Content warning: this episode contains references to self-harm and other issues related to mental health. As an entrepreneur, drawing a line between personal value and the success of your venture can be a daunting task. But when your personal journey intimately intertwines with the quality of your services, that line becomes increasingly blurred. On this episode, we're joined by Megan Rafuse, Co-Founder and CEO of Shift Collab - one of Canada's largest online therapy practices. In this vulnerable conversation, Megan candidly delves into her responsibility as a clinician to continually learn from her clients; and her belief that when one teaches, two learn. She shares her journey of balancing the enriching insights gained from her clients with the complexities of maintaining personal and professional boundaries. Being in the mental health field added another challenging layer, the weight of appearing 'perfect' whilst dealing with her own struggles. From navigating through traumatic experiences to the pressures of bootstrapping a seven-figure business amidst her mental health battles, Megan unveils the intricate dynamics that formed the foundation of Shift Collab. She also takes us through what she eloquently calls the "troughs of sorrow" — those difficult moments that tested her resilience, shaped her journey, and from which she eventually emerged stronger.
Content warning: this episode contains references to self-harm and other issues related to mental health.
As an entrepreneur, drawing a line between personal value and the success of your venture can be a daunting task. But when your personal journey intimately intertwines with the quality of your services, that line becomes increasingly blurred. On this episode, we're joined by Megan Rafuse, Co-Founder and CEO of Shift Collab - one of Canada's largest online therapy practices.
In this vulnerable conversation, Megan candidly delves into her responsibility as a clinician to continually learn from her clients; and her belief that when one teaches, two learn. She shares her journey of balancing the enriching insights gained from her clients with the complexities of maintaining personal and professional boundaries. Being in the mental health field added another challenging layer, the weight of appearing 'perfect' whilst dealing with her own struggles.
From navigating through traumatic experiences to the pressures of bootstrapping a seven-figure business amidst her mental health battles, Megan unveils the intricate dynamics that formed the foundation of Shift Collab. She also takes us through what she eloquently calls the "troughs of sorrow" — those difficult moments that tested her resilience, shaped her journey, and from which she eventually emerged stronger.
Learn more about Shift Collab.
In this episode, we cover:
Quote of the Week:
"If my sense of self is too much attached to the company…at the expense of the business’ success, then I’m not a healthy leader." - Megan Rafuse
Hosted by Katherin Vasilopoulos. Made by Cansulta and Ethan Lee.
Music by © Chris Zabriskie, published by You've Been a Wonderful Laugh Track (ASCAP).
Songs used in this episode include: "Air Hockey Saloon," "I Can't Imagine Where I'd Be Without It," "Stories About the World That Once Was," "Short Song 021523," "Short Song 022423," "The Lower Third Hall of Fame," "Short Song 020523," "Short Song 030923," "Cylinder 1."
Used under the Creative Commons 4.0 International License
[00:00:00] Katherin Vasilopoulos: Hi, I'm Katherin Vasilopoulos. Starting my own venture wasn't easy.
After a decade working in the corporate world, I realized that so many things were out of my control, like layoffs and changes in direction. I didn't like the instability. I didn't want that to define my whole career at professional story, and so I left. I started my own company and achieved more than I ever imagined.
Now I'm on a mission to share stories from extraordinary entrepreneurs who are changing the world and who never gave up on their vision.
In our last episode, we talked a bit about how difficult it can be for entrepreneurs to separate their personal value from the success of their venture. But what happens when your personal life directly reflects the quality of your services? When you can't truly leave work at work?
Megan Rafuse is the co-founder and CEO of Shift Collab, one of Canada's largest online therapy practices. Megan's role as a clinician hasn't stopped her from being a student. She values the profound insights she's gleaned from her clients, an aspect of her work that enriches her life both professionally and personally.
But her deep level of involvement has also presented significant challenges. Drawing boundaries between work and professional life was nearly unmanageable. As was coping with the added pressure to appear perfect. Throw in traumatic moments, the immense challenge of bootstrapping a seven figure company and her own struggles with mental health, and you'll start to get a sense of the tense circumstances under which Shift Collab was born.
