing my braindown. Sometimes it looks like letting my
brain run right like going out for awalk and listening to a podcast and
(28:26):
listening to the birds and talking to mydogs and doing all the things at once
like that. Sometimes that can be reallyfueling for me, and sometimes meditation
and slowing down, which I hatemeditation, I got to just be honest,
like I do it and I and I commit to it 60minutes a day right now for the last
like seven weeks, and man, it's astruggle to get on that map. For me, I'm
(28:47):
not one of these people that loves itand enjoys it and can sit there when I'm
in it. I I understand the benefit for mysoul and the connection with spirit, and
when I miss it, I can tell that I'vemissed it because I'm not clear of
focus, but I don't love it, so evensomething like that, right as an example
of where am I willing to choose fromcommitment, instead of enrolling myself
(29:11):
to love everything about what I see orwhat I believe? Yeah,
Robert Kuang (29:15):
interesting. That's very like neutral, detached of you, almost
like I don't have to love it, but I'mcommitted to it, and I know why I'm
doing it. Basically, yeah, I'm clear.Yeah. There's almost like, you know, not
to get too woo, woo. But there wasalmost like, then your emotions can be
whatever it needs to be. You're alreadyclear, right?
Elena Armijo (29:33):
Yeah, which was a big deal for me, because there's parts of myself
that I don't love that I've been tryingto change for my whole life, instead of
just letting them exist and be okay,right? Sure, yeah, we also that's part
of a practice of that is, Can I, can itjust be okay that I don't love it,
Robert Kuang (29:49):
right? Sometimes that's very freeing. Yeah, I
Elena Armijo (29:52):
felt so it certainly gave me the the innovation that I needed to
take it on, because before. In my life,I needed to love it, to do it. And that
was just like a losing game. I was nevergoing to get on the mat from that place.
Robert Kuang (30:07):
That's so true, because, you know, it's almost like, what am I
doing this for? What do I get out of it,which is such a transactional way of us
thinking about our daily lives and whatwe choose to do, right? But also, like
an hour, holy cow, I know. I don't know.For someone who's like, I'm in deep
struggle. I was like, two hours a day,babe, I don't know. Maybe you're not
Elena Armijo (30:30):
that's true. Somebody was like, You need to be on the map for
three hours. I would be absolutely not.So
Robert Kuang (30:41):
absolutely, yeah. And is it just curious? Is it like, seated, or
are you someone who's like, you know,like a walking meditation? Is
meditation?
Elena Armijo (30:48):
Oh, yeah, no, seated. It has to be seated and focused, because
otherwise my brain will focus on otherthings, right, walking around. So, so
for me, it's seated, yeah,
Robert Kuang (30:57):
but it's also so true, you know, my partner has ADHD, and, you
know, sometimes it's like, what are thekids say? Bed, bed, rot, whatever. Brain
rot. Oh, yeah. They're like, I need to,like, I don't want to, like, engage with
something intellectual right now.Please, let me give me my bubble. And
then other times, their way of restingis like, I'm gonna knit like, three hats
(31:18):
this weekend. And it is genuinelyrelaxing. Yeah, you know what? I mean.
It's just like thing and and it's justallowing noticing your rhythm and
actually being okay with it in someways, like I've noticed
Elena Armijo (31:31):
that's beautifully said, because I really feel like it's not only
being with your rhythm, it's allowingyour rhythm to be great, like, I'll, I
won't say crazy, it's not crazy, butdifferent. Yeah, right. Like I craved
for it to be consistent for so long,because then it meant I I could control
it, and I knew who I was and I wasconsistent for other people. And only
(31:51):
recently have I been like, this is notgoing to be consistent, and that can be
okay, and as long as I honor whatevershows up in the moment, you know, in
alignment with my values and not, youknow, being a crappy person in the
world, that that's more loving to methan trying to make myself a certain way
to to adhere to, like the norm, thecenter norm. I'm
Robert Kuang (32:11):
curious because you are. You're a vocalist. You're an opera
singer. Yeah, even the way you speak, Ican hear it when I was editing our last
podcast conversation. Oh yeah, you hadthe most even breathing of my life, and
it was audible. That's literally justthe waves. I was like, Oh my gosh, this
person has practiced breathing, evenbreathing for a long time. Yeah. Like,
(32:34):
you were just so good with that. And inany case, you know, I think right now,
I've noticed, particularly for, let'ssay younger folks, but lots of people,
you know, there's a fear of speakingout. There's already a fear about
censorship, let's say that's been comingup more and more, yeah. But then
traditionally, historically, speakingout, public speaking has always been,
like a pretty nervy thing for mostpeople, right? And so I wanted to ask
(32:59):
you, just like, I suppose, tips andtricks or just like your perspective
around how can people get comfortablewith speaking up? You know, the thing
is, even when they don't want to,because another consequence of not
speaking up is just completedisengagement. If no one speaks up in a
group session, nothing happens exactly.
