283: Why Ego Is the Biggest Threat to Your Joy

[00:00:00] Tiffany Sauder: You are not going to get better at something faster if you are not in proximity to like in collaboration with people who are solving the similar challenges. But you can only get there if you're willing to be honest with yourself and honest with the outside world about what you're stuck about. Like being vulnerable about it can be really hard to admit to yourself because then it's like, oh crap, I have to do something about it.

[00:00:21] Tiffany Sauder: Or you have to sit in the discomfort of it, both of which are like annoying. I am Tiffany Sauder, entrepreneur, wife, mom to four girls, and a woman figuring it out just like you. If you're tired of living a life of half to and finally ready to build a life of want to, then you're in the right place. Come on, let's go build your Life of And.

[00:00:50] Tiffany Sauder: Well, I am pretty pumped today that my hair is washed. I have had several days in a row of getting my workout in, but. Uh, little other self-care being able to actually take place. So I dunno about you guys, but my hair sometimes gets so like dirty that I literally can't, I can't think. Like I just have to go wash it.

[00:01:07] Tiffany Sauder: So that's where I was at. Just keeping it real. Today, I had on my calendar today to record a solo show, which is where I just push record on the microphone and go through a topic. And instead of teaching on a tool or something like that, I'm, I'm just gonna export. A few things are just like going on in my life, going on in my head and some lessons that I am trying desperately to keep in front of myself as I just go through the season.

[00:01:35] Tiffany Sauder: I've been talking on the pod quite transparently that it is, it's just gonna be a sprint this fall and there's not a lot of space and I can do it and it's a lot. There are things that like hijack my focus and hijack my brain and hijack my confidence. And so I was just like kind of inventorying my thoughts and reactions and conversations over the last couple of days.

[00:02:00] Tiffany Sauder: And I'm just gonna export some of those and I'm, I don't know, maybe these are relatable, maybe they're not. Maybe I'm the only one on planet Earth that deals with this stuff, but I find when other people expose what their brains are doing and telling them, it helps me reflect more intentionally on my own.

[00:02:16] Tiffany Sauder: And so that's what I'm gonna do. So we're gonna go through three things. We'll see where else my brain goes. Okay, I wrote down this, don't let your ego take over your joy and priorities. Don't let your ego, so I'm like talking to myself, Tiffany, do not let your ego take over your joy and your priorities.

[00:02:37] Tiffany Sauder: And I, I talk about in the Life of And academy, the difference between values driven decision making versus ego-driven decision making. And I have definitely been in seasons where I have ego-driven decision making. So like, Hey Tiffany, we love that you, you know, blah, have insert talent here and you know a lot about marketing.

[00:02:57] Tiffany Sauder: Would you be interested in joining this super fancy board? It's like ego-driven. Tiffany is like, oh my word, I am needed. Absolutely. That looks like an important room. I'm sure I'll learn things and meet people and it'll be cool and there'll be a party I get to go to. And so eco driven Tiffany is like for sure in.

[00:03:16] Tiffany Sauder: 10 times out of 10 on that offer, values driven. Tiffany looks at her calendar and says, oh, wow, you meet on Thursday nights. My daughter's volleyball games are always on Thursday nights, and in this season while she's at home and in high school, I wanna be available for those games as much as possible. I don't want recurring conflicts, though.

[00:03:36] Tiffany Sauder: I do have conflict sometime. And so values driven. Tiffany says, thank you so much for the offer. I would love to do that someday, but this is not the moment. So egos driven, Tiffany versus values driven, Tiffany could respond to the exact same situation in a very different way with a very different long-term consequence.

[00:03:55] Tiffany Sauder: And so when ego driven, Tiffany takes over my decision making, I get into a bit bit of a mess. Ego driven, Tiffany. I hope he listens to this. I'm gonna send it to him because I'm so proud of all that he's doing. But if you live in Indianapolis or in Indiana, Nate Spangle has just been crushing it over the last, I don't know, two years.

[00:04:14] Tiffany Sauder: He's really working on building a content platform, promoting and featuring how amazing the state of Indiana is, and he is just like crushing it. He's doing a great job and alongside crushing it, he's also just putting in. An enormous number of hours. He tailgated for like 72 hours. I'm being a little extreme but not much at the Indy 500.