Megan dives into all of this, reflecting on her journey so far, and what she calls the "troughs of sorrow" that she's managed to climb her way out of. We also talk about the complications that come with applying your expertise to your own life, and how to reframe your role as a teacher in a way that benefits both you and your clients.
Hi Megan. Thank you so much for joining us today. We really appreciate it.
[00:02:07] Megan Rafuse: Hi Katherin. Thanks so much for having me.
[00:02:10] Katherin Vasilopoulos: I wanted to first of all, get you to tell us a little bit about yourself and your background, and to tell us a little bit about your company called Shift Collab.
[00:02:20] Megan Rafuse: I am a mental health therapist turned Co-Founder and CEO of Shift collab.
And Shift Collab is a leading virtual mental health practice. We offer counseling, custom therapy, matching, and individualized mental healthcare for Canadians all across the country. I'm pleased to say that we currently have a team of over 18 staff and 125 mental health clinicians and counting. Shift Collab was born out of a dream that I had for a really long time, basically since I was a teenager, and it really stemmed from my own mental health journey.
I was 16 years old, I lost my mom to cancer. I was grief stricken and angry and frustrated, and I was really struggling at the time to find a mental health clinician who just got it. I was looking for somebody who just got me, and what I kept coming up against was older therapists who were really feeling like a blank slate.
I didn't find them relatable at all, and I just felt like these people don't get me. And so, armed with that feeling and that big life experience, I went into starting Shift Collab in early 2015. I rented a room by myself as a solo-preneur. It was a side hustle. I was still working a full-time job, and I really wanted to change the industry.
I saw a big gap, whether it was finding relatable care, whether it was finding accessible care. Whether it was finding care from a company that was owned by a clinician and not from a marketing or tech company. I really wanted to offer something different in the market that I was looking for myself and that I knew that other clients were looking for.
[00:04:22] Katherin Vasilopoulos: Do you remember the defining moment of when you decided, okay, I'm ready to let go and leave?
[00:04:29] Megan Rafuse: Oh my gosh. There was a series of multiple moments that really propelled me, and so first I had been working as a full-time frontline social worker, and at the same time I was working every single spare minute outside of that full-time, nine to five in growing a clinical practice.
So I had been taking training on how to be a strong clinician. I was Googling, you know, what is marketing? What is business? How do I do business? And I started to realize that the lifestyle of working a full-time job and working every evening and weekend may not be sustainable. But at the time, I honestly was really afraid to leave that full-time job.
So I had what I like to call the golden handcuffs. I had a full pension, I had benefits, I had stability, and I had everything that my dad at the time was like, you know, that's a really good setup. Why would you leave? But you know, for me, I felt like I was investing so much of my time in a career that I knew I didn't want to do long-term.
I knew I wanted to be a therapist, and I would leave my full-time job feeling drained, go to my private practice role, where I felt energized and excited, and I loved working with clients. And so I started to think briefly about what might it look like.
To leave the full-time job and head toward my side hustle full-time, and you know, as fate or whatever would have it, what really happened was that I got in a car accident. I was on my way home from my full-time job, I got rear-ended and as a result I suffered what they call a catastrophic concussion. And so I spent the next nine months really struggling to function. I was off work of my full-time job. I was barely hanging on to my private practice and I was really struggling.
And so, it was that catalyst moment that really made me question, you know, life is short and life is unpredictable and I need to determine what I'm going to do with my time here. And during that time, you know, I received a letter from an aunt that I'm really close with and she sent me this little tiny card and it was a poem by Emerson called "Success."
And it was the last three lines that really hit me.
To know that one person has breathed easier because you have lived this is to have succeeded. And I thought, you know what? I love being a therapist, and that lights me up, and that is my definition of success. And so I went back to my full-time job. I gave my notice. I took a lot of deep breaths. And felt a lot of fear and worry.
And I resigned and I went full-time into private practice on, you know, a wish and a hope that I would succeed because I was just going for it. But that catalyst moment of having a major health scare and negative impacts of an accident really is what drove me into making this decision for myself.
