Building Resilience During Times of Growth, Uncertainty, and Change

Too many of us wait until crisis is upon us before we realize the importance of a change in behavior, thought pattern, or environment. What if we worked our minds ten minutes every day to build the mental resilience and strength we need to thrive no matter what external circumstances happen around us? Elite Performance Expert, Deborah Dubree, shares her "7 C's" framework for solo-prenuers and top performers to claim the life they know they're capable of.

Some of this weeks episode highlights are:

12:43 Here's something and this is what I will do even with my NFL players or with corporate people. I use what I call, e-magination. It's imagining with emotion. It's knowing that the mind doesn't know the difference between real or imagined.

30:32 Now, most people when they come to me and I don't care who they are, what position they have, they want more competence. I want more competence to do X, you know, so they might be competent in 95% of what they're doing. And that 5% it's like, I want, I want, I need more confidence in this area. And I go, no, you don't. They go, what do you mean? I said, competence is an end result. What you're looking for is courage.

46:29 We have to train our brain and our emotional system every single day.

--- Full Raw Transcription Below ---

Deborah Dubree (00:00):

The reality is we want growth as individuals. It's a matter of does fear have a greater hold on us than the desire to grow.

Introduction (00:13):

Welcome to the SideHustle Lounge. If you're looking for flexible ways to earn income, grow your mindset, and live the lifestyle you've always dreamed of, you are in the right place. So lower the lights. Grab your favorite beverage and join your host founder of NotaryCoach.com and Amazon bestselling author of Sign and Thrive: How To Make Six Figures As A Mobile Notary And Loan Signing Agent, Bill Soroka.

Bill Soroka (00:47):

Cheers and welcome to my guest today, Deborah Dubree, an elite performance expert and strategist plus the author of 'Average Is An Addiction: From Mediocre To Millions'. Debra, thank you so much for being here.

Deborah Dubree (01:01):

Oh, it's my pleasure. Thank you for having me.

Bill Soroka (01:04):

I've been looking forward to our conversation. Today guys, what we're talking about is finding resilience or building resilience during times of growth, uncertainty and change, which it feels like all the time Debra.

Deborah Dubree (01:17):

It is nowadays, especially. I mean, it was before, but after you know, 2020 and people refocusing what's a priority for them and being able to not be, excuse the expression, but like gun shy, anytime somebody coughs or sneezes or, you know, look sideways. Resiliency is definitely needed to get through it and needed even now after we're hopefully, fingers crossed, coming out of it.

Bill Soroka (01:47):

Yeah, definitely. Now, right now, people see you as an elite performance coach, as a successful business person that sold a $20 million construction company. You're a published author, but where did you get started?

Deborah Dubree (02:02):

Well, and I will make one correction. I'm not a coach. Coaching is one of the skills that I use. I'm an elite performance expert and strategist. So many of the skills that I use are unique and are based on the sciences coaching, just as one of my skills. I got started years ago, back in Illinois, actually a small town outside of Chicago, 8,800 people. Your Stateville prison, which is even as a girl scout, we took field trips, believe it or not to Stateville prison. Interestingly….

Bill Soroka (02:32):

Where to avoid, yeah.

Deborah Dubree (02:34):

It did stick in my memory obviously. But I started out, I mean, in a year and a half, I graduated high school cosmetology school, took my state boards got my license, went to Chicago to take my state boards, got my license, got my first W2 job, got married and had my first child. And that was all in within 18 months. And it all completed one month before I turned 19. So I knew everything. I was just so damned smart. Incredible, right up until the point I went into labor and then it was like, I could use a little help here. But from there moved out to Arizona in 1979. My husband, I had two children at the time where we had two children at the time. And my entire goal was to once my family was settled and I wanted to get my, my daughter who's six years older than my son.

Deborah Dubree (03:25):

She was settled in school and my husband was working. My son, I was looking for a real good preschool that was more than cut and paste. And my entire goal was to get out of the house, not talk baby talk and make enough money to put my youngest into that really good preschool, and ended up with a job as a receptionist at a property management development company. I thought receptionists was the position that I was supposed to have because I am a small town girl, high school diploma, you know, where else would I fit in my mind? Six months later I was bored to tears, had totally rearranged everything in the front office. I started taking phone calls I wasn't supposed to take, but I knew I could handle it. So I took them anyway and really looked at what, what else, what else was possible for me?

Deborah Dubree (04:17):

And we had an opening and our sister company, which was the construction company that was directly across the hall from where I was seated and I answered their phones as well. And the position was for construction accountant. I wanted the job, I wanted the money we could use the money. One of the big things was I wanted a business card because everybody who came into my office handed me a business card and I felt I want to be important enough to have a business card. And I ended up at the weekend right before, it was on a Sunday before Monday was the cutoff for the resumes. I had seen the resumes come in from various people; CPAs, bookkeepers, people in the industry for years and years and years. And here I was with two things going against me.