Elena Armijo (33:17):
Well, the tips and tricks are nervous system regulations. So when
I used to get on stage, I used tosqueeze my hands and dig my nails into
my hands, because it reminded me that Iwas alive, or that I could feel my hands
and that I was there before I took astep on stage. Same thing when I was
actually on the stage, speaking orsinging, I would feel my feet. It was
(33:40):
constant, like sending breath to myfeet, and all of that was just resetting
my nervous system to be able to groundit into the ground physically wherever I
was. Because when I get nervous, I tendto lift out of my body and come from
just my head and disconnect from mybody. So I think the first step is
noticing, what does your body actuallydo when you're afraid? Because
(34:01):
everybody's body is different, and youmight need different things. But if
you're disconnecting just some ways toactually ground your body again, if
you're feeling too heavy in your body,then we need to do the opposite. We need
to actually, like, send the beam oflight up through your head, right to the
to the universe, or different differentmodalities that have you lift your body
(34:21):
out of the ground instead of sinkinginto the ground. So I think the tips and
tricks are different based on whatyou're doing. I think Breath, breath, to
me, is the most magical thing we have onthis earth, outside of herbs for
medicine or Western medicine or food,any of that can support us in our
nervous system. But breath is the onething you have that you have instantly
(34:44):
attainable to you while you're living,and breath cleans out so much, it cleans
your blood, your blood, literally inyour body, the blood oxygen cleans
itself out when you're breathing. Andmost of us don't know this, but you tend
to walk around using only 20% of yourbreath. Capacity as a human so it's only
people like singers or athletes orpeople that are needing more breath to
(35:08):
create something that understand or getthe awareness that there's so much more
breath available to us than we know,because you don't actually need a lot of
breath to live walking around every dayin life. So I would say to people that
are nervous around speaking out, explorehow much breath you actually have to
ground your body or to expand yourlungs, or to do square breathing or
(35:32):
tactical breathing from the military toreset your nervous system. Because
breath is key in any sort ofvocalization. It's actually the thing
that makes your vocal cords work. It'snot your vocal cords, right? It's the
breath that's going through your vocalcords that makes them ring and sing and
speak. So So breath is really magical,and I don't think it's enough credit.
(35:56):
You know, in the world, I
Robert Kuang (35:58):
think I've had about the same amount of conversations with
vocalists, as I do with like, likeBuddhist or meditation teacher about
breathing because they're both they'reboth super vital, because there's
something about the musculature of likewe're in our body, but I think there's,
like, an intangible spirit as it'sattached to our voice, and what we think
and feel is such an important part of usto to nurture. And yet, I see, you know,
(36:25):
you know, my partner is teaching inuniversity now, and there's just a lot
of disengagement as a result of justpeople not using their voice. I think
opera and singing is one breakthrough.And I've also heard, you know, for
collaboration, learning how tocollaborate and have those skills do
some chamber music. So again, the artsand humanities for me, you know, find
(36:46):
the breakthrough chair. Yeah? Well,yeah, I
Elena Armijo (36:48):
wanted to answer the second part of your question, because I
think it's really an important which isthe speaking out, right? Yeah, when
we're afraid. So the the way that I havebeen thinking about this question is
that it's exactly what you said. Notspeaking out costs you your dignity and
your soul in the long run, right? Ifyou're swallowing something or you're
(37:08):
you're staying small to stay safe. Onone hand, there is a physical safety
aspect of not dying, like speaking outand not dying. So I think you got to
choose who you're going to be in thisworld, and what that will cost your soul
when you are taking your last breath inlife. And that's a tall order. It's a
large ask, and it's a privilege to askfor some you know, for those of us that
(37:33):
that have the ability to even do that, Iwas recently on a call with my coach. I
think this was like, in January, rightafter the elections, and I was like,
spinning out. I was like, this is goingto get bad, and people are going to get
deported, and people are going to getput in prison and disappear, and people
are going to like, like, it's just goingto it's going to get really, really bad,
which is my way of processing, the waythat my my brain, not my body, likes to
(38:00):
work is to think of the worst scenarioso I can be prepared. That's my version
of safety, right? It's not necessarilyhealthy, but that's that's what I do
when I'm afraid. What I had in myconversation with her was, okay, let's
play the worst scenario out. My businessis taken from me. I'm imprisoned. All my
rights are taken away. I'm living as aservant to this to the government, like,
(38:22):
let's just play that scene out for asecond while. I don't wish that for
anybody. You know. The question that sheasked me, which I think was really
brilliant to work with me in my fear,was, Well, who else would be in that
room? And when I thought about who elsewould be in that room beside me, like
all of the people in history who havebeen imprisoned or locked up or murdered
(38:44):
or their lives taken away for what theybelieve. I was like, oh, that's actually
the company that I would want to be atcompany with. Like, I'd want to be
sitting in a jail cell with thosepeople. And if, you know, if, if that
leads to death, you know, can that be aso be it conversation from commitment
and courage, and again, I I strugglewith this conversation publicly, because
(39:06):
it's a bit of a martyrdom complex aswell, and I can easily dip into
martyrdom. I don't think that's what I'mtrying to say, but, but it certainly
helped me ground in my commitment and myvalues to go, Okay, I'm clear. I'm clear
where I sit, yeah, without the fight andthe rage, and it doesn't mean that I
would fight and hurt other people, but Icertainly won't silence my voice.
