Jay Papasan:
So, maybe on the journey to success and trying to be more, there have been times where you felt maybe a little isolated, a little alone. Our guest this week, Liz Bohannon, kind of shared some startling facts about the percentage of leaders and founders that report feeling isolated and disconnected from their communities.
And the thing that kind of floored me is that at the moment that they took the survey. 70%. Seven outta 10 said that they felt lonely at that moment. So if you’ve been through that period, maybe you’re feeling it now, I do think there’s a lot to offer you in this episode.
Liz is a serial entrepreneur. She started Sseko Designs, which is now part of Noonday Collection. She’s done this mission-based business to help change the world. She’s also the author of a great book called Beginner’s Pluck. But why you should listen to this episode is if you felt alone, if you’ve felt isolated, she gives some practical frameworks how we can increase our connection, not just to our family and our friends, but also to colleagues, how we mastermind and connect with people to be better professionally and connect more with the world. The line that is in here somewhere, but I remember carrying forward is that the connection we seek lies on the other side of the fear of rejection and how we bridge that gap is what matters. And I think Liz is gonna give us some clues. I hope you’ll enjoy this episode.
I’m Jay Papasan and this is The ONE Thing, your weekly guide to the simple steps that lead to extraordinary results.
All right, Liz, welcome to The ONE Thing podcast.
Liz Bohannon:
Thank you so much for having me. I’m so excited about this conversation.
Jay Papasan:
Me too, me too. I’ve really enjoyed. I’ve been diving into your first work, Beginner’s Pluck. Fantastic and funny. So if people miss the footnotes, like you have footnotes, but it’s not academic stuff. It just makes you laugh. So definitely if you grab a book, definitely go there. But today we’re gonna talk about a lot of your work today is around building community. So where did you become aware of how important building community is and where does that start for you?
Liz Bohannon:
Yeah. You know, it starts in the same place that my entrepreneurial journey started, really, which was I had graduated from university with a master’s degree in journalism. I was really passionate, I would’ve said at the time about big global issues. And specifically for me, it was issues facing women and girls living in global extreme poverty and in conflict and post-conflict zones.
So, as a true grad student, it’s like I have all of this knowledge, a lot of opinions but I don’t actually have any real world experience. I had this moment where I was like, cool, you can run your mouth about how you think the world should work. You don’t have one single friend who is a girl who grew up in global extreme poverty or in a conflict or post-conflict zone.
And that changed my whole life. That was the moment where I was like, “Okay, there’s a delta between what you say you care about and the actual life you wanna live. How do you close the delta? You have to have at least one friend.” So, all of a sudden, kind of the big ideas, big opinions, big global issues, my new life goal became go make one friend, go make one single friend.
Jay Papasan:
Is this when you went to Uganda?
Liz Bohannon:
And so, this is when I bought a one-way plane ticket to Uganda with the goal.
Jay Papasan:
How old are you when you did this?
Liz Bohannon:
I was 22.
Jay Papasan:
Okay.
Liz Bohannon:
So I was two months out of grad school. Two months into my first job, when I wrote my little letter to my boss, put my two weeks in, Spent my life savings, which was not very much on a one-way plane ticket to Uganda with the sole goal, my one thing was go make one friend. That was my KPI for success.
So, I show up in Uganda and end up meeting a group of girls who tested in a college but couldn’t afford to go. Tried to solve that problem. Solved it initially for three young women and ended up building. An international fashion brand that employs women and girls all over the globe to make products so that they can build healthier, fuller, more beautiful and dignified lives.
Jay Papasan:
Which by the way, you’re wearing examples of right now if people are watching on YouTube.
Liz Bohannon:
Thank you, thank you. You appreciate that.
Jay Papasan:
Yes, yes.
Liz Bohannon:
In the meantime… So, that’s my day job. My day job is building a fashion brand and building companies like literally vertically in integrated manufacturing companies and partnering with existing groups all over the world. So, we’re talking, I started in Africa, but then Asia and Southeast Asia and South America and Central America. So I spend, my formative-
Jay Papasan:
And just because people are like, I want to know. So, it was Sseko Designs, but now if people are looking it’s Noonday Collective’s.
Liz Bohannon:
Yeah, it’s Noonday Collection. Yep.
Jay Papasan:
Collection.
Liz Bohannon:
So, I started a company called Sseko Designs. Two years ago, we merged with a company called Noonday Collection. And now it is under the Noonday brand.
Jay Papasan:
Great. Great.
Liz Bohannon:
Yeah. So that’s where you can get these earrings if you’re wondering. So, that was my day job was building companies and communities and then really getting grafted into, and invited into these communities all across the globe. And then, my side hustle became, whoa, what is going on here in these communities? ‘Cause I went over going, I’m gonna experience a lot of bad things, right? Poverty and war and malnourishment and any number of things that we expect to experience in developing economies. Those are all true. I experienced all of those.
