EP 23 Anchored, Aligned, and Accountable: Aiko Bethea on Transcending the Bullshit and Living Your Real Values
Julie Harris Oliver: Welcome to Deep Work Out Loud. The thinking that fuels our life, our work, and our leadership. I'm Julie Harris Oliver. is the podcast where I sit with another professional coach, and we do some work around a single concept, a piece of inspiration, a topic we've seen come up in coaching, something we're thinking about. And if we're really lucky while we're talking about it, we might demonstrate what coaching might look and feel like. But we'll see how this goes. It is all an experiment, and with any luck, you will leave with something that you can apply and use in your work or your life, or both. Today, I am here with Aiko Bethea.
Aiko is the founder of Rare Coaching and Consulting, a leadership development firm that guides leaders to successfully navigate today's workplace with more impactful approaches to leadership. has been recognized by Forbes as one of the top seven anti-racism educators for companies, and has been named an influencer to follow by Culture Amp. She contributed to The New York Times bestselling anthology, "You Are Your Best Thing," and her writing has also been [00:01:00] published by Forbes, Harvard Business Review, along with other outlets. She is a senior leadership consultant for the Brene Brown Education and Research Group, and a faculty member of the Hudson Institute of Coaching in Santa Barbara. And she was recently named the number three top executive coach in the industry globally by The Industry Leaders. And her book, "Anchored, Aligned, and Accountable: A Framework for Transcending Bullshit and Transforming Our Lives and Work," is out now. Aiko, I am so happy you are here. Hello. Mm-hmm. First things first, if you would tell us quickly, because we wanna talk a lot of things in this half an hour,
Aiko Bethea: Okay
Julie Harris Oliver: uh, what led you to coaching?
'Cause I know you've been an attorney, you worked at the Gates Foundation, so many things, but how did you get to coaching?
Aiko Bethea: I had the gift of having an amazing coach when I needed one desperately. And at the time, I didn't even know what coaching was. I didn't know what the experience would be like, [00:02:00] and it worked wonders for me at a point in my life where I needed one. And I thought, "Gosh, why don't more people know about this or have access to a coach?"
And I also realized there were, there weren't many people who looked like me who were coaching at this high level, and I wanted to make that more accessible to people
Julie Harris Oliver: Beautiful. So let's talk about your book. can you give us just the quick, , the quick what it's about, and then we're gonna dive into it, and also I wanna talk about the bullshit, , part of it, but
Aiko Bethea: Um, Anchored, Aligned, Accountable, it is a self-leadership book. I think right now when the world's a little bit unhinged, upside down, and for many of us it can even be our, you know, personal lives can sometimes feel like they are just out of whack. We forget the path to ourselves. And for some of us, as you know as another coach, people often haven't had a chance to even recognize what the path [00:03:00] to themselves looks like.
And this book at its core is about self-leadership, about recognizing your values, which
are your, is your North Star. Uh, recognizing how you engage with your ecosystem and the collective, the impact you have on folks around you, things around you. And then how do we hold ourselves accountable for what that impact is? And that's what it is about. But when people get that first North Star part about what they're anchored into so they don't become unmoored, their life becomes so much clearer, and some of the most difficult situations become simpler for them to navigate.
I don't wanna say easier, but simpler for them to navigate.
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah, I think clearer is, uh, is such a good word to describe it. I remember when I first heard this concept, people were like, "What are your core values?" And I was like, "What? What does that mean?" Um, until I saw the list, I'm like, "Oh, okay. Let's, let's do this." , And it is surprising, you know, I [00:04:00] ask every client, "Do you-- can you name your core values?
Do you know what they are?" And would say 0% of them have them at the ready. So that's so much of this work just starting. So the thing that struck me about the, , the book is, you know, historically, when I was doing values work with people, we would talk about the words and what they mean and, and what really resonates with you. But the s- the switch that this book made for me is you talk about what behaviors and actions support those values in your life. 'Cause it's one thing to say something is important to you, but if, if there's no evidence in your life or no behaviors that you do that support that, it really? So I wonder how you, , how you think about that part and how you came to that.
Aiko Bethea: I think for most coaches we are familiar with, "Oh, there's this values exercise, let's figure out values." But we don't understand, like, what's the purpose and how to leverage them. So
Julie Harris Oliver: Mm-hmm.