Deborah Dubree (05:09):

One I knew nothing about construction, and two, I had never taken an accounting class in my life. And this was for a construction, accounting position.

Bill Soroka (05:17):

Big challenges.

Deborah Dubree (05:20):

Yeah, just a tad, just a tad. But Hey, you know, you got to build someplace. So I ended up on that Sunday and I wrote about it in my second book, the Averages Is An Addiction book. I'm sitting on the living room floor in our apartment, trying to write out why would they choose me over all these other resumes I'd seen? Cause again, I opened all the mail; couldn't come up with anything, ended up tearing pieces off of like a yellow, legal tablet where I started to write something, you know, tore it off, folded it, or balled it up, threw it across the floor. Did that multiple times until I finally got up, went into the kitchen to splash some water on my face, tears rolling down my face, just I wanted it so bad and I just couldn't see a way.

Deborah Dubree (06:03):

And then all of a sudden with some more energy running through my body, it was like, well, why not me? You know, I call it now getting my Chicago on. And it was, you know, why not me? And I went back and I wrote what I now teach others. One of the things I teach others is my self identity the statement, not based on, not based on any of the tests and disc and Myers-Briggs and all the other tests, which are good, but I haven't found a whole lot of benefit in many of them because to me, depending on who's using them, they can be great. And for other things, it's just a way of confirming, yeah well, that's why I'm not any good at that. Which to me, I don't believe in that. So mine was similar to, you know, I'm tenacious, I'm gutsy, I'm street smart.

Deborah Dubree (06:48):

I asked a lot of really good questions and I expect answers and I will do whatever it takes within my value system to get what I want. And I went in the next morning and when I'm out speaking, I tell people that I walked in and handed my application to the construction manager who was also one of the partners over the entire corporation, handed it to them and said, here you need to hire me. Now what I really did is I waited till he was out of the office, snuck over to his office, hid my resume within the pile of mail that I was taking over there, went back to my desk, shaking my heart, just beating like crazy. Cause I just didn't know what was going to come of it. And fortunately I was called in for an interview, lied through my teeth whenever he asked at one point, it was like a three page job description.

Deborah Dubree (07:41):

And I was looking through it as he was showing it to me. And at one point he said, do you have any problem? You know, being able to do any of these tasks and responsibility. And I said, absolutely not. And I went home and told my husband this time. I said, I don't even know what some of those words mean. But they said they would train somebody. I know if they hire me I'll learn and God knows for whatever reason they did hire me. And that started my 25 year career in construction of going from answering phones as a receptionist to owning and running a $20 million corporation that [inaudible] different corporation.

Bill Soroka (08:20):

Yeah. Yeah. Amazing. And I love that. Just having the, a little bit of gumption and courage to step towards what you really want.

Deborah Dubree (08:27):

Right. And it was shortly after that, that I started studying all the quantum physics, neuroscience, brain research, NLP, hypnosis, body language, conscious language, behavioral psychology, sports psychology, you name it. I mean, I can talk angels and spirit guides or I could talk synapsis and you know, the heart-brain emotional system connection and how it affects us physiologically. So…..

Bill Soroka (08:53):

Then you did that in the beginning as more of a hobby than as a career trajectory or did you know you were going to end up here?

Deborah Dubree (09:02):

No. That's a great question that has to do with when, I was, it's like the, the whole, the real origin story. When I was 12 years old, five days before Christmas, my brother was killed in a car accident. He was 16. I was 12. And what I have since learned is what hit me at that time. I was at home making Christmas cookies with my girlfriends, singing songs and lights and Christmas lights, course, Chicago, lots of snow on the ground and things like that. My parents were at a party at the local restaurant for my mom's work. And my brother was over at the church for a youth event. And when my parents came home with the minister, because again, small town and they came in and when my dad said something similar to Stevie's dead, he lost control of the car and was killed.

Deborah Dubree (09:55):

And he held me. I was in his arms, my mom was behind him holding us. And it was that flash of lightning that I call lightning bolt moments where, you know, the energy comes together and it gathers everything around it and holds it really tight. It's like PTSD. It's not like it is PTSD. So what became of that was, oh God, even like 12, 13 years later, I couldn't say his name without going into tears. I could not smell Aquanet, hairspray without going into tears. And because of all that, when I finally, after we moved out here and I was like, this is a bunch of crap. I need to figure out what's going on here. Cause I cannot continue to live like this. And that's when I started studying all the different scientists, you know, sciences as well as the spiritual side and seeing how the two actually crossed over and how science was proving out spirituality, which if you're spiritual, you don't need it to, but it's kind of cool that it is. So, yeah. And that was what started me down that path.

Bill Soroka (11:05):

So this was part of your healing process. When, how long did it take to get there, find the release?

Deborah Dubree (11:13):

How long is it taking?