What I wasn’t prepared for was the culture shock of, how is it that there are very hard things that are happening? Every community I’m working, and we’re talking some of the more marginalized, oppressed groups really in the world. I’m not working in places where it is free from pain. But in so many of these places, there is a relational connection and sense of community. This dense network of support that I noticed there was a lot of pain, but there was an absence of, or at least less of a certain type of suffering. And that suffering is what happens when we believe we’re alone in our pain.
So, I’m experiencing people that are like, you’re experiencing way harder things than I’ve ever experienced. But you feel connected, you feel supported, you feel like you have the relational support that you need not just to survive, but actually even to thrive and to have joy. I would call that resiliency.
So, then, my journalism self kind of kicked in and I’m like, “What’s going on here?” It started when I was living in, like, an actual village, like a thatched roof village in Uganda. I’d be like, “What are people doing? What’s creating this?” But then, as I traveled and as the company expanded, I would find myself in, like, an urban environment in Delhi, in India, and I would go, “Okay, this village looks very different. But actually the principles, like they did that in the village in Uganda.”
Jay Papasan:
So you’re starting to see a pattern.
Liz Bohannon:
Exactly. And then I started exploring other, you know, like a random suburb in Australia where there’s very dense network of support, these secure connections. And I’d be like, “Okay, does it work in this environment?” and kind of investigate. It was like, they’re here, same principles, they manifest very different based off of the culture obviously, but the principles of building and making kind of these secure connections and this dense network of support, which I believe is probably the most powerful way that we can build our resiliency, are the same no matter where you go.
So, then I came back to the US and I was like, “Can it be done here?” We are arguably the most individualistic country in the world. So about 80% of the world operates in more of a collectivist worldview and mentality. About 20 or 30% is individualist. So America’s individualist, and of all of the individualist countries, we are the furthest end of the spectrum. So, we’re in the minority.
Jay Papasan:
So, we start with me, not we.
Liz Bohannon: That’s a beautiful way to say it.
Jay Papasan:
Okay.
Liz Bohannon:
Exactly. In a collectivist culture, the first question that you ask is “What is best for the group?” In an individualist culture, the first question that you ask is, “What is the best for me?” And maybe me and mine, meaning kind of my nuclear family, right? So not only are we the minority, 20 to 30% of the world, we are the furthest end of the minority.
So, this just totally rocked my world because of course, I’m like everyone else. The culture that you grow up in is the culture that you think is normal, right? Like that sets your standard for normal.
Jay Papasan:
Yes.
Liz Bohannon:
But then I spent the first decade of my formative adult years experiencing a different way of existing altogether and had this realization, I’m like. Oh my life, my upbringing was not normal. If we’re just talking like percentages of what’s most common-
Jay Papasan:
The 8 billion people on this earth who are actually in the minority.
Liz Bohannon:
Yes. And then as a kid that grew up in the like middle class suburbs of the Midwest, you push that even further to like the priorities that my family had growing up were really around the nuclear family, what’s best for us, privacy, kind of saving face, reputation, you don’t air your dirty laundry, right? The reality that people perceive of us as really important, and it may be even more important than the actual reality of what’s happening inside our home or with our relationships. My family life was really challenging and it was completely hidden from the public. So it was like your, not only-
Jay Papasan:
The family you grew up with or-
Liz Bohannon:
Yeah. So, my nuclear family-
Jay Papasan:
Got it.
Liz Bohannon:
… just like train wreck. And yet there was a lot of importance about like, “But we would never tell anybody this.” And like, but when we show up-
Jay Papasan:
It stays in the locker room.
Liz Bohannon:
It stays in the locker room. And a lot of our family culture, which to your point was not spoken, it was not articulated, but the messages you received are, we keep secrets. And the most important thing is how we’re perceived. So, for me, and I bought into it ’cause I’m a kid and that’s the rules that you’re handed. And so I’m just like, “Okay, this is, this is really embarrassing.”
Jay Papasan:
Right, this is how the world works.
Liz Bohannon:
“This is really shameful. Like nobody can know about what’s happening.” And then, I have this experience of living in these places where a lot of times it’s because you can’t hide right? Where it’s like you’re in a village in Uganda and your little thatch roof hut is eight feet away from your neighbors and there’s no sound insulation.
Jay Papasan:
And there might be multiple families living in that set hut.
Liz Bohannon:
Absolutely.
Jay Papasan:
Right.
Liz Bohannon:
So you’re kind of forced into this, like hiding isn’t even really an option, which at the time felt horrifying to me, right? Like the idea that you couldn’t hide is like, no, that’s where safety comes from. You hide and you pretend, and you put on pretenses and you care about your reputation. What I actually saw over time is how much freedom that breeds when people can’t hide.
Jay Papasan:
Well, we know this. Not to interrupt. I mean, like I’m on the edge of my seat ’cause I want to get to the principles too. But we’ve all had that moment where we felt we were in a safe place. And we were able to actually talk about the thing we’re afraid to talk. And it’s so unburdening on the other side.
Liz Bohannon:
It changes everything.
Jay Papasan:
Because what we realize is that people can see us for who we really are and still accept us. And that’s what we all want at the end of the day.
