Sometimes it helps to switch things up. For this episode, we’re pivoting from our usual in-depth exploration of identity and personal struggles to highlight techniques for managing stress in our daily lives. Suze Yalof Schwartz, the esteemed CEO of Unplug Meditation, returns to share her wisdom on stress management and achieving a well-rounded lifestyle. We've invited Suze to provide guidance to one of our dedicated listeners, Abby McCoy, who is navigating her journey as a freelance healthcare writer under her brand "Evicom" while juggling the demands of motherhood. Abby candidly shares her challenges as a mompreneur, the hurdles she faces in achieving work-life balance, and her difficult transition from a strenuous nursing environment to becoming her own boss. With Suze's guidance, Abby learns strategies to make small, sustainable steps towards her goals while preserving her mental and physical wellbeing. Join us as we delve into Abby's entrepreneurial journey, Suze's practical advice, and how we can all move the needle towards goals that we truly care about.
Sometimes it helps to switch things up.
For this episode, we’re pivoting from our usual in-depth exploration of identity and personal struggles to highlight techniques for managing stress in our daily lives.
Suze Yalof Schwartz, the esteemed CEO of Unplug Meditation, returns to share her wisdom on stress management and achieving a well-rounded lifestyle. We've invited Suze to provide guidance to one of our dedicated listeners, Abby McCoy, who is navigating her journey as a freelance healthcare writer under her brand Evicom while juggling the demands of motherhood.
Abby candidly shares her challenges as a mompreneur, the hurdles she faces in achieving work-life balance, and her difficult transition from a strenuous nursing environment to becoming her own boss. With Suze's guidance, Abby learns strategies to make small, sustainable steps towards her goals while preserving her mental and physical wellbeing.
Join us as we delve into Abby's entrepreneurial journey, Suze's practical advice, and how we can all move the needle towards goals that we truly care about.
Learn more about Unplug.
Get a 30 day free trial on the Unplug App with the code CANSULTA30
Learn more about Abby and Evicom.
In this episode, we cover:
Quote of the Week:
“Our goals are not always met the way we think they will be met. So [be] open to the way that things happen.” – Suze Yalof Schwartz
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," "Short Song 010923," "Short Song 012023," "Short Song 011923," "Short Song 020923," "Readers! Do You Read?" " I Am Running Down the Long Hallway of Viewmont Elementary."
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.
Over the course of the show so far, we've swam into some deep waters together. Exploring topics like self-doubt, internal baggage and rage helps us to better understand ourselves as women who've left the comfort of a certain space or pushed back against some preconceived notion. But every once in a while, it helps to simplify these discussions.
To shift our lens from exploring identity and personal journeys to purely exploring practices that can help us in our daily lives.
Abby McCoy is a freelance healthcare writer operating under the brand Evicom. She's also one of our listeners. As a mompreneur, Abby mentioned to us that she finds it tough to finish the work she needs to while tending to other parts of her life. Like spending quality time with her family. So to help Abby, we decided to call up the exact expert she needed to hear from.
In this episode, Unplug Meditation CEO Suze Yalof Schwartz returns for a grounded discussion about managing stress, making small sustainable steps towards living a well-rounded lifestyle and learning to move the needle towards goals that you truly care about. You'll also hear about Abby's turbulent journey to entrepreneurship and how she gained the confidence to leave the intense working environment of nursing.
Welcome back Suze. Thank you so much for being here with us today. You're an alumni of, uh, And So, She Left and it's always nice to see people come back and, uh, participate again in the podcast. Can you tell us a little bit about yourself? Just for those who don't know you.
[00:02:21] Suze Yalof Schwartz: Well, I'm really here on this planet to help people meditate.
Because I know from firsthand experience what a huge impact it can make on your life. I started off as a fashion editor. Uh, you might have seen Devil Wears Prada. That was me. I wasn't, I was the assistant version. And then I got to the top, you know, racing around and I was stressed, and then I found meditation.
And I'm like, why is everybody on the planet not doing this? So I dumped everything I had known before and opened up the world's first drop in meditation studio. Launched the Unplug app so we could help people around the globe, and that is why I'm here.
[00:03:02] Katherin Vasilopoulos: And Abby McCoy, you're a listener. Tell us a little bit about yourself.