Aiko Bethea: take these two words that our client gives [00:05:00] us, and we run away with it. The behaviors part, I will say I did that first exercise in terms of being, uh, expected to name the behaviors when I learned Dare to Lead from Brene.
And she has this exercise in the curriculum that asks you to name the behaviors that reflect those values. But what made it more concrete for me as I started working with clients was, wow, and this isn't stated in her, her work, this is something I learned as I was doing more, uh, coaching practice, was, wow, when I name the behaviors, one, it's a measurement of accountability for me。 Two, it moves me away from just these words, but really what the meaning is and what's important to me.
It helps me to understand how, , to stay motivated. It also helps other people to understand how to motivate me, inspire me, and what they could be doing to demoralize me. It also helps in terms of setting boundaries. It helps other people who know more va-values to [00:06:00] understand, kinda implicitly if I don't say it, what some of the boundaries are.
Like, what's gonna be a no-go or what's going to be a point of friction. And it also helps us to make decisions more quickly. So, or if you get a gut feeling of something is off or out of line, there's some kind of misalignment somatically, you can get that feeling,
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah
Aiko Bethea: go back to revisit your values, then often you can find, wow, there, this, there's a breach in my values here.
And so I can make a decision quicker or understand how to re-readjust or reset just from knowing those two things. The thing I want to say, which is very important for people to understand, is that it is a privilege to be able to work in, workplaces where they're always aligned with your values, be it that your direct leader is aligned with your values or the organization.
Because people will ask me, "Well, it's not I'm out of my values, it means that I [00:07:00] need to quit this job." No. It means now you can be much more intentional about what's being asked of you, how you execute, how you don't, what's, what are, what are the questions that you're going to ask? Or also, "Huh, maybe this isn't the best place for me," and you can start exploring other places.
But the idea that you're going to find this place that is directly in alignment with your values and shows up that way all the time is almost like a ca-castle in the sky. And even I have my own company, and at times I have to reset and be like, "Wait a minute, what am I doing? This doesn't feel right." , And I just feel it's important to say that.
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah. it's not like your, , company's mission statement has to be exactly your personal mission statement. You can live within it according to your values. You know what I'm thinking about as you're saying this? I had this moment, um, I think this will also touch on the bullshit. , This is my example of the bullshit. Uh, th- I had a job, , at one point that was a big job, high [00:08:00] pressure, and I had a two-year-old.
Aiko Bethea: Mm-hmm.
Julie Harris Oliver: And I remember birthday, I left... Oh, this makes me emotional thinking about it. This child is now 24 years old, but this is lingering. Uh, I left work at lunchtime, and work was half hour, 45 minutes away from my house. I left work at lunch, picked up the cake, brought the cake to a house of people I didn't know, 'cause I had a nanny who was very networked in the local park, so all the local nannies would get together and celebrate the kids' birthdays. So I show up with a cake. There's 25 people I've never met at a house of people I don't know.
I dropped off the cake. I could stay for literally 20 minutes before I had to run back to work, and I cried the whole way back to work. And I just thought that, that is the last time I miss my child's birthday because I feel like I can't take a lunch break. 'Cause I realized was no reward for skipping my child's birthday [00:09:00] to work through lunch.
Like, there was... I was not getting promoted for that. I was not getting a raise for that. Like, that didn't help my career in any way. It just made me miserable. And I was like, "This is, this is so wrong, and this is not how I wanna live, and this is not the mother I wanna be, and this is not the employee I want..."
Like, all of it was just like, "Ugh." And it was a real turning point in my career and being able to put boundaries be able to be the parent I wanted to be, and it didn't harm my career at all.
Aiko Bethea: Invaluable lessons
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah is that what you meant by bullshit?
Aiko Bethea: Yeah, we can get into that. Um, so the first chapter of the book just outlines, um, believe me, there's no limit in bullshit, but it outlines about 11, and those are the ones that either I've grappled with personally and/or wow, this is what comes up a lot with my clients. And these-- And I-- The reason I have the bullshit in the first chapter is because for [00:10:00] you to do the things later in the chapter in a way that's very honest to you, you have to understand like what could be influencing you
Julie Harris Oliver: Mm-hmm
Aiko Bethea: and put it aside, or what can be giving you messages that aren't aligned with who you want to be and put it aside, and that's the bullshit.