Liz Bohannon:
That’s what we all long for. There’s a beautiful quote by Tim Keller. He uses it in the context of marriage, but I think it applies very beautifully more broadly in the context of community. He says, “To be unknown but loved is comforting, but it’s superficial.” I’m hiding and I’m liked, I’m accepted, but I’m not really known. To be fully known and not loved is our greatest fear. But to be fully known and fully loved is a lot like being loved by God. He says it liberates us from our pretense. It brings us out of hiding and it enables us, it builds up our resiliency and enables us to live the fullest version of our lives. And that’s what I saw. That is what I saw in these communities. Really, the crux of it was being fully known and still being able to belong. And so-
Jay Papasan:
How powerful.
Liz Bohannon:
And it’s so simple, right? It’s like the most basic, fundamental truth. And yet, it’s not easy. It’s simple, but it’s not easy because there’s so much risk. We were talking beforehand and I was mentioning a study where they showed that when we anticipate social rejection, so we share something and it’s not safe, and people judge us or they kick us out of the club or, you know, make their, whatever, their reaction is-
Jay Papasan:
The average Tuesday in seventh grade for most kids.
Liz Bohannon:
Exactly. The stress that that puts, the cortisol that is released, actually the part of our brain that lights up in fear when we are imagining social rejection is the same part of our brain that lights up with a similar level of intensity is when we imagine being physically assaulted. So it is. There is risk and there is fear, which is why it’s simple, but it’s not easy. And yet, what interpersonal neurobiology teaches us is that there is a cap, there is a limit to how much our brains can grow and learn and change and heal. That’s neuroplasticity alone and just with information. It actually has to happen in the context of others and, specifically, in the context of safe and secure relationships.
Jay Papasan:
I’m aware of some of that research in the context of like a lot of foster children and things that were not given a lot of love very early. And you see the developmental challenges they can face when they didn’t grow up in a safe environment. But that happens when we’re adults too?
Liz Bohannon:
It happens when we’re adults too. Yeah. We can’t actually, there’s just a whole level of neuroplasticity that we can’t access without one And so, in order to be the fullest, healthiest versions of ourself, we have to do it in the context of these safe and secure relationships, these dense networks of support.
And there’s different rungs of it all the way from a small group of people that know the full story of your life. These are the people that when you experience pain, you can name it, and they will hold space for it, and they’ll ask questions about it and very often we’ll go, “Oh my gosh, me too.” Maybe not that exact thing, but like that fear that is just literally keeping you awake at night, like I know that fear too. You’re not alone. All the way to these kind of broader networks of support. We’re talking the grocer, the neighbor, the people that you see at the park that there is a sense of “I know.”
Jay Papasan:
The barista that knows your name and knows your coffee order.
Liz Bohannon:
Exactly. Those connections actually matter a lot. It all matters. Harvard released the results of the longest ever study done on human wellness and flourishing. Have you heard of this study?
Jay Papasan:
Oh, yes. Yeah.
Liz Bohannon:
Yes. Okay.
Jay Papasan:
And I know what the payoff is. Give it to us.
Liz Bohannon:
Single greatest predictor. And they looked at so many things.
Jay Papasan:
Yeah. Over 70 something years?
Liz Bohannon:
80 years.
Jay Papasan:
80 years.
Liz Bohannon:
It was 80 years. And they looked at socioeconomic status, education level, diet, exercise as you smoked, did you drink? Single greatest predictor of how long you will live and how happy and healthy you’ll be at the end of your life is the quality of your?
Jay Papasan:
Relationships.
Liz Bohannon:
Relationships.
Jay Papasan:
Yeah.
Liz Bohannon:
And that actually has to extend outside of your nuclear family. In order to receive those full benefit.
Jay Papasan:
So that’s a nuance I wasn’t aware of.
Liz Bohannon:
Yeah. So a lot of Americans go immediately to like, okay, well I need to invest more in my marriage and my kids, which is great. Like if that’s-
Jay Papasan:
But that’s more of the me instead of the we.
Liz Bohannon:
It is. it’s a little bit more of the me than the we. That actually doesn’t create a secure sense of belonging where like, but what if something goes wrong for me? All of a sudden, we’re on our own. Like no one’s gonna come in and save my family. So, you’re exactly right, your nuclear family often ends up being an extension of me. The we is the collective that ends up creating this incredible sense of security that goes, even if the worst happens, I’m not alone. I have a network of people and friends, loose connections, very, very secure, intimate connections that’ll be there, that’ll hold me. And then there’ll be a time when it’s my turn and they need holding and they need support, and then I’ll be there.
And what that does to the human brain, you’re exactly right when you kind of likened it to attachment with really young kids, is that if from a young age, the message you get is you are alone in the world. Like you don’t have safety, you don’t have security, the stress levels, cortisol levels, you basically end up existing in a, in a state of flight or fight. But when we have that sense of secure connection of like, I belong and I can’t get found out because they already know it, the level of security that that creates changes your whole life.
Jay Papasan:
So, you have this epiphany, you’re an investigative journalist, you’re starting to document it and see it’s not just in this one village, you’re seeing it all over the world. And you decide, I’m gonna bring it home to maybe the most challenging environment we can imagine and see if it works.