Bill Soroka (11:14):

Is it the better question? Yeah.

Deborah Dubree (11:17):

Well it's the reality is now obviously I can say, you know, Steve, my brother's name and I can talk about it without going into tears and all that type of thing. Does it crop up every once in a while maybe I hear a commercial or something happens and I just, you know, for a moment and I catch it, I can release it and I can go on. So it's, it's starting an understanding of catching it faster and shifting it quicker by having the tools and the technology that I know simply by studying. And I find this true with any of my clients and I only work with high achievers that by studying and beginning to understand the like the brain body feedback loop and the way that we as human beings communicate and hold onto memories, both. I was able to move that energy fairly quickly. And once I got started holy man that sort of opened up the doors to all the different things I was studying, because it was just super interesting at that point and to say, well, if I can do that, what else can I do? You know? And then it became you know, took all that knowledge and built some of my own techniques that are based on the sciences that are out there.

Bill Soroka (12:34):

What would you say, because you just said something really interesting that I want to dig deeper in. What would you say is the most compelling evidence of science proving spirituality?

Deborah Dubree (12:43):

Oh Lord. There's so much out there. Well, partly energetically. Okay. So here's something and this is what I will do even with my NFL players or with corporate people and that is, I use what I call, e-magination. It's imagining with emotion. So it's knowing that the mind doesn't know the difference between real or imagined. So as I can take someone, I've had a player who was injured, an NFL player, he was an offensive lineman. And during preseason, he tore his tricep 80%. Now, for those of you who don't know football this is a gentleman that had to punch another gentleman. They call it punch when like, you know, they hit them towards the chest and they'll move them out of the way. So they can't come through to the quarterback. So the other team can't get through to the quarterback.

Deborah Dubree (13:38):

So this is like a 300 pound man hitting another 300 pound man. Both of them coming at each other like locomotives. Anyway, he tore his tricep 80%. The doctors, the surgeon said he'd never play again, partly because an 80% tear, partly because of the position he played. Any other player around him said the same thing, anybody else in the NFL. He happened to have just signed on with me like a month or so earlier. And when I talked to him on the phone and all my work with him as with all my clients is done either over the phone or Skype. And I said, well, what do you say? And he said, well, I want to play again. And I said, I am getting to the answer, I told him, I said, we have two choices. One, we hang up the phone, I'll say my prayers for you send you good healing energy, and we're done.

Deborah Dubree (14:23):

You don't owe me anything more. I said, or we can work together and let's see what we can do to get you back in the league. And he said, let's go. So fairly quickly, like within a week after surgery I started working with him again, completely over the phone and knowing and understanding the science of here we go back to the real answer, the, the brain not knowing the difference real or imagined I would have him close his eyes. Imagine his arm already healed to actually physically, to actually see internally what, you know, like the x-rays would show the tear and all that, that he could imagine his body mending itself. If you wanted to put color around him, I give people an option they do or don't have to put color around it. Certainly seeing energy, moving energy could have been moving up and down, swirling around it's, whatever their imagination wants them to do.

Deborah Dubree (15:23):

But I also did mere therapy. So that was a way of using the mind and the real versus imagined in order for him, his body to d-stress because the body doesn't heal when it's stressed, we can't think straight when we're in stress. And also, for him to be internally letting his body know it's time to heal, you know, let's get this and then worked with them all through rehab. First, visually is to what weights he was picking up and what it was like to pick them up and move them never telling him what weights to pick up, but again, a whole nother type of technique to have him work. We ended up cutting what he figures is about two months off of what was a normal rehab period. And he got picked up, was back in the league playing. So that's using the imagination and the way our mind, it's a mental, emotional, physiological aspect. People talk about mental, I dunno where to, mental toughness and I go, yeah, it's a third of the equation. Thanks for trying, but it's only a third of the equation. It's the mental, emotional physiological, and you have to work all three together to get real change.

Bill Soroka (16:37):

That's powerful.

Deborah Dubree (16:39):

So the science was he healed faster and was stronger than ever before which could be tested by what he was doing, how soon he was doing it and those types of things. Certainly x-rays and those types of things, which showed the healing quicker. And then the spiritual aspect was using the spirit of who we are to heal ourselves.

Bill Soroka (16:59):

Yeah. This is a, I don't even know, I guess it's still considered an emerging field, but there has been so much evidence of, of this type of what is there a, is this a, an emerging field? What, what would you call this?

Deborah Dubree (17:17):

Well, science in itself is, I mean, there's all sorts of, you look at the nano bodies you look at, I mean, everything, you know, what we thought we knew? Here's an example: If we look at just the brain alone, we used to think, you know, two hemispheres, one side was the emotional side and the memory side, the other side was the conscious side, the doing-ness the busy-ness, which is kind of maybe almost still true, but there's really four aspects of the brain. And those four aspects have emotion in all four of those aspects. Is one stronger than the other, towards the emotional and when stronger to the conscious yes, but there are four aspects and it's knowing and understanding that as well. So that's relatively new science. When they discovered neuroplasticity, which has been around for a long time, you know, that was new science. So science is always new.