And when people ask me, "Well," or they use the term bullshit like just any old throwaway bullshit, there is a very specific reason why I use that word, and it's based on the bullshit asymmetry principle, which is a real thing. And
I was like, wow, this really captures what I mean when I say this word. So if I read it specifically, it is, "The bullshit asymmetry principle. The amount of energy needed to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude bigger than that needed to produce it."
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah
Aiko Bethea: And this programmer who, an engineer, Alberto Brandolini, who created this theory, he also-- he usually says, , amount of energy needed to refute misinformation,[00:11:00]
Julie Harris Oliver: Mm-hmm
Aiko Bethea: misinformation bullshit.
So it's so easy for it to be produced because it's in our families and our communities of origin. It's in the workplace, these assumptions like what you said, one of the, , pieces of bullshit that's in the places that we work is that you can't be a mom and be successful in your career.
Julie Harris Oliver: Mm-hmm
Aiko Bethea: what'll happen if people knew that you're taking your, the day off of work for your kid?
Man, now you're on mommy track. Oh, now you're not serious about your job. So all these narratives, and for you to actually have a different belief or prove something differently, guess what? We had to have these studies from Lean In, studies from Chief, studies from all these places that show that actually women are quite ambitious, and actually being a mom provides all these different skill sets, all of this in order to refute this bullshit belief that's in our system.
So I wanna make sure people understand bullshit asymmetry principle is what made me name this. But some of the things, these derailers that keep us from [00:12:00] being our core self and aligned with our values: people pleasing, our ego, narratives from family and community of origin, misuse of power, either power being used over us in an oppressive way or us using power over other people for whatever reason.
So the list goes on and on, but we have to be aware of those so that when you ask me as my coach, Julie, and you say, "What are your top two values?" I don't just fly out and say, "Faith and family," 'cause that's what I'm supposed to say. It sounds good. I think that's right versus me really looking into me and what's important to me and why do I live according to that.
But for me to be that honest with you, I have to understand what are the things that would make me dishonest or to make me live according to some other terms or ways of being that are out in society or my community
Julie Harris Oliver: I love how you [00:13:00] said you can't live, laugh, love your way through this.
Aiko Bethea: Yeah. Right. You sit down and get your ass in the seat and ask yourself the hard questions, and if there's not the discipline around that or you need a nudge or a push, get your coach
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah. It, it's funny what you said about, uh, well, with the people-pleasing and the what are the norms and what is the conditioning and what does everyone e- sometimes when I just stop and think, all of it is made up. Like, people made up all the things that they're putting on us.
Aiko Bethea: Mm-hmm
Julie Harris Oliver: And so then the, the courage to say Some or none or is any of that actually true and true for me, I think is kind of courageous or can be at times
Aiko Bethea: What do you think makes it courageous?
Julie Harris Oliver: I think if you're... And I'm just thinking if your, if your values may be in conflict with, your family system or your [00:14:00] religious system or your, whatever conditioning that has been so drilled into you. You know, I've, , sometimes working with clients, even as we're talking about values, there's a lot of questioning.
It's like, "Oh, is that my value or is that my parents' value?" Like, "Do I really mean that or is it just this is our family value and I've been, I've been taught that this is what I have to uphold?" And then the questioning of that can feel very, confronting and frightening.
Aiko Bethea: Mm-hmm.
Julie Harris Oliver: I rejecting my parents' values
Aiko Bethea: Mm-hmm.
Julie Harris Oliver: that have been instilled into me?
Aiko Bethea: Mm-hmm. Yeah, that's exactly right. And, it's like opening Pandora's box because I have to look at things with a critical eye that I took for granted. It's super hard under a few circumstances, which is, wow, I actually don't agree with some of the things that the people who I love most or who did so much for me [00:15:00] believe in or taught me
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah, the people who taught me to walk.
Aiko Bethea: Yeah. Right. And then it's also really scary when you realize, or it can be so challenging, I don't wanna use the word scary, but the, um, really challenging when you deci- when you recognize, and I've made so many decisions, treated other people in certain ways in adherence to this, and now I'm sitting with regret.
I can't undo that.