[00:03:08] Abby McCoy: I am a nurse of 17 years and I have worked all over the place in nursing, in home care and hospitals and you know, over the last three to five years, I have felt the pull to do something different. I didn't really know what I could do, but I read a book called How to Become a Nurse Writer by Beth Haynes and it was a game changer for me.
I kind of followed these steps that she laid out so clearly to start my own business in June of last year, and started my portfolio and started getting clients slowly but surely. Basically, I write health content for online publications. Some of the things I've written about recently are good sleep positions when you have a chronic health condition.
Um, things that people are looking for. My business name is actually Evicom because my tag is evidence-based communication for the healthcare community. I never imagined I could do this for a living and I'm so happy to be able to pivot. Nursing just was not the place for me anymore, and I'm so happy I get to do this now.
[00:04:13] Katherin Vasilopoulos: What I'd like to facilitate today is a discussion between the two of you and see where we can find some kind of answers and also a really cool discussion on where you're at and what you would like to get from Suze's experience. Uh, one of the things that always fascinates me is one was the moment that you decided, you know, I can't do this anymore and I'd like to switch out.
[00:04:35] Abby McCoy: I was responding to a call for a behavioral health issue, screaming down the hall was the call and, uh, running down I, I jump on this patient's legs to help keep him safe. And I got an injury, I got a whiplash injury on my neck. So, you know, the hospital was great in paying for physical therapy, but I had a little one at home and, and driving out, you know, pretty far to this therapy three days a week just was not sustainable, and I just felt that another injury was inevitable. That, to me, was a big tipping point. Just that I'm not physically fit enough to do this job and I'm not enjoying it. I get panic attacks the night before. I have to go to in for a shift, and I know a lot of my coworkers were experiencing the same thing, but I just felt like if I can do something else, I wanna do something else.
Luckily, I had a little bit of experience with starting a business because, uh, my husband is a photographer, a really talented photographer. So I started our business back, ooh, long time ago. But obviously my days were very different. I had to decide how many hours I need to devote to creating a website.
Like you just suddenly you have hundreds of decisions to make and you feel unsure about, just about all of them.
[00:05:54] Katherin Vasilopoulos: Yeah. And how was the pandemic for you in terms of nursing experience?
[00:05:57] Abby McCoy: Oh, it was really tough. It was very tough. The floor I was on, we experienced so many behavioral health issues, uh, through it all.
Everyone was at their absolute max emotionally. Patients in general, when patients come into the hospital, that's, you know, their time when they can just need what they need and be upset and get angry at the nurse cuz I'm sick, you know? But it just reached new heights. It was difficult to say the least inter personally, uh, professionally, it was a very hard time during Covid.
[00:06:30] Katherin Vasilopoulos: Yeah, so the mental health aspect also was a huge deal. And Suze for you, I think you probably saw that as well in your business. And do you ever have conversations with entrepreneurs who are looking for balance? They're looking for that. How do I manage my stress? How do I manage these new challenges that I'm taking on in my life?
[00:06:48] Suze Yalof Schwartz: Every day I have conversations with entrepreneurs on how to manage stress, how to have balance, and this is what's so interesting. I'm taking a course right now with this brain, super brain called Jim Quik, and I am taking his course and learning so much from him. I didn't realize all we needed are these little tools to be able to unlock our memory.
Well, it's the exact same thing for stress and anxiety. People don't know. It's so easy to flip the switch on stress and anxiety when you have the tools, so I'm happy and lucky enough to be able to teach millions of people how to do this on a daily basis.
[00:07:31] Katherin Vasilopoulos: Do you remember what it was like for you when you first started your business?
How much stress you had and or what were your major or major challenges? Suze?
[00:07:38] Suze Yalof Schwartz: I remember how lucky I was that every time I felt stressed I was able to pop into a class, and then I was like, this is the greatest thing of all time. So even though I should have been running around like the Tasmanian Devil, I was floating around like a peaceful dove because I had all these amazing professionals helping guide me on how to stay calm in the chaos.
[00:08:01] Katherin Vasilopoulos: Abby, what do you think when you hear all this? Because in your situation, you're working at home alone and you have a little one and you have no team, and so what is that conjure?
[00:08:13] Abby McCoy: I got into a practice of meditation three years ago and noticed such a huge difference, but I really am interested to hear from you if there's a way to do it that's quicker. And there may not be and that's okay. But um, I was doing it for 20 minutes, twice a day, which was incredible. But it was, um, there are only so many hours in the day.