Bill Soroka (18:15):

It is it's the, and I love the brain in particular. It's like the new frontier, lots of focus on space, lots of focus underneath the water, but inside our brains is this whole other world waiting to be discovered,

Deborah Dubree (18:29):

And I will agree and upgrade meaning, yes, I agree with everything you said in the upgrade is, and our heart and our gut as well. Because the heart sends more electrical signals to the brain than what the brain sends back and the heart and the brain pays attention to what the heart is telling us, because the heart is what responds to emotion. So when it's a negative emotion of any kind, the signal that goes to the brain is very erratic, the heart rhythm. In other words, the space between the beats, it's a very erratic signal. So the brain picks up on that and goes, oh man, beep, beep, beep, dive, dive. You know, we got a problem here. And then it sends out all these signals to the, to the muscles, which, you know, tighten up to the nervous system to the pounding of the heart, to the sweaty palms and pits.

Deborah Dubree (19:17):

And you know, those types of things. Now, when the heart picks up on love, peace, joy, kindness gratitude, which were used to be called the soft emotions types of things are now known as, you know, it's, it's, it's a power emotion. So when I'm working with, and I'm often asked, so how do you talk about emotions when you're talking with, you know, football players? I said, real easy. I show them one PDF that shows what the effect is when they're under stress and then how it's affecting their game. And they're in there listening from that moment on. And it's the same thing when I show a similar type graph to graphic to business professionals. So it's, it's, you know, understanding every aspect of who we are and not just taking the, oh, it's just the mental game. Oh, it's just the brain. And it's like, no. Good luck, positive thinking, positive thinking is in my book, a bunch of BS because it's positive thinking, it's thinking it doesn't change anything. Now, positive thinking that's believed in, in other words, that heart emotion it's like fricking-a, I don't care what goes on and how bad it is. I know I'm going to make it everything. I'm going to figure out a way to make it right. That's a belief system and I do the positive self-talk, that's believed in.

Bill Soroka (20:44):

How do you get to belief? How do you work yourself from maybe it's fear, maybe it's disbelief at first, how do you convince yourself? Or how do you get to the belief point that everything's going to be okay.

Deborah Dubree (20:58):

It's repetition, just like it is with changing the mental game. And if it can be done a lot quicker I'll give another example. I had a gentleman, again, the NFL for this, he was injured had come out of the injury. Had gotten picked up by a different team, was at that team, and we would, he would usually hit me up towards evening cause he was cross country. He was on the east coast. So it was evening for him, luckily not as late for me. But he texted me and said, you know, can we talk? And I got on the phone and I told said something to him. At one point, I said, I can tell, and I can feel it in my own body that there's something going on. I don't know what it is, but when you figure it out or when you want to share with me, let me know.

Deborah Dubree (21:44):

And all of a sudden, he just, just bawling. I mean, just crying and then apologizing for the crying. But I mean, this is big. Heeps of energy. And I said, dude, I just feel so honored that you trust me enough to be with you during this time. And I said, you're just releasing years worth of energy, where you had to be the one that knew it all, did it all faced it all and went through the whole process of holding all that in. I said, let's let that come out and be proud that you are going through this. And I let it go for a while. And then I asked him at one point, I said so what are the tears about? And he said, well, my contract is set up that if I get injured then I'm done. There's no guaranteed money.

Deborah Dubree (22:34):

There's no nothing. And he says, I can tell that I'm hesitating during practice where my body is stronger than when I was drafted even, but I'm hesitating during practice. And I said, yeah, it's because your mind and your emotional system was going eh eh we are not going to do that again. Don't you remember how bad that hurt? And I said, you're not aware of it, cause it's all subliminal, but it is there. So this using a technique, I just asked him, I said, you trust me, right? Yep. I says, all right, shut your eyes. And I took him through a technique where I won't go through the explain explanation of it. By the time we were done with a one hour phone call. And I let him, I let, when I do that, I just tell him, just hang up the phone. If you have questions, you call me back right now. You just write anything, everything just write. And he texted me the next day and his text, It just said, it's amazing what you can do when you're not in fear. So that was a one hour boom, shift in how the body perceived itself. You know, how the mental and emotional body perceived itself differently than it did before the call. Wow. Cause our body is made to protect. Our mind is made to protect, I should say for training.

Bill Soroka (23:54):

Yes, exactly.

Deborah Dubree (23:55):

Yeah. That's why, that's why growth is so hard because the mind keeps going or the brain keeps going. You haven't done that before. Who do you think you are trying to do that? We're not going to do that. What, no, I don't. I'm looking, I'm looking, I don't see anything in our memory bank that says you can do this. Stop it. And yet our hearts going, but I know I can do this.