Liz Bohannon:
Exactly.
Jay Papasan:
So let’s dive into that. We’re gonna do it after the break. Is that okay?
Liz Bohannon:
Okay, that’s great.
Jay Papasan:
All right, folks, We’ll be right back after this break.
All right. So, welcome back, everybody. So, I’m in suspense. You decide to bring this home to the United States. What does that look like? And if you can tell us why you’re unpacking your journey here, could you also help us understand, you know The ONE Thing, what are the first principles we have to apply? What’s the first thing we have to do to make sure this thing works?
Liz Bohannon:
Great question. So, the first principle before we even get to the first principle is we start small. So often, people hear community, social health, the loneliness epidemic. We immediately go big.
Jay Papasan:
Let’s change our country. Let’s change our state.
Liz Bohannon:
Totally. It’s big tech, it’s big pharma. There’s a lot of kind of abdicating responsibility of just like culture these days, social media, and there’s really valid things that we could talk about. We got here for a reason, but people just yammer on about these big things that they actually don’t have a lot of agency in. So, my first thing is go, what can you actually control? All of that’s hard. If you wanna be a socially healthy person and you were born in America in the last few decades, that’s a hard card that you got dealt. We can acknowledge that. We don’t need to spend that much time there. What I want us to do is get really small. What do you actually have agency and control over?
Jay Papasan:
You’re speaking our love language, right?
] Liz Bohannon:
What is your one thing? Start small.
Jay Papasan:
Start small. Yes, start small
Liz Bohannon:
And don’t diminish the small, like treat the small like it’s big. That’s what I want you to do is go, this is big, and this is important, and I will never win a Nobel Peace Prize for it, and I won’t make it on Oprah, and it’s not a super sexy thing to talk about at a cocktail party, “What are you working on, man? What’s your next big thing?” And you’re like, “I’m trying to make a friend.” No one’s impressed by that.
Jay Papasan:
But everybody who’s won a Nobel Peace Prize, everyone who’s done those things started there.
Liz Bohannon:
That’s true. That is true. That is-
Jay Papasan:
We don’t know where it ends, but all that positive change usually starts from one small act, one small conversation, one small thing that you then build momentum around.
Liz Bohannon:
Exactly.
Jay Papasan:
And it almost always gets bigger than we imagine if we keep doing it.
Liz Bohannon:
Yeah. And even if big just means it fundamentally changed the course of your life and the lives of those in your immediate friend group or community, that feels pretty big to me.
Jay Papasan:
That could be multi-generational just in itself.
Liz Bohannon:
A hundred percent.
Jay Papasan:
Okay.
Liz Bohannon:
So, I came back home. I’m an entrepreneur, so I do have a playground, right? Where it’s like I get to decide, what are our norms? How do we communicate, what do relationships look like within the walls of our company, right? So, I had to kind of figure out, how do we professionalize this a little bit? And there is a difference. How you show up in community and connection and relationship in your personal life versus organizationally or professional, the same principles apply, different application, obviously.
Jay Papasan:
Okay.
Liz Bohannon:
So, the first principle, there’s actually an acronym. It’s R-I-C-H.
Jay Papasan:
R-I-C-H, RICH.
Liz Bohannon:
Because these principles are gonna teach you how to get rich relationally, okay?
Jay Papasan:
There we go.
Liz Bohannon:
So, we’re actually gonna start with I, ’cause when you get an acronym, you kinda have to work with what you get. Okay. That’s the best I could do and that’s the best me and ChatGPT could come up with for acronyms. Okay. So, let’s start with I.
Jay Papasan:
It’s better than URCH. So, RICH.
Liz Bohannon:
There you go.
Jay Papasan:
Got it.
Liz Bohannon:
So, I is initiative. You just have to take initiative. We have this bananas ideas around relationships in America that don’t exist in most other parts of the world, which is all about chemistry and kismet and the right time and the soulmate, and you’re gonna meet somebody and just immediately be like, “Oh, we felt the soul connection, and there was so much chemistry. And obviously, I knew you were gonna be my best friend.” We do the same thing in marriage. Most other people don’t think about marriage right away.
Jay Papasan:
You write about this in this book about passion too. We have an unrealistic idea about-
Liz Bohannon:
Yes, yeah, totally unrealistic.
Jay Papasan:
… we’re gonna have, like I grew up with the church, like a Road to Damascus moment where the light comes down from the heavens and tells us this is what you were born for. It’s not how it happens.
Liz Bohannon:
No.
Jay Papasan:
With relationships or for purpose.
Liz Bohannon:
Yep, same thing. So first of all, I just want you to think about it like you think about your physical health. ’cause now we’re talking about social health. I want you to think about your social health, like your physical health. It would be very silly if you were like, “I’m just gonna lose 25 pounds and get in shape,” without actually prioritizing it, right? Without taking initiative.
Jay Papasan:
I’m gonna run a ultra marathon, which is also gonna be my first race-
Liz Bohannon:
Totally.