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah
Aiko Bethea: I've been raising my kids according to this standard without even knowing it, and there's no take back. Now, there may not be a take back, but you have moving forward. And so in the book, I talk about things that I had to name for my kids that I wish I hadn't have done. I explained to them why,
Julie Harris Oliver: Mm-hmm
Aiko Bethea: but the impact I would've never wanted and taking ownership of that.
Julie Harris Oliver: I'd love to hear how you had that conversation. I think about that [00:16:00] all the time. Like if, uh, if I knew I had toddlers what I know now, I would've done the whole thing differently, right? And you gotta kind of forgive yourself, also, uh, I love how you said you talked about it with your kids. How did you, how did you do that?
Aiko Bethea: Oh, there, it wasn't even like it was one conversation. There were a lot of moments when I realized something. If we're just driving somewhere and I say, "You remember that time when..." Especially I have teen- teenage boys, so it works better to have these types of conversations when you're doing something else.
Julie Harris Oliver: Always in the car.
Aiko Bethea: like, you know, we're, we're driving somewhere, we're doing something, and even for them to understand why. so when I have a realization, I think about, gosh, I need to, you know, apologize for this or tell them where that came from and share with them why I wanna do something different. And I even ask them, you know, hold me accountable.
Uh, in my household, I don't wanna say every day people were always yelling, but yelling wasn't a bad thing [00:17:00] or considered w- it wasn't something that people tried not to do, I should say that. And it was a point in parenting where I was just like, I don't wanna be a yeller.
Like, it w- oh, I think I read something or learned something about yelling is, like, also abusive towards kids,
Julie Harris Oliver: Hmm.
Aiko Bethea: uh, or a type of abuse, and I never thought about it.
And I started reading the science and realized, oh man, how this messes up their nervous system, this, that, and other. I was-- And it was just like, I'm not gonna, you know, I tell the kids, I was like, "I should have never been yelling like that, and I'm committed to not yelling." Now I put some parameters around it, like, if it's the 60th time I'm saying this, I don't know what to do.
Um, but just when I have a realization, sharing it with them to unlearn it. And it's the same thing as when I have coaching clients and my clients are trying to, they're trying on a new behavior and they're like, "How do I do this at work? I've been, I've always been, uh, the go-to person. I [00:18:00] always have the answers."
And like, if I'm coaching them on how to take a coaching stance with their... So
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah
Aiko Bethea: they're like, "How do I do that?" I was like, "Well, you share with them, right?" I was like, "What, what are you afraid of happening?" Well, then I'm like, all of a sudden, Dr. Jekyll, Mr. Hyde. I was like, "Well, so what is it they need to know?"
"Well, I guess I need to share with them that I'm trying something different."
Julie Harris Oliver: I'm trying to think
Aiko Bethea: "And, and do you wanna give them context around why? Like, why would they, why would this be important to them?" "Because I wanna have this different impact." So say, "Hey- I'm not gonna be giving you all the answers all the time because you're here, you're brilliant, you're smart, and I believe in you, and I've been hijacking your ability to, you know, problem solve and to be great, which is exactly why I hired you.
So you're gonna notice I'm not gonna be giving answers and directing you all. I'm gonna be curious about what are the answers you're bringing to the table. Like, okay, that sounds really amazing to me. So, what-- And that's the same approach I take with, uh, I took with the kids is that, "Hey, [00:19:00] when I'm doing this, I realize it's not the impact I want.
I'm gonna try not to be doing that anymore. If you notice me going into that, would you please call me on it? My commitment to when you call me on something is that I'm gonna be appreciative versus blah, blah, blah, but I am gonna ask questions probably." Right?
Julie Harris Oliver: Well, the teachers, uh, the teachers. a Freudian slip. The teenagers
Aiko Bethea: They are our teachers. They are our teachers. What are you talking about? Can't-- aren't they the... They are the teachers, for real
Julie Harris Oliver: They will not hesitate to call you out. That is the beauty of it. and I was thinking as you were saying that with the, uh, yelling, I remember being very conscious of I am not going to hit my children, you know, 'cause I'm of a generation where we got hit. Um, and I, I was very firm on that is what I'm not going to do. I didn't realize when I made that decision I didn't have a whole lot of other tools, then there was yelling. then, um, like, as time goes on, [00:20:00] you have to think about what are you gonna replace or what tools do you need in order to do the behaviors that you want to, because the instinctive one is the one you don't wanna do anymore.