[00:04:36] Tiffany Sauder: He's like doing all these insane races. He ran the entire Monan trail. He memorized like every county sea of the 92 County, like insane things. And it is incredible what he's doing, what he's building, and I'm so proud of him and I'm so rooting for him. And sometimes when I'm scrolling my phone. I'm seeing that he has 70,000 Instagram followers and that some of his reels are getting like half a million to a million views.

[00:05:04] Tiffany Sauder: Ego, Tiffany is like, I want to do that. Oh my word, I'm so far behind. Why am I not doing that? Why am my reels not performing that way? I need to get myself in action and I need to get with it. And so ego tri, he can a lose confidence in what I am doing and building and what is working. Ego, Tiffany can commit my time that I do not have to tasks that I dunno how to do against strategies that I don't understand.

[00:05:32] Tiffany Sauder: You know, like and ego. Tiffany can do all these crazy things that bury me under a pile of, I don't know, just feeling bad about what I'm doing. It's like so silly and I love Nate and I'm so excited for what he's doing. But even those people that are adjacent to you who are having success in an area that is different than you.

[00:05:54] Tiffany Sauder: Values. Tiffany looks at that and says, I'm so excited for him. I'm gonna support him in every way that I can. Which ego? Tiffany says that too, but values based Tiffany says, I have four kids at home. Nate does not values. Tiffany says, I have other businesses that I've invested and started that need me in ways.

[00:06:13] Tiffany Sauder: Nate does not like values. Tiffany needs to be available for her kids in a season that are important to me and. That is not the same set of ingredients as Nate has in his life. And so he has a different set of things that he's choosing to go after 'cause those don't exist. And so values driven, Nate can go do those things, but only ego.

[00:06:34] Tiffany Sauder: Tiffany can go do that. I don't know if that makes sense as I'm saying it across the pod, but I hope it does. It does in my brain where ego, Tiffany can sabotage. The choices that I've made to say, this is the effort, this is the pace, these are the outlets, these are the channels. This is where I'm going to go win those choices that values based Tiffany has made.

[00:06:57] Tiffany Sauder: Sometimes ego, Tiffany can come in and say, it's not enough. You're not going fast enough. Look where you're losing. Look where other people are winning. It's just not productive. So I don't know if there's a simple fix except acknowledging it. I was literally scrolling Instagram this morning. I looking at Nate's stuff and I was like, oh my word.

[00:07:16] Tiffany Sauder: It's incredible. And then right after that I was like, I feel bad that I'm not doing it too. No values. Tiffany has already chosen her strategy values trip. Tiffany understands her priorities, values. Tiffany has right sized her effort against these things in a way that are a little uncomfortable. But do indeed fit inside of all the other things and all of the other people that I've committed to and love and the roles that I want to show up in, it all has to exist together.

[00:07:48] Tiffany Sauder: And I think that's like the secret to the Life of And is like, yeah, I'm on social media creating content, but I'm doing that at an. Like an octave or like a decibel level, maybe that's a better way of saying it. A decibel level that fits with everything else going on in my life. We don't get to pick a decibel level of a gajillion.

[00:08:10] Tiffany Sauder: I don't know what a real decibel level is, but we don't get to pick a decibel level of a gajillion and every area of our lives, every single day of the year. It doesn't work. We have to rightsize things as they fit together so that the things and the people and the priorities that we've committed to.

[00:08:25] Tiffany Sauder: Are fueled by our values, and we manage those day in and day out according to our values. So anyway, I'm just, I guess maybe this is confessing and also just drawing it out for myself. I can take my happiness away in a way that is so unnecessary by just letting ego Tiffany drive the bus doesn't work very well.

[00:08:45] Tiffany Sauder: So, okay, that's number one. Don't let your ego take over your joy and priorities in decision making. Number two, I wrote down the power of collaboration and being vulnerable with your challenges are like trajectory changing, the power of collaboration and being vulnerable with your challenges are trajectory changing?

[00:09:08] Tiffany Sauder: I don't know, like six months ago I met, I'll use her name, Danielle Ireland. She was on the podcast with me a couple of weeks ago and she had mentioned like, Hey, I'm out here. I'm a, she's a therapist, she's a podcaster. She's like, I'm just feeling super lonely. And she was very bright and vibrant and clear about that.