[00:08:09] Katherin Vasilopoulos: Yeah, that's when people have those moments of clarity. Right? And you say what's really, really important right now, cuz everything could have been taken away, uh, in a blink of an eye. Right?
[00:08:18] Megan Rafuse: Right.
[00:08:18] Katherin Vasilopoulos: Uh, and that's when you have that, okay. I think I need to do what's really important to me right now, and I love that you've defined quickly what success means to you? Cuz not everyone knows, right?
[00:08:29] Megan Rafuse: And I think honestly, we all have our own definition. And so if I was to ask my co-founder, if I was to ask a fellow therapist, if I was to ask you. We all have a different definition of what success means to us, and so if you are somebody who's thinking of leaping into entrepreneurship, something that can feel really grounding is just naming what success means to you, because I promise you, on those difficult days, you are going to need that to hold onto.
All you really can hold onto is your vision and what you know to be true in. In terms of what success means to you, and that is what will pull you through when times get tough.
[00:09:23] Katherin Vasilopoulos: Do you remember what it was like to go from just the one client to then scaling up?
[00:09:29] Megan Rafuse: I often relate growing shift to raising a baby, and at the time I didn't even have a baby, but somebody had told me that this is now my business baby, and I am responsible to keep this baby alive and functioning and ensure that it had this support system and the money and everything that it needed to thrive.
And honestly, in those early days, raising this business baby was so hard. I remember some of those early weeks where I was Googling how to do marketing, how to do payroll, what is bookkeeping, and I often was really hard on myself in those early days. I had a lot of shoulding on myself, which is essentially where we stuff a bunch of shoulds in our mind and we think, I should know this.
I should be able to do this. This shouldn't be hard. And in reality, it is hard. It is hard going into business for yourself because often the skillset that we have that make us really good at what we do are different skill sets than what it means to own and run and operate a company. And for me, being a therapist while also running a company, essentially having two jobs in the early days made it really tricky.
And so I always tell people, remember that it is going to be hard, but we can do hard things. We are wired to do hard things. And early on in my business, somebody had said to me, you know, Megan, there's this thing called the "trough of sorrow."
The trough of sorrow is very well known and talked about in entrepreneur circles. However, at the time, I wasn't self-identifying as an entrepreneur. I was thinking, I'm a therapist in private practice. And I was like, okay, I'm setting up a company. This feels really good. And then it started to feel a little harder and it started to get a little more difficult, and then it started to get extremely difficult.
I was feeling the pressure and responsibility of having to ensure other people had a livelihood. And that felt like a lot. I think over time what happened is I started to slide into that trough of sorrow. I started to feel like I am the only person who can ensure this business is successful. I am the only person who can support my dream of owning and running Shift, and I was really afraid to ask for help.
But as the novelty started to decline, reality kicked in and I really started to recognize, I was feeling overwhelmed. I was feeling exhausted. I didn't want to go to the clinic anymore. I didn't wanna show up at work. And I'll never forget one night, it was about nine o'clock at night. I had just finished a full day of clients.
I was on my second shift, which was running the company. And that day I had gone to Staples already four times to look for receipt paper, and I was on my fifth time that evening because clients were paying with the electronic banking machine, and I had to make sure that they could get a receipt. And I went into Staples and I looked at the receipt paper and I was so frustrated, and I was exhausted, and I looked to my right.
And I will never forget looking down and seeing "make your own will." And in that moment, it was the first time ever in my life I felt suicidal. And I thought, that is my out. I am gonna buy a will making kit. I'm gonna take it home. I am gonna make a will. And then I don't have to live anymore. I don't have to be here anymore.
And feel the pressure of what it feels like to own and run a business and be responsible for other people's livelihoods. And thankfully, in that moment, I thought about my clients who I had seen that day who were struggling with suicidality, and I was working with them on how to cope and how we can deal with hard feelings and how to challenge those thoughts.
And I said, I have to leave staples. So I left Staples, I went right to the car. And I called a friend and said, I am not okay. I need help. I don't know what I'm doing and I don't know what I don't know. And I love being a clinician and I hate owning a business. Looking back, hindsight's 2020, where despite entrepreneurial circles talking about the trough of sorrow, they don't call it the troughs of sorrow.