Bill Soroka (24:16):

Yeah. So that's a perfect segue to talk about your framework of really building resilience during those times of growth and uncertainty and change. And how do you use this and how do you teach this?

Deborah Dubree (24:33):

Well, those are two different questions because how I teach it is practical and it's practical with stories. Cause I like storytelling so that people can know and understand what it's all about when I'm working with a client we'll delve into it and make it very personal to them and what's going on with them and how they're going to utilize it themselves. And at what point in, in what moment are they going to use which particular piece? So it becomes a, a growing model where, you know, what we're talking about is the seven C's of excellence. So the first C is choice. And we always have a choice. You're going to do it or not do it, but it's a choice if you're in-between that you've not made a choice, you're just ho-hum and it through. So once you make a choice, then it's becoming more conscious, more conscious of what triggers you, what upsets you, what concerns you, what builds you up and gives you energy?

Deborah Dubree (25:31):

And there's a whole graphic that I use with people, my clients, to start to capture some of those thoughts, the feelings you know, what they label the feelings, what their specific thoughts are, the body's sensation. Cause again, the body's going to give us clues. And what are the behaviors? So it could be that they cower in a corner, in a fetal position. That's a behavior. It could be that somebody, you know, starts playing video games or sticks a headset on that's a behavior they're trying to drown out what's going on instead of dealing with what's going on or putting a fist through a wall or going for a walk. It's all behaviors, not good or bad, just signals of something going on. So it's becoming much more conscious of all of that. Yeah. And then, so I was like, go ahead.

Bill Soroka (26:23):

It takes a real honest look at yourself to

Deborah Dubree (26:27):

Absolutely. And honesty is a huge word there. The choice has to be a strong choice that you truly are willing to give up something, to get something. And for everything that we want to get, we have to give up something. You know, there's always a price, but it depends on which is the higher price is the higher price, not getting what you want or as a higher price, giving up something that you really don't want, but you're just addicted to it, which is why the book is called Averages In An Addiction because we are chemical addictive machines that until we can break that cycle, we could be addicted to really good eating or running every day or whatever. It's still an addiction cause addictions aren't bad. It's just, what are you addicted to? And what's the result of that addiction. Right? So that's choice and consciousness.

Deborah Dubree (27:25):

And then here comes, the, the biggest thing has changed. And this is where people get tripped up. You can go Google, you can go Google, how to set a goal or, you know, come up with a choice. You can look at conscious. So I'm aware and I'm, you know, la di da and aren't I just so evolved. It's when you come to the point of change that the problem comes in and it comes in because of those addictive behaviors that we have that will cause us to keep going back to what's familiar. May not like it, but it's familiar. Some people will go away from a, an abusive situation and then they'll go right back to it. And people wonder why. Well, at least they know it. And they know that at five o'clock somebody, he or she is going to come home, slap the crap out of me. And then we're done for the night.

Deborah Dubree (28:21):

You know, it's having that knowingness. It's the uncertainty that scares us. So the uncertainty of going into a safe place can be scarier than being in a place that's harmful. Wow. It's the same reason somebody says you need to stop smoking or you're gonna die. Your lungs are just toast. You know, I don't know how you can get any oxygen in your lungs and the person goes back to smoking. Why? Because it's addictive. It's that simple?

Bill Soroka (28:51):

Are we addicted to our comfort zones?

Deborah Dubree (28:53):

Oh yeah, absolutely. Same thing when I talk about high achievers. The reason that, the reason high achievers come to me is because they have gone through the, the up and I should go the, the up and down and up and down of getting to where they are. Maybe at a very high level; NFL player, one percenter, people who he or she, that works in the tallest office building in, you know, LA or New York or Chicago or whatever, with the biggest office in a $10,000 suit on an event [inaudible] sitting outside, they can still be average to their peers or at least average to themselves of what they know they are capable of, but they're just not doing it. And they start to plateau. And they plateau because they, you know, the work that I do with people is changing contextually, how they think about themselves and how they think about those around them and even their company. Let's go back to the very beginning comments we made about 2020 and everything we went through that has changed conceptually how people and contextually, how people begin to think about what's important to them. Very true. All of a sudden family and friends started becoming more important.

Deborah Dubree (30:09):

Teachers started becoming more important. It's like, get the kids back in school and get their freedom back or their, their sense of wellbeing back, you know, at times. So yeah, so then we go from change one of the, the next C's. So that's the first one is choice. Second is consciousness. Third one is change. The fourth one is courage. Now, most people when they come to me and I don't care who they are, what position they have, they want more competence. I want more competence to do X, you know, so they might be competent in 95% of what they're doing. And that 5% it's like, I want, I want, I need more confidence in this area. And I go, no, you don't. They go, what do you mean? I said, competence is an end result. What you're looking for is courage.