[00:08:35] Suze Yalof Schwartz: Well, this isn't the first time, Abby, that I've heard something like this. Most of us just don't have the time for that. And guilty, I was one of those people.
I've learned those techniques and meditation does not need to be long to be effective. You can meditate for 16 seconds and feel the difference your bone before and after, and I'll teach you a tool like that. It doesn't need to interfere with your life. It shouldn't make you feel bad because you missed it.
But what I will say is I notice with myself that if I don't meditate, I'm not the best version of myself, and I have three kids, so I empathize with you with a small one. I have my own business. I'm living a similar life to you. How do I do it, and how can you do it to make it easy in your life? My ritual is I wake up first thing in the morning.
I lay back down in my bed and I do a 10 minute meditation, and then I get up. I don't let my kids wake me up. I set my alarm in the morning. I don't press snooze, and it's really easy. I never miss a day because I don't get out of bed until I meditate. And the consistency is where the benefits lie. It's really easy to do because they're 10 minutes long.
So I at least do 10 minutes a day before I talk to my kids, before I talk to my husband, before I talk to my coworkers, and it makes me a better person. So creating that 10 minutes for yourself to just start the day intentionally and know that you're doing something good for yourself. That is one of the greatest things that you can do.
Another great thing that you can do for your brain and for your mental health is to move your body. You could just then roll off the bed next to your bed and do 20 crunches or a 60 second plank or whatever it takes just to get the oxygen flowing. Then, drink a glass of water because our brains get dehydrated when we go to sleep.
[00:10:39] Abby McCoy: And I definitely set my alarm. Before the kids wake up. So I, and I hit the snooze one or two or three times. So that would, that's a great idea.
[00:10:49] Suze Yalof Schwartz: Davidji, who's one of my favorite teachers on the Unplug app, says, snoozers are for losers. Not to insult you, Abby. But it's actually to inspire you.
Because that 10 minutes news button could be your 10 minute meditation timer. So you could sit up or lay down and just do this easy meditation that I call GAS where it's gonna fill your own tank. GAS is closing your eyes and just thinking about three things you feel grateful for. And then a is for affirmation.
I am whatever you wanna be. So it could be focus, present, happy, calm, you choose your word and then s is silence. So GAS: gratitude, affirmation, silence. And then open your eyes and start your day.
[00:11:49] Abby McCoy: And I think I'm reaching the place in my business, thankfully, where it's uh, quite busy and I am thankful. I put a lot of systems in place to keep everything organized cuz it's, you know, you do hit those moments of overwhelm. Um, and I could imagine even doing that mid-afternoon when I'm, okay, what do I need to do right now?
You know, and, uh, it's feeling like a lot. I think that would help.
[00:12:11] Suze Yalof Schwartz: Hmm. Well now, you're gonna use that snooze button as your meditation timer.
[00:12:16] Abby McCoy: Yes.
[00:12:16] Suze Yalof Schwartz: So you have that 10 minutes between when your alarm goes off and when your snooze button goes off. It's interesting because doctors in medical school are not really taught about nutrition, which is kind of when, you know, you think about your fuel, imagine yourself as a car. We don't wanna have the bad stuff going in. Like, we don't wanna fuel ourselves with processed food. We need to fuel ourselves with natural food and real food. And food that's actually food, right?
[00:12:49] Abby McCoy: Food.
[00:12:49] Suze Yalof Schwartz: But they don't, they don't learn about that.
And it's so interesting because that's probably the number one cause for a lot of health conditions. And the other thing is stress.
[00:12:58] Abby McCoy: Oh, yes.
[00:12:58] Suze Yalof Schwartz: Stress. They're not trained meditation teachers, which I think doctors, nurses should all get certified. And become meditation teachers because patients come in, they're super stressed out.
That only increases the symptoms, and being able to just teach 'em a little breath exercise to decrease and calm down will not only help them feel better, but it'll really make an impact on their health.
[00:13:25] Abby McCoy: It all comes back to that work-life balance in nursing and in your own business. I'll sometimes say, oh, I took a minute to read to the baby.
Well, that's wonderful. That still wasn't time for myself. It's hard. You feel selfish to take out time for yourself, but I think I need to get better about that.