Jay Papasan:
… and I haven’t trained for it. No, it doesn’t work.
Liz Bohannon:
Totally. There’s so few good things in our life, good goals that we go after, that we have this idea that we do with community and friendship and relationships. Like when, “If it’s meant today, it’ll happen.” And it’s just like, okay, maybe, but most likely not. So, initiate, show up. Go first. Be willing to face rejection and frustration. Be willing to invest ahead of the results.
Jay Papasan:
All right. So, you’ve highlighted earlier the parts of our brain when we’re afraid of social rejections are the same part that might be physical pain. If the first step is take initiative and say, “Let’s be friends,” or whatever that looks like. How do we get past that the first time? What advice would you give someone that’s like, “I know I need to do that. Yeah. But I don’t know how.”
Liz Bohannon:
Know that it’s okay that you’re afraid and that you’re not unique and you’re not special. I feel very motivated when my insecurities, when I realize like, you’re not uniquely insecure in this area. That’s kind of boring. Like we’re all afraid of this. So, just kind of level setting that like, we’re so often taught like… I mean, and this is what fear, why it’s helpful, right? It exists to send a signal to us, you are unsafe. So, what we just have to understand is like, no, this is different. You are not actually unsafe. Actually, long-term safety is on the other side of this fear.
So setting up some challenges like stating your goals, it can be really helpful to be like, “I’m gonna go try to get rejected five times.” Kind of gamify it. Take a little bit of the intensity out and personalization of you go out and you try to initiate and it doesn’t go well. You try it one time.
That’s literally like going to the gym one time and being like, “I didn’t lose weight or get abs.” So, that probably didn’t matter, right? So, we just have to understand you gotta get your reps in like anything else, and it is something that once you do, it becomes easier. The more safe and secure you get, the less scared you are of being rejected because you have safety and security.
So, let’s decide you get over the fear. And you’re like, I’m gonna initiate, I’m not gonna wait for somebody else to do it. A lot of us fantasize about like the cool kid, “We’re all just middle schoolers.” We’re all just middle schoolers in the lunchroom who see the cool kid table, like, “Maybe someday I’ll get the invite.” What I want you to do is go… don’t… start your own table. That’s right. Initiate. Start your own table. Set the table, make the ass, make the invitation.
So, let’s say that you are there. You’re like, I wanna do this. Next step, R stands for rhythms. So, people are like, “I wanna build community. Okay, I’m on it. I need to be more social.” And then, they just start doing things willy-nilly. I’m gonna text this friend and then I’m gonna try to show up in this club a little bit. And they get very overwhelmed and it’s very scattershot. So, then they’re spending like months. Spending more time on their social health. They’re just feeling kind of exasperated, kind of exhausted because there was no-
Jay Papasan:
You’re doing 20 things. You can’t build momentum, momentum around any of them.
Liz Bohannon:
Totally. So honestly, I would apply The ONE Thing principle. If you have a certain amount of hours a month that you can dedicate towards your social health, I want you to do one thing. I want you to create one rhythm. It’s not a one off thing, like texting your friend group you know that you haven’t seen in a year, like we should get together for happy hour. We know what’s gonna happen. You’re gonna go back and forth via text for days, throwing out dates, what works, what doesn’t work. And then, eventually it’s so awful. People just give up and then the text thread kind of dies. And then like two months later, somebody will resurface it. We are not going to build social health, like going to happy hours once every six months when it actually ends up working. It’s very counterintuitive, but what I want you to do is establish a committed and consistent routine.
Jay Papasan:
Like a book club or something.
Liz Bohannon:
Yes. We are going to meet monthly, twice a month, maybe even weekly. And it’s the same time, the same place week after week. And here’s what’s gonna happen. That’s gonna feel really intense in the beginning. You’re like, “We’re not even friends yet. You wanna hang out every Wednesday night.” So, there’s a risk involved in that. However, the security that we long for, that’s what actually creates the intimacy and connection.
So, a lot of times, we get it wrong. We’re like, “Well, yeah, once I feel… once you’re my best friend, I would definitely hang out with you two times a month.” Once I feel that with you, that’s like the very thing that’s gonna create those feelings is the thing that you’re not doing.
So, I want you to pick one thing, one friend group, start a book club. start a small group that meets at a local pub but it has to be on the calendar, and it has to be a reoccurring event on the calendar. And it’s gonna feel really hard in the beginning because you haven’t built your life around that, and it won’t take very long. Take a couple reps before all of a sudden you’re like, “Oh, I don’t plan things on Wednesday nights because I have my Wednesday night hang out with the girls.” It gets infinitely easier because this becomes a rock in your life that, now, other things kind of go around.
So, it’s gonna feel really hard to find the time initially. And then, once you start committing to it and start saying no to other things to protect that time, it becomes infinitely easier.
Jay Papasan:
There’s so many examples I could just jump in. So, like my wife established that on the weekends, she does a walk with her best friend.
Liz Bohannon:
Love it.
Jay Papasan:
And so it’s a weekly ritual. We have a Wednesday night date night.
Liz Bohannon:
Love it.