Aiko Bethea: Yeah. Yeah
Julie Harris Oliver: And I love, when you're saying about just explaining what you're doing, like what a relief for everybody. They don't have to then make up stories and figure out like, "Why, why is my boss different? Why are they not telling me anything anymore?" And trying to like make up a whole story as to what is going on, as opposed to like just saying, "Hey, I'm trying to be better.
Here's what I'm gonna do."
Aiko Bethea: That's right. It takes a lot of the churn out of the system. It also models that we can change and we can unlearn, and that I'm willing to hold myself accountable. I'm not the flawless person, and I do think a lot of parents are afraid to show that they're learning as they're going along. They're not the know-it-all.
They're not the perfect one. What I say, that whole idea of what [00:21:00] I say goes
Julie Harris Oliver: Parents don't know anything
Aiko Bethea: Right. We're learning also. And I-- when I'm actually telling them, even when you're in a team environment or when you're with your, um, your kiddos, to be able to say, "I don't know it all, I'm gonna get things wrong," it gives them permission to get things wrong too. It gives them permission to be able to say, "I don't know either."
It gives them permission to actually carry some of the accountability to say, "Oh man, Aiko, I think that there may be a better way to do this." And I would say, "Oh, tell me," because I don't know everything, versus a boss who always has the answers. They may not even say my way is the highway, but they may always have the answer.
Then they're like, "Well, why would I propose something new? 'Cause of course Julie knows how to do it."
Julie Harris Oliver: It seems that if, to do that at work, and if you're in a culture that leads towards or leans towards fear, that could be a really hard thing to do.
Aiko Bethea: Mm-hmm
Julie Harris Oliver: And [00:22:00] so there's the piece about, um, I kinda wanna dig into this a little bit. Uh, uh, we've been calling it psychological safety for a while,
Aiko Bethea: 嗯
Julie Harris Oliver: which I know is not... You know, there, there's things to be said about that phrase. , But how do you think about, you know, creating or fostering an environment, uh, not led by fear, but, , about openness and collaboration and there is a modicum of, safety to be even as vulnerable enough to say, "You know, I don't know.
Let's figure it out together"?
Aiko Bethea: Okay, I'll pick up and say yes, it is hard when you're in an environment that doesn't encourage not knowing, and maybe it even punishes you for not knowing or getting something wrong. And Part of this, which is part of the purpose for the book too, is recognizing what systems are dictating of us, are expecting of us,
Julie Harris Oliver: Mm-hmm.
Aiko Bethea: and us [00:23:00] having a choice to say, "Do I want to do what it's telling me to do?
Huh. Is this me wanting to do this or is it being required of me? How is this serving me or what is the cost it's extracting of me?" So I want people to be able to look at systems and what's happening around them and say, "But is this who I am and what I want?" it's a different way to go about shifting things because mainly a majority of what we see in society is about how to change systems.
If you're an activist or you're into social movements or what have you, we're always thinking about changing a system. What I'm inviting people to do, because systems can feel so overwhelmingly messed up right now that it can just feel like, wow, yeah, I can't even do anything here. What you can do, systems are just, they're made up also of people who decide to collude with it and continue or to be, um, you know, allow it to, or enabling it in different ways.[00:24:00]
So here in the book, I'm asking people to ask themselves, "Is this what you want? Is this working for you? If it's not, what would you dare to do differently? Or what are the conditions for you to do something different? What's the cost of you continuing on this path and why are you even choosing to do it?"
And when I think about, um, exceptionalism and perfectionism, which are types of bullshit, I know why I, um, am attracted to that or it, uh, or why I, , defer to that. It's because I was always rewarded for being right, getting things right, having it just so, plan, put in effort and it's gonna be great, et cetera.
And workplaces also reward us for trying to be perfect even at the cost to ourselves. So I know why I do it, but what I had to understand w- and I know how it served [00:25:00] me, but what I had to understand is what was it costing me? Mental angst, hours I couldn't get back, being on edge in a different way with people who I love.
And so then once I could see it and what was exact- exacting of me, I could make a different choice. Kind of like when you were telling us about going to your daughter's birthday, tears owed, and you, you had this oh shit moment of this is the cost, never again. This isn't who I want to be. I don't like the way this feels.