And so while I got out of that one trough, over the last five to seven years, I have felt many troughs. And really what the trough of sorrow is all about is recognizing when you need to ask for help, and it's recognizing where you need to be skilled or build skills so that you can cope with those big feelings as they come up.
And I don't go to that place of looking at, you know, the wills anymore. I really think they should move that section in the store next to, you know, something a little less stressful. But honestly, entrepreneurship is a journey in which we really have to build up our own mental resilience in order to ensure that we get to take care of ourselves.
To take care of our companies.
[00:15:28] Katherin Vasilopoulos: Did you feel at that time that you were just trying to be the perfectionist? You were trying to do everything perfectly because so many people were relying on you.
[00:15:38] Megan Rafuse: Yes, a hundred percent. And the irony in that is that as a therapist, I specialized in perfectionism. And so here I was showing up to session with clients, talking about how to challenge those perfectionistic thoughts, how to experiment with making mistakes.
And then I would go into my other role and feel like, Oh my gosh, I have to be perfect or I'm a failure. And the good news is I don't think shift would be in the place it is today if I wasn't a therapist first, because in those early days I really learned that when one teaches, two learn. And what that means is as I was sitting in the therapy room with clients talking about perfectionism, talking about failure, talking about struggle and growth, I too was learning how I could handle my own version of that.
I was sharing strategies. I would ask them questions like, what's the worst that could happen and how could you deal with that? And then I would leave work and think about, well, what's the the worst that could happen? You know, if we don't get this partnership or if this marketing campaign doesn't go well, how could I handle that?
And it was those early days of supporting clients that I think really shaped my own entrepreneur journey and ability to be resilient in growing the business to what it is today.
[00:17:17] Katherin Vasilopoulos: Yeah. I find that interesting that we always think that it's a one way direction. When you go to a therapist, the client speaks, and then the therapist gives a diagnosis or some advice, and then the therapy session is over. What kind of lessons have you learned from your clients?
[00:17:33] Megan Rafuse: Every single one of the clients that I've had the pleasure of working with have always taught me something about how to live my life, how to run my business.
I always joked that, you know, my clients were my first business focus group. They were very clear about what they needed from a therapist. They were very clear about where they saw the gaps in the mental health industry. They were very clear about what Shift Collab could do better. When one teaches, two learn.
And in those early days, I was learning so much.
[00:18:08] Katherin Vasilopoulos: I have a question about that journey that you say that you go on with your clients. Do you remember any times where you got really emotional alongside with them or what are the most emotional stories, if you can share one with us?
[00:18:21] Megan Rafuse: As a therapist, I'm bound to keep client journeys confidential, right?
But something that I often used to hear from my clients was that, you know, it took me so long to reach out for support because I didn't feel like I was "that bad." And I'm putting "that bad" in quotation marks because when it comes time to get help, there's no such thing as having to be that bad.
There is no requirement of where you are on your journey dictates when you can start therapy. You're allowed to come to therapy as an effort to be proactive in dealing with challenges in your life. That's actually when therapy works really well. And so some of our clients started therapy when they saw a life stressor coming down the pipeline, whether it was entrepreneurship, whether it was having a difficult conversation with a boss, whether it was navigating their relationship with their co-founder or a colleague, and that is what drives me to do what I do.
[00:19:28] Katherin Vasilopoulos: I'm listening to you speak, and I hear you saying that the amount of work that you've put into this has led to the culmination of where you're at right now, but do you ever find yourself not being able to separate yourself from your work or from your company?
[00:19:43] Megan Rafuse: Oh, that's a good question. Honestly, I'm a little bit better now than I once was.
I co-own the company with my now husband, and so not only is it a founder's journey of learning how to have healthy boundaries between work and life, it's also the journey of what happens when your co-founder lives in your house and you're eating at the same dinner table? And you know what? Honestly, it's taken a lot of practice.