Jay Papasan:
It emerged when our kids were small and over the first few years we were always scrambling. And then it got to be where the world kind of knows that it’s Wednesday night, where are you going?
Liz Bohannon:
Exactly.
Jay Papasan:
So you first have to kind of teach yourself that this is a ritual, but then the world kind of falls in line.
Liz Bohannon:
Exactly.
Jay Papasan:
But we interviewed a lady that was trying to get healthy and she just put it out on the neighborhood. It’s like, “I’m gonna start walking. I need to walk for like 30 minutes a day. I’m gonna be on this corner at this time and I’m gonna walk. You’re all welcome to join me.” So you can do kind of a mass invite.
Liz Bohannon:
Yeah, absolutely.
Jay Papasan:
But it ends up and there’s like 20 people. They’re not some regulars that show up and do these morning walks.
Liz Bohannon:
Exactly.
Jay Papasan:
You’d be surprised if it’s like the first Thursday, every morning at 8:00, like that’s the rhythm of consistency.
Liz Bohannon:
That’s the key, the rhythm of consistency.
Jay Papasan:
You don’t have to communicate it ’cause they just know when it is.
Liz Bohannon:
Yes. And don’t we all wanna not have to ever be in that text thread of back and forth again?
Jay Papasan:
And where, where are we going?
Liz Bohannon:
Exactly. Exactly. So, it actually gets easier over time. So, it gets easier, and then the ROI continues to grow and compound and can become very lived out.
Jay Papasan:
What would it look like at work? Like if you were trying to do this at work, what would be an example of someone doing this? Like a rhythm for a work?
Liz Bohannon:
Yes. So, same thing. It has to be on the calendar. So, in like my companies, everything from… you know, we had this tradition where I think it was like every Thursday afternoon, there’s just like a 30 minute break, people bring their favorite snacks. We all gather and we hang out. And the only rule is like, we can’t talk about work. It’s so small.
Jay Papasan:
Okay.
Liz Bohannon:
But it actually can be really consistent. We also would bake it into the core rhythms of our operations. So, specifically in organizations, if you want community and connection, you have to operationalize it, right? So, we baked it into… we operate on a two week sprint methodology. So, every two weeks, we get together… Monday is basically what are we gonna accomplish over the next two weeks. Everybody takes ownership, we assign value to it. You know, we all get an agreement that by the time we meet next Friday, we will have all done what we said we were gonna do. It’s a really core rhythm for really just like productivity and within the company for our like core metrics.
Jay Papasan:
I love it. Short sprints in the same direction.
Liz Bohannon:
Yeah, exactly. So, we bake in community into our sprints where it’s like, we know these meetings, these kickoff and these recap meetings are gonna happen every two weeks. It’s like sacred to us. So, how can we use that Monday meeting and that Friday meeting, one tradition that we have that has grown and evolved and has become such a huge driver of connection within our organization is Hearts. We call it Hearts.
An employee of mine actually started it. She was like, what if we started this meeting with Giving Hearts? And what I mean by that is, can we have a time, because we would go through our Asana board, you immediately jump into, “Here’s what I did to move the company forward.” She was like, “What if we had just like five minutes to share the things that won’t show up on the Asana Board.” The time a colleague helped you out, you saw them working really hard on a thing or taking a risk, these little behind the scene moments of noticing and then acknowledging. And so it truly started out, five minutes.
But I mean, it has grown to… these meetings can be anywhere from five minutes. There have been times where it’s been 45 minutes of colleagues just going, “I saw when you do that. It was only me that saw that. I want all 25 people in our department to know how hard you worked, the risk that you took, the way that you showed up for me. And you do a little.” Like, “I’d like to give a heart to Jay,” right?
So, it can feel really cheesy, which that’s another thing I wanna talk about. Don’t be afraid of the cheese. Like we are so obsessed in our culture with being cool and being nonchalant and just like, just like no community and connection isn’t organic and it’s not nonchalant. It’s going to feel cheesy, enforced.
Jay Papasan:
It makes it feel safer too when people are able to be a little silly.
Liz Bohannon:
You know, we have Donut. It’s a really powerful tool if you use Slack. Are you familiar with Donut?
Jay Papasan:
No.
Liz Bohannon:
It’s a little application that you can literally integrate into your Slack, and you get to set the parameters. But this is something, talk about operationalizing. I was like, I want everyone in our company to have 30 minutes once a week with a one-on-one with a colleague where you’re not allowed to talk about work. And so, there’s an app for that. Literally you install it, it looks at your calendars, it automatically matches you up with a coworker that you haven’t been matched up with for the last like six weeks. It syncs up and it’s like, “Hey, you’re meeting with Keith in accounting at 3:00 on this day.”
And then, you’ve got… So, it does all of that like logistical work but it’s operationalized. So, I’m not going, “Hey, team, I’d like you to meet with someone once a week and be friends.” I’m going like, “Hey, here’s the tool that we use. Here is the habit that we have. If you expect it, if I expect my teammates to know each other, to support each other, to love one another, like if you expect it, you have to inspect it.” So, you set up the standards and then you check in. You can see who’s actually doing the thing that we all said we were gonna do. But it really is about operationalizing,
Jay Papasan:
And that’s where I bet some of the Hearts come from, those talks.