What is the co- oh, I work in the system that Whether they said it explicitly or not, it makes me feel that I need to be there instead of here. Misaligned. Never gonna do it again. So what I want is for people to look at systems and to be able to say, "What is it exacting of me?" And to say, "Do I wanna do that?
Why am I doing that?" And everybody can't leave their job, right, and run off or just be like, "I don't want this family," and [00:26:00] throw... I'm not asking people to throw their families away, but to think about how do I reset boundaries and how, where does my agency come into here? And I need to be accountable for what's happening here
Julie Harris Oliver: Is this what you mean when you talk about we, , collude with the systems that, with us?
Aiko Bethea: So this is one way we collude with systems that resonate. Like, this is so familiar. Okay, of course I'm gonna do this, and I don't ever think to get off the hamster wheel to figure out what's the cost.
Julie Harris Oliver: Mm-hmm.
Aiko Bethea: That is one way to collude. Another way to collude is by saying, um, "Oh, I don't want to be the one to have to now make a decision, 'cause now I've gotta be accountable for whatever the decision is."
And I'm sure you've met people who are like, "Well, my mom always told me. My parents made me do this. They da, da, da." It's everybody else. Even though whatever they're doing doesn't really resonate with them, they get to not be accountable because X, Y, and Z. It's colluding by being able to say, "I'm not accountable [00:27:00] now because this-- well, this is what I was supposed to do."
I always ask people when, when, whenever they hear that you're-- I'm supposed to, I should've, I need to, I have to, I want them to ask, "Says who?"
Julie Harris Oliver: Says who?
Aiko Bethea: That's right. And sometimes when we answer the says who, it's a person or a system or something we don't even respect, but we're adhering to it. Says who?
Julie Harris Oliver: I've, I've heard it, I'm sure you have too, like 40-year-old people blaming their parents for where they are in life.
Aiko Bethea: and older
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah. Like, you can blame them for the first, I don't know, 18, 20 years, and you've had 30 years to make different choices. What are we doing?
Aiko Bethea: Yeah. Yeah. But it goes back also to one of the things that you mentioned, which is why it takes courage to do it
Julie Harris Oliver: Mm-hmm. Say more
Aiko Bethea: That the, the whole line of reasoning that you gave us, like, well, [00:28:00] now I have to look at things differently. I might have to go against people who love me. also this idea, this weird sense of but you should be grateful, which m- which oftentimes limits us or restricts us from saying the thing that's really the truth.
I can be grateful and I can also say that was some bullshit.
Julie Harris Oliver: Mm-hmm
Aiko Bethea: I can be grateful that I had a head of, uh, um, roof over my head, food on the table, but also there was a whole bunch of other bullshit that was going on. And often we fall into the binary trap of thinking good or bad, right or wrong, versus, ah, this part was good, this part not so good.
And we don't know... And one of the things I'm trying to advocate more of is just slow thinking. Slow thinking, slow learning, [00:29:00] because as things are going so fast and folks like to say, "AI and this complex stuff and everything's going so fast," is that you can slow it down for you. I can slow it down for my household.
We're not going to 20 different sports practices a day. We're not going to be in every activity under the sun. We don't always have to go on some vacation somewhere. We can do a staycation and love our time in the house
Julie Harris Oliver: The running joke in my house was I presented soccer to my kids as, "You don't wanna play soccer, do you?" To
Aiko Bethea: Yeah, all of the
Julie Harris Oliver: they bring it up
Aiko Bethea: But giving them some agency, do you really wanna do that? Okay, you know what it's gonna require is this, this, and this. And not only what it's gonna require of them, but what it's gonna require of the household so that people can understand all the different moving parts. Not saying that I'm not going to take you to the 10,000 practices, [00:30:00] but I want you to understand what it means for all of us in this investment
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah. And for soccer in particular, I'm like, "We're so tired. Are we really getting up at 7:00 every Saturday and Sunday?"
Aiko Bethea: Pick your sport. Baseball, oh my God, that's like the worst. Oh my gosh
Julie Harris Oliver: It's hard. It's hard out there in these streets.
Aiko Bethea: Mm-hmm.
Julie Harris Oliver: Being aware of the time, I would like to talk to you for about three hours. Are you available right now? So I've heard you say, am I withholding and who do I wanna be?" I understand the who do I wanna be, right? That's what-- that's really what this work is about. And talk about the what am I withholding piece. how do you look at that?