[00:09:26] Tiffany Sauder: Like, I'm feeling super lonely and me being who I am, I was like, oh my word, I'm so sorry you feel lonely. And then I was like, you know what? I do too. I didn't say that, but I, it gave me permission to inventory whether I was feeling that same way and I was feeling lonely. Like I'm used to being part of a big team.

[00:09:44] Tiffany Sauder: I'm used to having an office to walk into. I'm used to ha, I'm just like used to having my calendar pull me through my day. A leadership team helped me identify priorities the fiscal year, you know, according to get me clear on what my life is gonna look like. Like I'm just used to all those external forces pushing and pulling and informing what my life looks like and in this world of life of.

[00:10:07] Tiffany Sauder: And I am set to architect that in a way that is more on my own. And so my strengths and my weaknesses are like amplified in this environment. And so I was like, I feel lonely too. So I got a group of women together to meet for lunch. That we're all kind of in this new media podcasting space, and that was a springboard for what has become just this like excellent relationship with Danielle.

[00:10:30] Tiffany Sauder: I asked her to put her brain into my life of Ann stuff. She asked me to help her on some monetization and marketing things that she work on, and we have both, like our brains have grown at an exponential speed first because we were willing to be vulnerable with, this is where I really am. Then we were willing to claim and name where it was that we were struggling and feeling vulnerable and behind and kind of stuck and plugging one another into those areas that like is not an area of strength for the other.

[00:11:02] Tiffany Sauder: Has like just moved us forward so exponentially and I think it's like just reminded me how powerful. Collaboration is being in proximity of people who are solving something similar to you. I've got YPO is a huge outlet of that for me. Other business owners. I was just on retreat with a group of business owners talking about like this idea of being in proximity with people who are solving similar challenges to you is an imperative to changing your learning trajectory in any aspect of our lives.

[00:11:37] Tiffany Sauder: I mean, I'm like even finding this is like. But my friends are very healthy. I would say I'm like on the lower end of the healthiness of my friends, you know, like I'll eat an Oreo still. Maybe that day will come where I won't, but I like will. I'm just like on the lower end of healthiness because I have all these super healthy friends.

[00:11:52] Tiffany Sauder: It makes me know more about that stuff because I'm closer to that information, like I'm in proximity to it. Kind of a stupid example, but. It becomes so obvious to me when I say it out loud that like, you are not going to get better at something faster if you are not in proximity to like in collaboration with people who are solving the similar challenges.

[00:12:15] Tiffany Sauder: But you can only get there if you're willing to be honest with yourself and honest with the outside world about what you're stuck about. Like being vulnerable about it can be really hard to admit to yourself because then it's like, oh crap, I have to do something about it. Or you have to sit in the discomfort of it, both of which.

[00:12:32] Tiffany Sauder: Are like annoying. If you decide to address it, it gives you another to do. And if you decide to sit in it, it's like, oh geez, Liz's pretending I didn't have to deal with it so much. So anyway, this has been just a reminder experience for me that when I sit in my office and do the things like, yes, I have to do that sometime, but getting out in the world, taking stock of where am I stuck.

[00:12:54] Tiffany Sauder: And putting myself into proximity of people who are solving or have already solved the same challenges, just critical to being successful. I don't know what your area of life is, but I'm sure there's somewhere where you feel like I'm stuck here, or I'm feeling lonely, or I just don't know where to start.

[00:13:11] Tiffany Sauder: It can be a really intimidating thing, especially as leaders and as solvers and as like moms who have the answers to everybody else's problems. Uh, I think it can be really vulnerable to sit in that discomfort, like that discomfort and that uncomfortable pause. Okay, third one. This is like literally stepping through my life right now, people.

[00:13:32] Tiffany Sauder: The third one is my reaction and choices will inform everyone else's experience. My reaction and choices will inform everyone else's experience. I am gonna talk about this through the vein of my own personal life, but then I also recently spoke to a company who was going through a ton of transition, and I think there's a professional application for this too.