Liz Bohannon:
Oh my gosh. It transformed our community to be like people whose paths you wouldn’t cross, the humanization, the sharing of joys, the sharing of burdens, the inside jokes.
Jay Papasan:
Well, there’s all the petty stuff though that can happen as people are jockeying for advancement and stuff in companies big and small, and they have these little resentments, and it’s really hard to have those resentments that get someone that you actually have built a friendship with.
Liz Bohannon:
That’s so good.
Jay Papasan:
You start to give them some credit. That little walk, like I have a friend that does this with an in-person company, and they do it randomized, where you go on a 30-minute walking meeting. So, you also get out in nature. But you’re not attached to any hardware. You just have to go and talk for 30 minutes. Same thing. You build connection, and those connections create all kind of safety in the organization.
Liz Bohannon:
So much.
Jay Papasan:
Yeah.
Liz Bohannon:
I’m so glad you said this specifically about the conflict and resentment. It is hard. I think it was Graham Green, the author who said it’s, it’s really hard to hate up close. I think he said something to the effect of, once you see the wrinkles on the side of someone’s eyes, it becomes very hard to hate. You wanna know the other thing that helps us handle conflict and resentment? I’m so glad you asked because-
Jay Papasan:
Please.
Liz Bohannon:
… comes to see, our communication skills and specifically how we handle conflict. So, conflict is gonna happen in the workplace-
Jay Papasan:
We’re human.
Liz Bohannon:
… in our relationships, in our friendships, specifically in America. We are terrified of relational conflict. Now, we are not scared of conflict online. We basically put all of our need to have conflict behind a screen name
Jay Papasan:
That’s all one way.
Liz Bohannon:
It’s all one way. It lacks any level of courage or helpfulness, but it gives us our outlet to speak our peace or whatever.
Jay Papasan:
We get to vent.
Liz Bohannon:
We get to vent.
Jay Papasan:
Yeah.
Liz Bohannon:
We get to vent. But actual in-person conflict and relationship, we are terrified of. And there’s two reasons that we’re really afraid of it. The first is we have a wrong belief that ruptures in relationship, that conflict hurts a relationship. It kind of tears it down. So, we wanna avoid it. You say something that I felt a little bit diminished by in that meeting, I am terrified to come to you because here’s what I think is gonna happen. I’m gonna say how I felt. And then, you’re gonna get super defensive. And you’re gonna tell me I was wrong. And I’m gonna walk away angry at you or feeling like an idiot that maybe I was being too sensitive, but no, I’m definitely not. We have all of these imagined scenarios about what’s gonna happen.
Jay Papasan:
It’s just the opposite, isn’t it?
Liz Bohannon:
It’s literally the opposite.
Jay Papasan:
Yeah.
Liz Bohannon:
So, relationships are like muscles. When we are going out to build muscle-
Jay Papasan:
Gotta break ’em down.
Liz Bohannon:
You gotta break ’em down. You actually have to break them down. And it is in the process of repair and those muscles coming back together that actually makes them stronger. And relationships are the same way.
Jay Papasan:
I hear the word repair in relationships, and I go to Dr. Becky. Is it just about owning our piece of it and really being honest about it?
Liz Bohannon:
It is. And listen, again, it’s really simple. It’s not easy, but it’s simple. But most of us have not been taught how to do it. And then, we bring this into an organizational context. There are a hundred things that when you’re onboarding somebody, what you’re actually… this is the system we use.
Jay Papasan:
These are our SOP for this, whatever.
Liz Bohannon:
This is our process that we use. And then, when it comes to relationships and communication, we’re like. whatever you think is a good idea, right? So, people are bringing in their own family of origin stories, their own styles, their own fears, their own proclivities, and we’re literally just going, “Try it out,” right? And so I try to operationalize it. There is like, in my companies-
Jay Papasan:
When people disagree, you have like a model?
Liz Bohannon:
Process.
Jay Papasan:
A process.
Liz Bohannon:
It is a four-step process.
Jay Papasan:
Every time you go through that, you now have even more trust in the relationship ’cause you know that together, y’all can work through something tough.
Liz Bohannon:
Absolutely. And that is actually what creates security. And to your point, every time that happens, what it builds up, truly there are times where conflict just… you will get to a point where it’s not, it’s not scary anymore.
Jay Papasan:
So, having a process for this allows us to move through it. Every time we move through it, we get a little bit more confident about doing it. At least with the other person.
Liz Bohannon:
Yes, yeah.
Jay Papasan:
And the relationship gets deeper.
Liz Bohannon:
Yeah.
Jay Papasan:
We’re really out of time and I don’t wanna leave people.
Liz Bohannon:
Okay. Yes, no.
Jay Papasan:
No, It would be like, “Where’s the H? Where’s the H? I’ve gotta go into the house. I’m walking the dog. What’s the H?”
Liz Bohannon:
H stands for help. Help. And this is-
Jay Papasan:
Is that asking for it or?