I live by the adage that we are all community made, especially as entrepreneurs. No one is self-made. And if they tell you that they are, they're lying. They have a community behind them who is supporting them through thick and thin. And I remember at the time someone suggested, Hey, do you think you need maybe a family business coach?
And I remember thinking, why are they suggesting this? Like, what do they think is wrong with me? And you know, that feels pretty ironic coming from the owner of a mental health company who often says, Hey, do you think it'd be helpful to talk to a therapist about this?
[00:20:53] Katherin Vasilopoulos: Right, right.
[00:20:54] Megan Rafuse: But when the tables were turned, I was like, oh no.
Am I not doing a good job? Are people perceiving me in a negative way? But I am so pleased to say that it really helped me to learn how to set boundaries both at home and in the company. It helped me to structure owning a company with my husband. So how do we stay in the same, no. How do we stay in different lanes but work toward the same goal?
And how do we really have a healthy marriage? And so I'm pleased to say that Jordan, my co-founder, and I got married last summer. And our family business coach was our wedding officiate. Any relationship you have with your co-founder is one that requires a lot of intention and it requires a lot of effort because you're essentially navigating another type of marriage.
So
[00:21:48] Katherin Vasilopoulos: Let me ask you this then. Do you have the ability to distance your personal worth from your business worth?
[00:21:55] Megan Rafuse: You know I'm a therapist, and that question cuts deep to the therapist inside me. As people, we get to define what worth means to us, and my sense of worth comes from many things in my life, whether it is my personal relationships, whether it's my marriage, whether it's what I know to be true about me.
And the business doesn't get to define that for me. And early on, I have to admit, I did feel that. I felt if I cannot make this business a success, then I am a failure. Took a long time and a lot of learning and understanding how businesses work and how they're an ecosystem all. In themselves and I started to consider-
[00:22:54] Katherin Vasilopoulos: Sorry, an ecosystem? Or an "ego"system?
[00:22:59] Megan Rafuse: I think it's a bit of both.
[00:23:00] Katherin Vasilopoulos: It's a bit of both.
[00:23:00] Megan Rafuse: It's an "ego"system, really. There is a lot of opinions and egos, um, impacted within a business. I started to realize that the business doesn't define my success, and if the business is struggling, it's okay. If I'm not struggling, that is the time I need to put in the work to take care of myself, so then I can effectively lead the business to the next stage.
The business has, its own needs, and those needs are completely separate from my needs for the most part. You know, I work really hard to stay proactive and to think about business challenges as they are. And it took a lot of learning. In the early days, I used to often have to ask myself, will this challenge be as big of an issue in two hours, in two days, in two weeks, in two years?
And it helped me really to reframe, am I creating fires? Am I looking for chaos? Which as entrepreneurs we're known to do that, we like to solve problems. Am I looking for something to help define me or to buffer against my own sense of failure? Am I so afraid of failing that I'm avoiding doing what I need to do in case I do fail?
But overall, the business can be dealt with. There is ways you can deal with systems and process. There's ways you can work on it. But if my sense of self is too much attached to the company, it doesn't do the company or anyone in the business any favors, because then I'm acting from a place of insecurity versus acting from a place of confidence and knowing that I can lead a healthy and sustainable company.
If I am focused on how the business is impacting me personally at the expense of the business' success, then I'm not a healthy leader.
[00:25:03] Katherin Vasilopoulos: Right. Because what's the danger of running things from a place of insecurity?
[00:25:09] Megan Rafuse: Oh my gosh, where do I even start? It's evident when people run companies from a place of insecurity.
Oftentimes the workplace culture suffers. Oftentimes there's a lack of psychological safety. Oftentimes, the owner's needs come at the expense of the company's needs. I wish I could say that there's one right formula, and here's how you ensure that that doesn't happen. But honestly, I've learned through trial and error, I've learned through a lot of self-reflection.
I think the biggest learning really was from having a husband who's a co-founder because you know, if there is stress, we take that home. And I have a child now. We have a child, and I really need to be mindful of what I'm passing on to my next generation. And so I choose every single day to reflect on how I'm leading.
I choose every single day to think about what is my vision for the company and how are we gonna get there and how are we going to do that in a way that feels really good for the most amount of people inside the company?