[00:13:42] Suze Yalof Schwartz: I love that you just said that because self-care is not selfish. In fact, it's selfless. If you take care of yourself, you are better able to take care of the other people around you.
If you do not take care of yourself, you become useless to the other people around you because it's really hard. To be high functioning and to even be present. And that is really the only thing that anybody wants is to be seen, heard, and know that they matter. But if you are so busy doing all the stuff, that doesn't really matter at the end of the day, not your eulogy values.
And I say eulogy values are those values that people always talk about when someone dies and you listen to it and you're like, they were a great person. They gave to charity. They were really present, they made you feel good. Those are the values that actually matter the most, what kind of friend you are.
So taking that time to just care for yourself so you can be the best version of yourself is a selfless act. Self-care is selfless.
[00:14:52] Abby McCoy: One of my nurse friends said every night before she'd come to work, she would just lay on the bathroom floor and just cry for a while. I've had nursing jobs where I cried the whole way there and I cried the whole way back every shift, and it mostly comes down to the way you're treated these bad situations where you're being physically and verbally abused by patients on a daily basis and sometimes by different team members.
That wears you down. You try to say, uh, you know, they don't know any better and that's the truth, or they don't know any better. You know, it's not about me, that's about them. But it still kind of starts to chip away at you and then year after year you just end up like, what am I doing here still?
[00:15:37] Katherin Vasilopoulos: I wanna ask Suze, your opinion on this mind shift from being employed full-time to then becoming your own entrepreneur.
Like what kind of advice do you have for Abby?
[00:15:48] Suze Yalof Schwartz: Well for her, I obviously would say that managing her stress levels and making a separation between your family time and your work time is gonna be challenging because you're working from home and that's just hard. So even if you just pretend by going outside your door and reopening your door and coming back in when you're the writer, Abby, the writer, and then going out through the door and then reopening your door and coming back in when you're Abby mommy. I know that that sounds strange, but just making that little act of separation and working in an area of your home that if you can, if there it's possible, maybe it's the basement, maybe it's somewhere where maybe it's outside, where you can just be and write, it doesn't feel like home. That I think is probably a really important thing. And taking time to take those mental health breaks for yourself.
Taking time to do something that's not work and parenting. So how do I do that? I schedule time for fun. And fun sometimes in my life wasn't happening because I was working all day and then going home and being a mom. And so I decided to take up pickleball. And I met all these different people. I created a new network.
These, they're not people who talk to me about work. They're not people who talk to me about parenting. They're total random strangers who I really like, and that's been really helpful. So finding something that you can do that's creative and that shut your brain off. Juggling. I know that sounds really weird, but getting three balls and learning how to juggle just forces you to kind of stop thinking and stop doing and do something that's totally different.
And succeed is something else. And it's fun.
[00:17:48] Abby McCoy: Yeah.
[00:17:49] Katherin Vasilopoulos: And it's fun. Exactly. Of course there would be a tutorial on juggling.
[00:17:51] Abby McCoy: Of course.
[00:17:52] Katherin Vasilopoulos: Of course.
[00:17:52] Suze Yalof Schwartz: There's a tutorial on everything. University of YouTube.
[00:17:58] Katherin Vasilopoulos: University of YouTube.
What are the biggest ups and downs that you've experienced just being your own boss?
[00:18:10] Abby McCoy: Well, I got kind of headhunted in September by a, content editor. I got invited on as a staff writer and I wasn't sure whether to take it. It didn't pay as much I thought as it should, but I'm so glad I took it. It was a big high for me to get sought out, and that was a really incredible learning experience.
And then I got laid off in January. I did not expect it at all and it felt really quick, you know?
[00:18:38] Suze Yalof Schwartz: Mm-hmm.
[00:18:39] Abby McCoy: Um, and so that was really tough cuz I had kept a couple freelance clients during that time, but I really, I did not have time to really build my business, so I kind of felt like I was starting from scratch again.
I had one week where I made two stupid mistakes for two different clients and I was so embarrassed. And I was just like filled with self-doubt and imposter syndrome. You can easily spiral against yourself when you make mistakes like that.
[00:19:09] Suze Yalof Schwartz: One of the things that Oprah, I just went to this amazing Oprah conference at UCLA.
It was mental health conference by WOW. And the surgeon, US Surgeon General spoke there, but Oprah also spoke, and what she said was that after her show, after every interview of her show, the person who was a guest on her show would say- even Barack Obama- was that good? So imposter syndrome is not something that's just meant for the little guy.