Deborah Dubree (30:58):

The courage to take the step, no matter what the results are, two steps in the right direction, and you all of a sudden have a different perception of what's possible. You have a different view of what's possible and you've built a new and different foundation for what's possible. So when you have that courage, the courage enough to go from where you are to take a couple steps and then competence starts to come up with it, right. Then you start to become average within yourself as to what you're capable of, which is what I've done my entire career. So then it's like, and I want more. So then I have to go with, okay, here comes fear. Cause fear and courage hanging out together because how could you be courageous unless there's fear. So now fear starts to come up again and it's like, oh, but yeah, I built some evidence that I can do this and I'll be okay. So now I have the courage to take another step, no matter what the results are. And now here comes competence and you keep building a taller and taller foundation, taller and broader foundation. And the evidence saying that I can do this. And even if I screw up, I learned something. So I'm going to go about it a little bit differently the next time or not do it at all because I've learned, I don't like it. And either one is okay, because now, you know.

Bill Soroka (32:19):

It sounds like growth then as you just described it, that balance between courage and the confidence catching up is a constant process. Do you think that people somewhere along the line are socialized or ingrained that there's a stopping point, so we just stop or is that just our, our, our, our mind and our ego trying to protect us?

Deborah Dubree (32:42):

Yeah. It's not so much the ego trying to protect us. It could be in some instances where the ego is like, you know, I'm, I'm better than anybody else around me, so why do I need to do more, want more or whatever else. But, it's typically not the case. Especially with high achievers and as human beings, quite honestly, we are meant to grow. It's within us to, to desire more. If we weren't like that, we'd still be back in the caveman days, you know? Cause all the way along, you'll look at the scientists and the inventors and what people have come up with that there there's absolutely no way I should be doing what I'm doing. I have a high school diploma, small town, girl, Chicago farming on both sides of my family, which actually has been a huge benefit because of the creativity and the hard work.

Deborah Dubree (33:32):

But the reality is I shouldn't necessarily, if you were to look at my background, beautician, how did that, you know, train me to do what I'm doing now. And yet it did cause I had to have conversations with people. So the reality is we want growth as individuals. It's a matter of just fear, have a greater hold on us than the desire to grow and not having the knowledge. You know, again, the people that I work with are highly intelligent, capable, knowledgeable people, or they wouldn't be where they are. But they don't, they, they have to contextually change how they think about themselves. Cause they're still, if I was still thinking of myself as a small town girl, high school diploma, I couldn't be doing what I'm doing. I'd be scared to death to be talking to you right now. Each step I had to contextually change how I thought about myself and then change it again and then change it again, which is why we get to a point throughout my career of you know, receptionist, beautician.

Deborah Dubree (34:42):

I had to change to become a receptionist. I had to change the context, the context of how I thought about myself to become the construction accountant. When I got really good at that, then I had to change it again to become an accounting manager, a CFO, go out independent, then take what I learned and teach it within my own corporation, to my VPs and such and out into the world, working with NFL players. That came from a marketing person at the time. And he said something about oh, I said something about why I want to work in sports. I want to work with athletes. And he says, well, I'll go out, you know, around Phoenix here and talk to some of the high schools and stuff and see if we can get you in to talk to the players. And I said, you know, BS with that, I said, I want to work with the NFL. Go find me people to talk to. Find me former players, trainers, agents. I need to learn. I need to learn fast. And I took a leap because the stairs weren't necessary.

Bill Soroka (35:39):

I love that. And you you've mentioned a couple of times the contextually change, how you see yourself. Is this framework you're laying out the seven C's of excellence, is this how you consciously do that? Or is there another system for that? Or how does that evolve?

Deborah Dubree (35:56):

Well, it's a real good question. The contextual change I'll answer it this way. I had a client, a CEO that I've never met, but we talked over the phone and he ended up signing, you know, signing up to work with me. And during the conversation, the initial conversation, he said, well, in the first six months, will I see much in the way of growth? And I said, dude, after we're done with our very first phone call, you will have growth. You know? Cause that's the only way that I work. It's like, okay. And I said, yeah, buckle up. You know, cause this is the way that I work. I'm known as a no BS, you know, elite performance expert. So you gotta be ready if you're going to work with me. You gotta, you gotta know, you really want to make changes in a good way. You know, what you've been dreaming of. So, go, I don't even know what your question was anymore.

Bill Soroka (36:50):

Yeah. That's all right. No, I think you're getting there. I was wondering how do you contextually change?

Deborah Dubree (36:57):

So it goes back to, yes, that's part of the seven C's of excellence, but there's a lot under each one of those C's. So even the consciousness, I mentioned it a little bit is I'll have them go through and look at what are their triggers, both the negative and the positive triggers that is eye opening to them. To actually stop and notice their thoughts, to do a check in throughout the day and realize how many times our mind is doing all the things that it used to do and not doing what we really want to do. To teach them ways to utilize the way the mind and the emotional system work together. To stay focused on whatever it is that they are looking to focus on and to know how to ask the right questions of themselves as well as their team around them. So it's, which is why I don't call myself a coach is because coaching is such a small portion of what I do. It's a very important portion, but it's a small portion. There's so much else.