[00:26:23] Katherin Vasilopoulos: It's great that you have your business, baby. You have your human baby. And you've also figured out ways to put really healthy boundaries for what you're, um, having to deal with in your marriage and in your business.
What happens when you encounter these big challenges? Like, can you remember a time where you were just so challenged, or even maybe the word defeated, because that does happen. Often, especially in the beginning phases of starting a business or even when you're in the growth phase, there are moments of full defeat.
[00:26:56] Megan Rafuse: There are moments of full defeat. Some of the early days we're really tough. There was a moment where two of our clinicians left the company and that was a big trigger point for me. I thought, I'm not a good leader. I don't know how to do this. How I am I going to ensure that we're going to be able to hire other clinicians?
And that was really tough. Later on, we ended a massive program that we ran. It supported about 250,000 people a year, and we ended it because it didn't feel like it aligned with the company's vision anymore. And that also was really hard. And so, you know, we often think that when we struggle with tough things in business, it's tough because it was outside of our control.
But I find honestly that the things that I tend to struggle with the most are decisions that are actually within my control. They're the decisions that I know I need to make to ensure that the company is thriving, and oftentimes they're not dictated by other people. Those decisions are decisions that I have to make.
I think, honestly, for about 10 years and through a few moves, I've kept a book on my nightstand and people who come over or like see it in my, if I move it to the living room, they say, Oh, have you read this book? And I say, Actually, no. But the title of the book is called Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway.
And it's a common book in the mental health space, and fair enough. I probably should have read it. I've asked clients to read it. So there's a therapist secret. I actually didn't read the book, but it is the title in itself that I just look at and I'm like, right, I can handle hard things. I feel the fear.
I make a really tough decision because I know it's going to benefit the business. And you know, sometimes the decision goes really well and it works out. Sometimes the decision goes really poorly and I regret it.
[00:29:16] Katherin Vasilopoulos: Mm-hmm.
[00:29:17] Megan Rafuse: But in practicing making decisions, it also sets me up. To really understand my own values, to understand the values that the company holds, and to understand where I wanna go.
And so if you're someone who struggles with decision making, whether you're a perfectionist like me or you're really afraid of "what if," I wanna encourage you to just practice making the decisions. You know, the first decision is really leaving the full-time job. But there are thousands of decisions that you are going to make that will be really difficult, but you can handle that outcome and there's no playbook.
There is not a playbook I have hidden in my desk that that is like, okay, is it time to hire staff members? Yes or no? I wish there was, but there is a lot of data that I use to inform my decisions and sometimes I misread that data. But as an entrepreneur, if I get hung up on all of the decisions that I should have made or could have made, or could have made different, it would paralyze me and I also wouldn't have the skillset that I have now to know how to make better decisions.
[00:30:31] Katherin Vasilopoulos: You just said something before that blew my mind. I'm sitting here listening to you and that's all I can think about is decision making is a practice. And you will find that you have moments of great success and other moments where it didn't go so well and that you're gonna have to try something else next time.
And that's it. You have to practice it. And I never thought of it that way. Thank you. That's uh-
[00:30:53] Megan Rafuse: It's a muscle.
[00:30:54] Katherin Vasilopoulos: It is. It's a muscle. It's a muscle. But let me ask you this. Let's go back for a second. When you said people left the company and you thought, oh my God, is it me? Is it my failure? But do you feel at that moment, betrayal?
Do you feel abandonment because these are people that you've built relationships with and then they leave. What does that feel like?
[00:31:12] Megan Rafuse: You're cutting deep here. It's really hard. I struggled. I felt like I wasn't running a company that could keep top performers. I worried about that. I felt sad. I did feel abandoned.
I thought I, you know, I felt like, oh, I thought we were in this together. And I came out of it, you know, I sat with it. I reflected, you know, it's still difficult when team members leave, but I'm also grateful for the time that they were here, for what they contributed to the team and company culture for how they supported our clients.
And I know that they're making the best decision for them. In the same way that when I left my full-time job, I knew that I couldn't stay and love the work and commit to being the type of colleague or employee I wanted to be. And I knew that I wouldn't be doing anyone any favors, especially myself. And so, it's hard as a business owner when people leave.