Everybody has it. Everybody wonders. So we need to become our own best cheerleader. And as they say, your brain is always listening. So anytime you have negative self-talk, your subconscious mind is hearing that. So the quickest way to stop self-sabotage is to replace your negative self-talk with positive self-talk.
So instead of saying, oh, I don't know if I'm good enough, you can say, I am so good at this. I am an incredible health writer. Who knew that this was my calling and that I would be so good at this. And the more you say that to yourself, look at your face. Look, it just lit up because it's true. But if, who else is gonna tell you that you're not gonna get that from the outside world?
So it's important for you to give yourself some inner cheerleader vibes every single day.
[00:20:46] Katherin Vasilopoulos: Just like there's Mommy Abby and writer Abby. I think you need to create a character in your head called Cheerleader Abby.
[00:20:54] Suze Yalof Schwartz: Beyonce has that, and she has a character called Sasha Fierce. Because she's an introvert. I don't know if you know that about her.
[00:21:01] Abby McCoy: That's awesome.
[00:21:02] Suze Yalof Schwartz: But she is, before she goes on stage, she calls Sasha Fierce. And Sasha Fierce is on stage.
[00:21:15] Abby McCoy: I dunno about you, Suze. And... I worry about not having enough work. I worry that I'll never, uh, breakout of the level of publication I'm in now. Like I've got these dreams of writing for, you know, big publications. And, um, I just, sometimes if I have a lot of tasks on, I struggle with knowing where to start. And I, I think that's probably pretty common.
Uh, and so I'll even start one thing and then jump to the other and jump, jump, jump, jump, jump. But I need to just focus more, I think. I don't know. What would you say?
[00:21:49] Suze Yalof Schwartz: Don't think about all the things you have to do. Just think about the one thing. What's the one most important thing that needs to happen now?
And have that be the thing that you place your awareness on. Anne Lamont talks about her brother, and I think it was called Bird by Bird, and her brother had to study all the birds and he was completely overwhelmed and he was going to school and he was freaking out about all the names of the birds that he needed to memorize.
And the father said, don't worry about all the birds you need to memorize. Just take it Bird by bird. And I think that's a great way to move beyond overwhelm and just take a bird by bird. Our goals are not always met the way we think they will be met. So being open to the way that things happen. For instance, when I first opened up Unplug, I was had this vision that there would be an unplug on every corner like Starbucks.
That was my goal, that was my dream, that was my vision. After opening up a second studio, I realized that was never gonna happen because I didn't wanna do that. Brick and mortars are really hard, but what did happen was someone reached out to me to write a book, Random House, and I ended up writing a book, and that book was published all over the world.
And that became the brick and mortar store on every corner. So being open to just pivoting constantly and the re-imagining of your dreams as you go along and landing in those moments that are really cool. And not holding onto the old moments. So my old moment of the Starbucks on every corner, after opening my second one, I was a little disappointed because that was the vision, that was the dream.
But then I created the Unplug app, which is available globally. I wrote this book, which is available globally. This was told to me by the woman who created SoulCycle. They said, where you start is not where you land. So don't worry about where you are right now. You don't know where you're even gonna be six months from now.
You don't know. You could be at Woman's Health Magazine. Who knows where you will land. And the other thing they said was, the mistakes we make are like tuition. So this is Julie Rice and Elizabeth from SoulCycle both said this, the mistakes you make are tuition. So every time you make a mistake, it's a gift because we realize, wow, I made that mistake.
I'm gonna learn from that mistake. It's never gonna happen again. But usually the mistakes that we make, which are bad, could have been a billion times worse than they were. And when we learn them, we're so lucky that we learn them then. Then for instance, let's say you didn't cite an article now. And it's in a small publication, thank gosh, right?
But if you had it in Prevention Magazine and someone called you out and they've got like a million subscribers, that would be a bigger issue. So when you learn these little things that seem huge, just appreciate the fact that they're not as big as they could have been.
[00:25:04] Katherin Vasilopoulos: My thanks to Abby and Suze for joining us today.
You can learn more about Evicom and Unplug Meditation by clicking the links in the episode description. For this episode, we wanted to share grounded insights about stress management that would really help listeners like Abby. If you know someone who's going through similar experiences, we hope that you share this episode with them.
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.