Bill Soroka (37:54):

Yeah. It sounds super deep. And this isn't just a one-time deal then. Right? You don't just do the seven C's of excellent worksheet and then you're done. Then you've got life figured out.

Deborah Dubree (38:02):

No that's like going into your right. That's like going to a, a conference or, you know, a two hour or a one hour, two hour, half day, all day weekend, whatever. And you come out of a going, oh my God, this was amazing. Can't believe everything that's going to change. And then you get back home. You're back in your old environment. Everything goes back to the way it was and you wonder what happened. It's because everything was intellectual, maybe a little emotional, but not emotional to the point of change, just emotional. I'm trying to be a little cautious here. Emotional to where you have a good cry, but nothing changes. Yeah. So I like to use the mind, body and emotional system to create a change rather than just a good cry in energy release.

Bill Soroka (38:56):

Right. Right. So we talked about courage. We talked about confidence….

Deborah Dubree (39:00):

Yes. So we've gone from choice consciousness, change, courage, competence comes with it. And then it's a commitment. It's being committed to day after day, moment to moment, week after week to creating this new behavior with the new mindset. And actually being aware of the changes that you're making and the, the good things that are happening in your life. Not all. It's not perfect. I don't have a magic wand. A d-stressing is something that I teach as well. But then from the commitment, commitment is really tied to consistency. So you have the commitment. Yes. This is what I'm doing. This is how I'm doing it. Something comes up that would possibly take you off track. And you go, Nope, Nope. That's not where I'm headed is this is what I'm being offered is what I'm hearing is, is the decision to go out and party at night when I've got a game the next morning, or to go out and hang out with a bunch of board members drinking when I'm the one at the head of the table that needs to be setting the example for the others. Is the goal is the choice I'm about to make, gonna take me further from, or, or bring me closer to the end result that I'm looking to achieve.

Deborah Dubree (40:16):

So that becomes a commitment. And then you also look at the consistency of doing that repeatedly. And then there's a bonus C. And the bonus C is challenge. Because everything begins and ends with the challenge. So then it's like, it's, it's kind of what I mentioned a little bit earlier is once you get really good at something, it's like, well, if I can do that, what else can I do, which is a big question. I ask myself throughout my entire career and let the imagination roll again to like, oh, all right, let me try that. I like that. Let me, let me head that direction. And you may get partly way part way there putting all forces towards it and go, no, I was going to go kind of off to the left at an 80 degree. But now I realize I really only wanted to go to a 90 degree. So if I went to a 90 year that small 10% difference in degree can make a huge difference. Just like a trajectory of hitting a golf ball. And if you're off the sweet spot or a baseball or having a, you know, a football fall into your hands and then you drop it because you're all of a sudden concerned about running down fields that are holding onto the ball. Those small trajectories make a huge difference.

Bill Soroka (41:29):

How do you with your seven C's here, how do you compare that against where you want to go? Do you advocate for a vision statement of mission or when you're making a big choice, whether this serves the vision or doesn't, what are you comparing that to?

Deborah Dubree (41:48):

Well, part of what I do in the beginning, which is a great question, is we look at, I go through a lot of questions from my clients is what is it that they want to achieve or accomplish or change, and maybe how they feel about themselves or about others, or it could be anything could be something, you know, I want to hit a 10 million a month sales goal. You know, it could be something very, you know, business, or it could be the individual which has business, especially when you're the catalyst to everyone else around you. So we have a conversation about that and I just asked him a lot of questions to go deeper. So when that happens in what will be new and different. Okay. So when that happens, when then what happens, and I have a, another technique that I go out into it's called future focus that I've taken.

Deborah Dubree (42:38):

In fact, I sat in a room in Texas with a company I was working with with their sales team. And within two and a half days, I think I met with 20, 20 of their people within the department. And went through like a 30 minute exercise of taking them out into the future sometimes out to retirement or 20 years. And it's amazing when the conscious mind can shut down of coming up with all the answers, it would always come up with because it's going to the same database, right? And you can start working with the subconscious mind, which is more, much more creative and allows much more input from outside sources, whatever your belief is on outside sources, you know, the universe or whatever. A lot more creativity to come in. Some of the things I had, one guy come up with a new intervention, one guy who they knew wasn't going to stay with the company he'd come out of the military and was working at the company while he was going to college.