Robert Kuang (39:27):
No, absolutely not. It's so interesting. I've never heard someone
talk about envision who else might be inthat scenario with you, even if it's a
crisis scenario, it's just another wayto get outside of yourself, and you're
also like your bubble of fear for aminute already about imagining something
in the future, perhaps right, and toground yourself and like what the
(39:48):
reality would be. The reality is, ifyou're going through a crisis, there are
many, many people who are experiencingthe same thing, and therefore you are
not alone. Things can happen out ofthat. So thank you for sharing that. I
have a, I guess, not easy, another onethat I know people sometimes like to
dodge or but these, you know,conversations around money and finance
(40:10):
and material resources, like, it's a,it's pretty important for coaches to
navigate that with, you know, in ourwork, I'm curious lately, because it's,
it always happens around times ofuncertainty. What conversations look
like right now for people around moneyand finances and just overall, kind of
(40:30):
just curious about your perspectivearound that right now? Yeah,
Elena Armijo (40:34):
I'll speak from the lens of being a coach rather than my clients,
because I think clients, depending ontheir industry and where they are, they
might be in different conversationsaround that, but in general, as a coach,
the way that I've approached money, andI think has been a really successful way
to approach it, is that the work works,and if I trust my work, then everything
(40:55):
else will fall in line. So it is a bigtrust piece with me, in my in the
building, in my business. And I launchedmy business in 2015 so this is actually
my 20, my 10 year anniversary. That'sright, as a coach. And so when I
launched, I just, I just did the work. Itook as many calls as I could, I coached
(41:15):
as often as I could. I remember charging$5 for a cup of coffee when I first
started coaching versus where I am now.I'm at the top of the market as what
coaches make. I would say I'm definitelyin the top, like 3% of what coaches make
in the world. What I notice is that weare in a business that no matter what's
happening in the world, coaches areneeded. So there is some privilege in
(41:38):
that, right. Not all jobs are like that.And I really believe that no matter if
times are good or times are bad or timesare in between, coaching is a good
industry to be in if you can reallytrust the work works. So that's that's
number one. Number two is diversify. Imeet a lot of coaches who want to go
down a road with one niche, and while Icompletely respect and honor that that
(42:03):
might be who you love to work with metoo. I have my my lane that I love to
operate in, I'm always looking todiversify my business, because I believe
just in any business diversification,just like I believe in communities and
collective and different voices androoms makes it a much more stable and
(42:25):
innovative and creative practice inbusiness. So what that looks like for me
is looking at ways I can partner withpeople that are other coaches in the
world. It looks like all different typesof clients I don't I still have sliding
scale slots for people that I love towork with and can't necessarily afford
me. I love working with innovators andcreative people. I love working in
(42:48):
industries I don't necessarily agreewith, right? Like that's another way to
diversify my portfolio. As a coach and Ilove I've just started recently to get
interested in boards and investing inbusinesses I believe in. So I think you
got to think multi dimensionally when itcomes to the energetics of money.
(43:10):
Because if it's just transactional, likewe were talking about everything else
today, it's a it's a very limited gamethat you're playing with the energy of
money. And I've always believed that. Ithink I've been pretty lucky, because my
father instilled some good money habitsfrom when I was young, and then through
my own growth, I've been able to expandwhat money means to me and what the
(43:32):
energetics of it are, and I've beenallowed to play with it from that lens.
So not everybody has that opportunity,but you you can look at how you're
holding money and the diversification ofwhat you do have, whether it's $5 or
more, and see what you can create withit.