Aiko Bethea: I think there's so many ways to unpack what withholding looks like. One is what we've been talking about, which is easy to pick up, which is withholding our, um, permission. Permission for me to be critical of people who I love and places I [00:31:00] love. permission for me to be something different, to do something different.
Permission for me to have a new belief system. Permission for me to be a different type of parent. So withholding looks like a lot of things. I think permission is a real, is one of the larger aspects of how it can come up. But withholding can also look like the other thing that makes this work really hard, which isn't just courage, but it is rest and
Julie Harris Oliver: Hmm
Aiko Bethea: spaciousness.
Can't-- When I talked about the three components of a transformational life connection, connection with yourself and others, learning, growth, expansion, and then rest and spaciousness. Rest and spaciousness is what enables us to do, to have connection with ourselves and others and learn and ex- learning and expansion
Julie Harris Oliver: It's the last thing we do
Aiko Bethea: And we withhold rest and spaciousness from ourselves quite a bit because we're rushing from one thing to another.
We are binging television or, or [00:32:00] other numbing behaviors. We are trying to keep up with the Joneses. We are doing all the supposed to, should, have to bullshit. And when you're unable-- When, when you're re- withholding rest and spaciousness, you are not at capacity. You do not have the capacity to actually have healthy connection with yourself and others because that's a lot of emotional labor for one, that many of us don't even know how to hold and carry.
And learning expansion and growth means that we're curious and we're challenging ourselves and other things around us, especially systems and that takes quite a bit of, um, tax in terms of thought as well. So withholding that, that disables everything when we're not allowing ourselves rest and spaciousness and also allowing ourselves rest and spaciousness means we're giving ourselves permission to do-- to lean into rest and spaciousness and permission to say no to a lot of things
Julie Harris Oliver: Did you ever think that, like, permission to rest would be the radical act?[00:33:00]
Aiko Bethea: I think Yes, because our society runs on, especially when I think about Western world, world culture, exchange for ti- time for labor,
Julie Harris Oliver: Time is money
Aiko Bethea: for pay to be able to exist and live.
Julie Harris Oliver: Mm-hmm
Aiko Bethea: So extractive. And so it makes perfect sense that I have to give myself permission to go against a big system that demands these things of me to live a certain type of way that I'm supposed to want Who would think that we would have to pay for healthcare when we're sick?
Julie Harris Oliver: Water
Aiko Bethea: yeah. So I think, I think, uh, a lot of this requires us to step outside of the bubble and step into ourselves and interrogate a lot of things that we take as a given And to do it with self-compassion. [00:34:00] And there's also a dearth of self-compassion
Julie Harris Oliver: 'Cause when you start doing it, as you said, there's gonna be a lot of cringing looking backwards.
Aiko Bethea: Yeah
Julie Harris Oliver: able to give yourself grace and forgive yourself. And going back to Maya Angelou, when you know better, you can do better. Okay, what would you leave us with?
Aiko Bethea: Get the book. Come to the retreat in October if you can. Have a great retreat in Costa Rica, which will be digging into this work. The reason why we're doing that retreat is a way to get people outside of their system.
Julie Harris Oliver: Amazing
Aiko Bethea: those are two things I would leave people with. And also just do the work. Start imagining and dreaming who you wanna be and how you want your life to be.
Do the work
Julie Harris Oliver: And give yourself permission. Where can people find you?
Aiko Bethea: On Instagram at Rare, R-A-R-E, underscore Coach, or on [00:35:00] LinkedIn or our website, rarecoaching.net
Julie Harris Oliver: And I'll put all the links in the show notes.
Aiko Bethea: Thank you, Julie. Thank you for having me
Julie Harris Oliver: you. Thank you, Aiko. This was so fun
This has been Deep Work Out Loud. I'm Julie Harris Oliver. I'd like to thank Aiko Bethea for joining the podcast. If any of this resonates with you, please subscribe, leave a review in all the podcast places. And if you'd like to work with me, you can find me at julieharrisoliver.com. And let me leave you with this invitation to do some work around your values.
Are they really yours? What of your behaviors and actions support those values? And are they different than what you originally thought? Think about it. Try some things. Report back. Thanks for listening. See you next time