Deborah Dubree (43:34):

He changed his whole choice of subject stayed within the, the area that he wanted to work on, which was in the aviation area of aviation, but changed the it was that tweak or the slight direction where he wanted to go, because he could now see what was possible and what he really wanted. And he could feel that internally, like, yeah, that's it. So once we can settle on what that, what that is, then the question becomes, well, how, you know, what would you be thinking? How would you be, how would you be, how would you be behaving? What would change in your behavior? I'm getting silly. What would change in your behavior? You know, how would you behave differently if you were in that position? And start, that starts going back to that contextual change where they they actually begin to think about themselves differently, behave differently, feel differently about themselves and others around them. And they start doing it now, not waiting. It's not a, when I get to that point, I will act and think and feel this way. It's no, start doing it now, reverse the formula and getting to that place will go a lot faster.

Bill Soroka (44:53):

Yeah. Powerful statement. Now, as we, we've had an amazing conversation, Deborah, I've loved this. And as we close out, what has coming to me and hearing you speak is about resiliency because so many people, I think, wait until crisis is upon them before they think about change or building resilience. So they they've got all this, they just waited a little too late. Can you close us out, speaking about the importance of resilience of having resilience when you meet crisis? Yeah,

Deborah Dubree (45:28):

Yeah, absolutely. And that's the difference between how some people went through 2020 and how others went through it. Those that had a little bit of knowledge and training, even if it wasn't a lot, or they sought somebody who did you know, who came to somewhere like myself and said, I need some help here. This is an area none of us had ever been through and I need some help figuring out how do I get through this and stay whole and keep my family whole and those types of things. So yes, absolutely. It would be like, and I do a lot of sports references, but it would be like if I were an NFL player and I hadn't played all summer, and I was thinking that was going to be first string should be first string. And I waited to the day before going to try outs and went into my conditioning coach and said, you know, I want to be, you know, 10 pounds heavier and you know, 15% more muscular weight.

Deborah Dubree (46:29):

And I want to be able to run the 40 and 3.9. You know, they're going to say, you are freaking crazy. You are out of your mind. There is no way we can do that. It's the same thing with the brain. We have to train our brain and our emotional system every single day. Now the good news. You know, it takes about 10 minutes and then it takes an awareness throughout the day catching things quicker and shifting them faster by using the techniques that I, that I teach. And when you do that, also bringing in praise of yourself for doing it. So people of what I get sometimes from clients is they will catch themselves with a negative thought. Oh man, I said it wrong or I did it wrong. No you didn't. It, it was exactly right. Cause that's what was going on with you at that time. Just make it interesting. It's interesting that I was thinking this way about X. So how, how would I like to think about how do I want to feel about that? If I were to make a conscious choice, what would my choice be? And then do that, think that, feel, that act that way. So it's a moment to moment, but it becomes so habitual to catch those thoughts and those feelings that starts to become relatively. I'll use the word easy. I don't know if it's easy but mindful.

Bill Soroka (47:57):

And I love your approach to that. Isn't that interesting, like taking the observer approach and avoiding that inner critic and shame that often comes when you're not acting as your highest and best self or not acting as you liked. I really enjoy that.

Deborah Dubree (48:13):

Right. Well, and the way I think about it is again, subconsciously it's going on anyway. Your body may be tensed up and you don't even recognize it because it's a habitual feeling that you have. Your mind may be coming up with all sorts of stories and ways of keeping you thinking a certain way. And unless you create the awareness and the it's the awareness that causes you to catch those things. Why would you make a bad, it's like, thank you, mind, body and you know, all the triggers and the tells that I called them for making me aware that that's what was going on, which is why it's not wrong because it's like somebody saying I'm positive. You know, I'm a positive person. Well, of course you are until something goes wrong and then you're not so positive anymore. Cause you're going to revert to old behaviors because that's what you're comfortable with unless you've built the beliefs that goes with it.

Bill Soroka (49:11):

Yeah.

Deborah Dubree (49:12):

So it's like I said, that the trainings that I have are not, they're not difficult to understand. They need to become habitual in the application. And that goes back to that change. That makes it a little more cumbersome at times. I'm still learning after almost 40 years worth of this. So peeling back the onion

Bill Soroka (49:34):

Well, and I think that's a great lesson for us to end on is that this is a constant continuous process of growth and discovery. Nobody has this figured out yet. We're all working on it

Deborah Dubree (49:46):

Again. If, if it were, you know, we would be exalted someplace, nobody be able to see us because we'd be hype vibrating at such a fast speed and higher level that we wouldn't be visible anyway. So considering human, Human. Yeah.

Bill Soroka (50:06):

I love it. Thank you so much for the incredible conversation today. I love this. If you're listening and would like to learn more about Debra Dubree, she's got her book Average Is An Addiction. Plus she's the host of the Leaders On The Edge podcast. You can visit www.sidehustlelounge.com/VIP in the VIP room. I'll have all the links to connect with Deborah. Thank you so much, Deborah.

Bill Soroka (50:32):

Thank you. My pleasure, Bill.

Bill Soroka (50:34):

Cheers, everyone.

New Speaker (50:34):

Bill

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