[00:13:59] Tiffany Sauder: So, okay. Personal application, quick reminder. My reaction and choice is gonna inform everyone else's experience. So we are going on this house journey. We've purchased a new home. It's under construction. It's gonna be like six to nine months before we can move into it. And so the Sauders have some choices to make.

[00:14:20] Tiffany Sauder: Do you have two homes for nine months until the other home is ready to move into? There's all kinds of things that are helpful about that. Like we're not displaced and there are all kinds of things that are uncomfortable about that. Like it's expensive to have two homes and will our house sell fast or slow?

[00:14:37] Tiffany Sauder: And how much will it sell for? We have equity wrapped up in this and like all, all those kinds of things. So there's helpful things and unhelpful things about waiting until spring to sell our house. Option two for the SOS is to sell our house now, which means we have to take half the contents out of it because it needs to look like hardly anybody lives here.

[00:14:56] Tiffany Sauder: We have to live our lives as our houses on the market, which I've heard living in a show ready house is terrible. And we have four kids and a lot of activity, and we're not always here. And so we have to leave the house every day, like all picked up and just all the things. It's like logistically makes me wanna fall asleep thinking of all the things that have to happen to make that happen.

[00:15:14] Tiffany Sauder: Well, and then I'm thinking about the holidays that are coming up and are my girls gonna be displaced over Christmas? Are we not gonna really have like a Christmas tree and a Christmas experience? Will we be living in a rental or at my in-laws, or will we go to my parents' house for two weeks over Christmas and will we even have a Christmas tree?

[00:15:34] Tiffany Sauder: Like I'm just sort of like panicked. I, I don't always even panicked, but just like trying to reconcile a bunch of things that don't have answers yet. And so our realtor came through on earlier this week and was like walking through with me, here's the projects that need to happen. Here's the closets that need to be cleaned outs.

[00:15:54] Tiffany Sauder: This stuff that needs to be blah, blah. Taken here. I was like, oh my gosh. It was like a long list of things aside the rest of my life that I need to figure out. And Jr's leaning towards selling the house sooner than later. I understand why. It's like a risk off move, but it's also kind of logistically feels hard to me.

[00:16:11] Tiffany Sauder: So I have a choice to make in the way that I lead myself and my family through this uncertainty. I can focus on all of the things that are hard and terrible about it, which there's gonna be a long list of those things. Or I can choose to focus on the like adventure and fun and one time, like one off life experiences that come from being disrupted for the course of six to nine months, and like make it fun.

[00:16:45] Tiffany Sauder: It might mean that we have to eat dinner on the floor. It might mean that we have to have. Of different meaning of Christmas traditions. It might mean that we're at my parents' house for two weeks. It might. It might mean all a whole list of who knows what. And my reaction as the mom and kind of the cultural leader of that, of the family, just because my reaction sets everybody else to sort of attitude and outlook is gonna make a really big difference about whether this is fun.

[00:17:15] Tiffany Sauder: And everybody looks back and says, that was hilarious and a little hard, but we were in it together. Or look back on this experience and say, that was terrible. Mom was stressed. Everything was awful, and our house was a, our lives were a mess. And I really believe that my choice and what I choose to believe about it right now is gonna wholly drive all of my vocabulary, all of my choices, where I put my energy, the way I telegraph it to my kids.

[00:17:46] Tiffany Sauder: The fun that I decide to put into it, or the drudgery that I pull out of it is gonna totally change the exact same experience, has a chance to be two completely different outcomes for our family. I mean, the outcome is gonna be, I guess, that we're in a new house eventually, but the process can be terrible or the process can be fine.

[00:18:07] Tiffany Sauder: My reaction and my choices and my attitude is gonna have a really big bearing on what that looks like for everybody else. So that's like personal life thing. But isn't that the exact same thing in our work lives? I mean, I've been in client services for 20 years in my career and like when a client comes back with a bunch of hard feedback at like the 11th hour, there's a moment of like, you just wanna murder him.

[00:18:28] Tiffany Sauder: It's like you wanna quit your job. You feel like none of your work is meaningful, and you just get mad and disengage. It's like one reaction. The other is to say like, okay, we've got this much time left. We can do this. We are super smart and capable, and let's go order some pizza and take a 20 minute walk to give ourselves a break, but we gotta get back to work.