Robert Kuang (43:52):
I think it's such an important conversation inside of
coaching, conversations about like, theway you spend money, the way you make
money and the way you save money, theseare all such important ways to look at
yourself and the way you're being and asmuch as there are, you know, like we
mentioned earlier, there are realitiesand structural things in place. But I do
(44:14):
try to remind people that prices anddollar values are man made. They always
have been. And the other thing is, youknow, like a positive profit margin can
look like many different numbers, and itcan still be a positive outcome compared
to the way it was before. So you don'tnecessarily, it's not necessarily a
(44:36):
failure to say you didn't hit anexorbitant profit margin, right? But,
but also, there's a lot ofintentionality behind why it may be
meaningful to aim for a positive goallike that, even if it's in terms of
materials. Because then you get to I donotice, you know, even if people are
saying like, ah, you know, it doesn'tdefine who I am when they find big
(44:59):
financial success. Yes, I do notice theway they choose to use money is quite
different, and I think that's also veryimportant, and that can alter the
future, you know? So one of the thingsthat you mentioned, that you mentioned
just now, is about like, who you workwith, and finding the right
collaborators and things like that. Soyou have a long running, ongoing podcast
(45:20):
where you spoken with a lot of creativeminds, including yours truly, and also
you run. You are part of this collectiveright, where you do, like group
engagements and things like that. So I'mjust curious, what have been some of
your maybe favorite guests or podcastmoments that were like light bulb
(45:40):
moments for you, I know sometimes I havethose, but also just some of your
favorite collaborators.
Elena Armijo (45:47):
Oh my gosh, that's such a big question. I love all my podcast
guests because they all teach mesomething. So I will start there. Like,
I don't have a favorite that would bereally hard to pick, because I think the
people that I invite on the show arereally innovative, disruptive,
courageous. That's why they're on theshow, right? Because of who they are. So
(46:10):
I learn every time I do it, it's why Ikeep doing it. Like I I'm pretty sure,
like, maybe I have, like, maybe 100people that listen to my podcast. So
it's not like, you know, a ton of peoplethat are listening all the time, but I
love doing it. I love the conversations,and I I always learn something. So I
hope that, I hope whoever's listeninggets something for themselves when they
(46:31):
listen. It's a, it's a service basedthing for me. So that's why I do it. And
then the collaborators that I love, man,I just, I love coaches that are, that
are good coaches. You know, I'msurrounded by some of the best coaches
in the industry, and I am so gratefulfor that. I think of everybody who's a
part of the collective who said yes tothis crazy idea that we still don't have
(46:54):
any idea if it's gonna work. You know,we're still, we're still experimenting
away and trying to build a brand and abusiness. And they just are so willing
to say yes and play and create. And,man, I feel so lucky. I really do that.
I get to be surrounded by these people.And I mean, I could list all of their
(47:16):
names. There's not a single one of themthat I don't treasure and love and adore
and respect, and it's just so much fun.That's the thing I really want to say,
is, even if the business itself doesn'tgenerate something that's, you know, a
ten million company in the future, thekey is the people. And as a coach,
(47:38):
collaboration has me not being out therealone, which I think is is awful in any
profession, and it's what entrepreneursand solopreneurs deal with a lot. Yeah.
So it was such a gift to be able tocreate a community where we could just
be together and be a brain trust calleach other up and say, like, Hey, I'm
struggling with this client, or hey, Igot this really cool contract, and I'm
(48:00):
thinking so and so and so might be greaton it. And what do you think that part
is fun? And I think that that that we ascoaches need more of that, and they're
everybody's too busy to create it,right? So it's, like, always a dream,
and nobody does it and and I'm glad thatTCC exists for that reason.
Robert Kuang (48:17):
Yeah, yeah, everyone talks about it, but sometimes, who's gonna go
through the discomfort of like, growingit, right? Yeah,
Elena Armijo (48:24):
right. It takes a lot of energy, and I'm just grateful that
people were willing,
Robert Kuang (48:29):
yeah, yeah, absolutely. And knowing quite a few people in that
group crew, certainly people shouldcheck out your space as much as
possible. So thank you so much for yourtime today, and I certainly just took up
every minute. No, I love it, just likeso fun asking you with these kind of
somewhat serious questions I'm certainlygonna put where people can find you in
(48:49):
the episode description, but realquickly, while we're here, where can
people find you specifically, and alsomaybe the collective as well.
Elena Armijo (48:56):
Yeah, you can find both myself and the collective on LinkedIn,
also our websites. Elena army ho calm ismy personal website, and then the c dash
suite collective.com is the collectivewebsite. And I mean, we're around, you
can find us anywhere. Just, yeah, justgo look for us, and we'll reach back out
for
Robert Kuang (49:13):
sure. Thank you so much for your time today, Elena, it's always
a pleasure to dive in. Thank you.
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