Liz Bohannon:
… creating.
Jay Papasan:
Okay.
Liz Bohannon:
It’s creating cultures of vulnerability and interdependence. We, in America, love to be helpers. We think that in order to grow our social capital, the way to do that is to show up, to be the helper, to give out of our time or our talents and that that helps us grow our social capital. That’s true. An enormous deposit that you’re making to a relationship is when you show up for a friend.
Here’s where we get it wrong, this is a very American thing. We think that when we ask for help or when we receive help, we are making a withdrawal from the social bank account. So, we can get really in our heads, right? When’s the last time that you needed help, but you thought about asking someone and you were literally like, “Have they given me a favor? Have I done a favor? Is this like…”
Jay Papasan:
You start going through the transaction history.
Liz Bohannon:
You start going through the transactions. “Do I have enough? How long will it be until I could pay it back? Would there be a…” And we get so in our heads that we eventually go, it’s better just not to ask.
So, what we misunderstand is that in the economy of a relationship, showing up and giving help is making a massive deposit. But actually an even bigger deposit is when you allow people to help you. And be so bold as to even ask for it, because the, the single most powerful thing that you can do to be a friend that someone will call on, you can say like, “Call me if you need help,” or drop off casserole until you’re blue in the face. What actually gives permission to call you at 3:00 in the morning is if you went first and if at 3:00 in the morning, you called and said, “I need help.” A year later, a month later, when your friend is in a dark or desperate situation and they don’t know who to call, who do you think is gonna be first on their list?
Jay Papasan:
Right. You’re making an advanced deposit. You just don’t realize it.
Liz Bohannon:
That’s good. So, initiative, rhythms, communication and conflict repair and help. Interdependence and vulnerability.
Jay Papasan:
So, I’m just gonna guess, take a wild gander that your great experiment in the us The me culture, it worked.
Liz Bohannon:
It worked. It works.
Jay Papasan:
It works here.
Liz Bohannon:
It works. It works organizationally, which I spoke to more today. I’ve also put these principles to life in my personal life, and I’ve taken them to a very far degree. I live in proximate community, seven families. My best friends, we live on the same street. We share property. We see each other’s kids every day. We help… I mean, whatever it is, a flat tire, a kid that needs to be washed in the backyard because you’re running late from a board meeting, we truly have created what I experienced in so many other cultures, a village culture, but in a very modern, mainstream American context.
Jay Papasan:
I love that. Thank you so much for sharing. What’s a challenge we can give our listeners? They’re like, “Oh, I’m inspired. How do I start?” What’s a good first step for them?
Liz Bohannon:
If you are in a position of leadership, and that could be your home, that could be leading yourself, that could be a leader in a company or an organization, I think that one of the single best investments that you could make is in, specifically, peer support.
So, what I want you to do is think about five people that are not in your world, okay? So, I don’t want you to do this with your employees, or your boss, or your coworkers, or your investor, or board of directors, somebody who’s like so in your world that you can’t tell the full version of the truth to, but someone who gets kind of the journey that you’re on. So someone who gets your world but is not in your world, and I want you to create a rhythm. I want you to reach out and go, “Hey, I have this idea. What if every two weeks or what if once a month, we chunk out three hours on our calendar?” That could be proximate for people that could be virtual. And we showed up and we shared the full version of our story and our lives with one another, and we see what happens.
Jay Papasan:
You’re building your own lunch table.
Liz Bohannon:
Yeah, there you go.
Jay Papasan:
I love it. Thanks so much, Liz.
Liz Bohannon:
Thank you.
Jay Papasan:
Well, no one who has spent time with Liz is gonna say that she doesn’t have something to share and that she’s low energy. I was along for the ride at parts, but it has lived on with me and this idea that we have an opportunity to be a little bit more purposeful, not just as business people, but as people moving through this world to be purposeful around our connections.
She’s living it at a high level. She’s built a group of friends around her that she lives very close to. She has built an engineered community, not just at her work, but in her everyday life. And I think a lot of us we’re suffering an epidemic right now. You read about it all the time, an epidemic of aloneness, of isolation. We all have an opportunity to be a little bit better, more purposeful about leaning into the relationships that matter and forming new ones because at the end of the day, cannot tell you how many times Gary and I have kicked it around, nobody’s gonna sit and on the gravestone, it’s gonna say, “I wish I’d written another book. I wish I’d recorded another podcast.” If we have any regrets, at the end of the day, it’s gonna be around our relationships. That’s the stuff of life, folks.
So, I hope that you will make some commitments to be more purposeful. Maybe take Liz’s challenge around forming what I would call your own personal mastermind. I think there’s a lot to take away, and I think she’s addressing a great ill of our age. This idea that in our pursuit of whatever it is we’re after success, money, fame, just maybe meaning even, we often work so hard that we isolate ourselves, but it’s not the recipe for success. It can be a byproduct, but one that we can avoid. Anyway, take these lessons to heart folks.
Next week I’m gonna be back with a special solo episode. I can’t wait to share that content with you. We will see you next week.
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