And you feel all the feelings, and I'm lucky I have some really great best friends who, you know, talk me through it. And I also know that the team finds it hard. I also know that the team wishes that they didn't have to say goodbye to a coworker that they enjoyed working with, and we process that together.
I think for people who are ready to leave, they're going to leave, and it's my job to support that. If you are thinking of leaving to go do something new, you need to take care of yourself first, and you need to remember that it's a small moment of pain. You're gonna give a resignation. People are going to have feelings about it, but we only get one life.
And if you're so worried about how others might react or how people may perceive you leaving, or about all of the unsolicited advice you're gonna get about going to be an entrepreneur and how hard it is. If you only focus on that, you're missing out on all of the incredible things that are to come. And I promise you, there's ups and downs, but I would never, ever trade my entrepreneur journey and getting to work with the team and to grow Shift Collab.
I would never trade that. For the fear of not making the decision and staying where I was. And so, you know, if you're working on making that decision, start practicing your decision making. That is the best thing you can do. If you're not ready to make the big decision yet, make some little ones that push you toward your goal because that is the practice and it's ongoing practice, and people are always going to have thoughts or opinions about what you are doing, but they don't live your life and so you are the only one who gets to live your life, and if you feel good living it, that is the ideal.
I love asking people to do this. I used to do it a lot when I was a therapist and I used to say, I want you to make a graph with three little columns. And I want you to write task in the first column. I want you to write prediction in the second column, and I want you to write outcome in the third.
And I want you to use that template if you are thinking about making a decision. If you are ready to leave that full-time job, I want you to think about what do I need to say? What is my task? What is my prediction? I predict people are gonna judge me. My colleagues are gonna question why I would choose to do this.
I'm letting people down and they're gonna tell me, I want you to think about all the worst case, and then I want you to start to plan for, you know, could you handle the worst case? Or what if the worst case doesn't happen because that outcome column, once you're ready to fill it out, when you're like, I've left, my predictions didn't come true, you are going to see all of that in the column. But you are going to know that even if there was a little bit of negativity in that outcome column, you can cope.
[00:35:45] Katherin Vasilopoulos: But I also think one word comes to mind when you're describing all of this, and it's loyalty. It's, there's a double edged sword here.
You have loyalty to yourself and loyalty to the employer that you're working for. And if you're thinking about leaving, where does your loyalty lie? And that's a tough one because being loyal to yourself first doesn't come easy to a lot of people.
[00:36:09] Megan Rafuse: I think there's often pressure. Especially for women to be the nice girl and you know, we want to please others.
We want to ensure other people are taken care of. We tend to be caregivers, and what's more important is recognizing that we actually aren't being the nice girl if we're not being nice to ourselves. And in order to care for other people, our needs absolutely have to be taken care of or else we just have nothing left in the tank.
And I want those people who are struggling with that feeling of loyalty to recognize that it can be what's called a "both and." I can have been so loyal to the company. I could have helped my company grow. I could have really done really great work, and I can really care about the people that I work with, and I need something different, and it's time to be loyal to myself and I'm ready for a new adventure.
And so loyalty doesn't have to be an "and or." It is a" both and." And that's pretty awesome, because when we start taking care of our own needs, you will see your ability to be loyal grow even further. And how magical and powerful is it when we're loyal to ourselves and what we need?
[00:37:51] Katherin Vasilopoulos: Thank you so much to Megan Rafuse for her vulnerability and insights. You can learn more about Shift Collab through the link in the episode description. We like to remind each of our guests that creating And So She Left is a collaborative effort. Their feedback and input always makes for a better show. And the same goes for our listeners.
Sharing what you liked about this episode in a review would be the best way to help us make this show even better. And So She Left is made by Cansulta and Ethan Lee. We'll be back next Wednesday with a new episode. Our music is by Chris Zabriskie, edited for your enjoyment.
You can find a list of all the songs you heard here in the episode notes. I'm Katherin Vasilopoulos, and thanks for listening.