[00:18:47] Tiffany Sauder: Like two totally different reactions to the exact same experience. So I, I don't know, maybe this is about helping me understand how much is in my control. Maybe this is really the lesson that I need to hear for myself. Is realizing how much is actually in my control in a situation where everything feels out of my control.

[00:19:08] Tiffany Sauder: Because when our house sells is out of my control, exactly the day we move into our new house is out of my control. Where we spend, Christmas is out of my control. Like those things are out of my control, but my attitude and my response is wholly in my control. Maybe that's really what I need to say to myself.

[00:19:28] Tiffany Sauder: And maybe that's what you need to hear today. I dunno, when I was speaking at, I have some corporate partnership relationships where I go in and speak to their employees, sometimes all, and sometimes just the women. And I was doing one recently for an organization that's going through just a tremendous amount of change, like a tremendous amount of change, been around a lot different companies, and this is a very long list of change that this organization is being asked to navigate and.

[00:19:53] Tiffany Sauder: One of the things I said that they really heard and felt was our reactions are literally contagious. And I literally feel like this work I do is just about holding a mirror up for myself every single day, teaching what I'm learning, learning what I'm teaching, this continuous cycle. And it's true. Our reactions are literally contagious.

[00:20:14] Tiffany Sauder: Literally contagious. You know when you walk into a store and you hear, hear, you know, feel somebody just be like my word. Welcome. How are you doing? Today's such a great day. How can I help you? It's like, oh my, okay, I guess today is a great day. Let me behave that into existence. So I don't know. These are what's going on in my life right now, and these are the things I'm learning in this choice and decision.

[00:20:39] Tiffany Sauder: To want a lot out of life and to wanna be good in a lot of areas in life. There are, I think, a core set of beliefs that we have to go back and revisit over and over and over and over again to keep ourselves in the center of the road as life tries to push us to one side or the other. Even right now, I'm, I'm working on a ton of events.

[00:21:03] Tiffany Sauder: And so there's a lot of recruiting involved in that where I need to reach out to people and say, Hey, I'd love for you to join. And like, like fear is just yelling at me like, oh my word, these are gonna be terrible. Nobody's gonna show up. It's gonna rain. Like just, I'm like, oh my word fear. No, it's not. No, it's not.

[00:21:19] Tiffany Sauder: There's no evidence that would suggest that that is true. That is not true. And so I think as we step into new things, as we step into our own potential, as we step into. Leading others, we have to first know how to lead ourselves. And I think I'm just like really aware of that right now, that I am leading a lot of things and I'm leading a lot of projects and I'm leading a lot of teams.

[00:21:44] Tiffany Sauder: And to be able to do that while I have to be able to be studying consistent and aware of what's going on in my own mind, so. Anyway, thanks for listening you guys. Maybe this episode was mostly for me, but uh, appreciate, we're almost at 300 episodes. I just can't believe it. That's so many. I don't know if I've done anything 300 times.

[00:22:03] Tiffany Sauder: As somebody who is, you're really inconsistent. That feels like a very big number to me. I can't believe I've kept pushing record. But here we are, we're almost at the end of year five. And just appreciate all the areas that you guys are supporting, this Life of And movement. I, the speaking engagements, attending my executive retreat, the seat at the table events that we're holding in Indianapolis.

[00:22:27] Tiffany Sauder: It's just like super fun. So anyway, thank you again for tuning into this, uh, this week's episode of Life of And. If this episode has helped you at all. Please share it with a friend. It's the fastest way that we grow the show, and I wanna just like give a special shout out to my friends at Share Your Genius.

[00:22:43] Tiffany Sauder: They've been such thoughtful collaboration partners with me over the last five years. And if you're thinking about pushing record in the new year or thinking about bringing audio into your content strategy, you need to reach out and call my friend Rachel, the, uh, links and show notes. So thank you all.

[00:22:57] Tiffany Sauder: Appreciate your time and go crush your week. Talk soon. Thanks for listening to the Life of And this is your weekly reminder to keep making bold choices, saying clear yeses and holding space for what matters most. As always, if you like this episode, I'd love for you to drop a review and share it with your friend.

[00:23:15] Tiffany Sauder: It's the fastest way that we can grow the show. Thanks for joining us. I'll see you next time.