Enough, the Podcast

Have you ever wondered if people in the public eye feel bouts of not-enoughness? And if so, how they handle it? 

Janette Manrara is a former pro dancer on Strictly Come Dancing, a television show watched by 12-18 million people each week. Janette now hosts the TV programme, It Takes Two, and recently published Tiny Dancer, Big World: How to find fulfilment from the inside out. 

In this conversation, Janette and I discuss her unusual entry into professional dance (her “wiggly career”), her moments of not-enoughness resulting from the rejections along the way, and how she finally learned to relate to moments of imposter syndrome and self-doubt (because – spoiler alert – they never go away). There’s a secret insight from Janette in the Outro, so listen to the very end.

(3:18) Mandy’s experience of ballroom dancing.

(6:18) Self-love has been a quest for Janette.

(7:31) Janette shares her career moments of not feeling enough.

(14:11) LA is the most ruthless place on earth for rejection.

(18:57) Janette’s first year on Strictly

(20:56) Her inner critic and not feeling good enough or liked on the show.

(23:26) What Janette would say to her younger self.

(24:42) Lenny Kravitz also has bouts of not-enoughness.

(25:28) Defensive pessimism and a recap of Janette’s points.

(27:28) Imposter syndrome – Janette had no “specialty”

(32:15) Adam Grant’s Overblown Implications Effect, and ‘what are you listening for?’

(34:38) Wiggly careers/skill stacking.

38:52 Emma Reid Turrell: 3 reasons your imposter syndrome might get activated.

(40:20) How Janette handles moments of imposter syndrome.

(44:16) Gratitude (it works, even if it sounds “old hat”).

(47:08) The biggest takeaway Janette readers experience from her book.

(49:00) Enoughness is a practice. Recap of Janette’s practices.

(50:36) Janette’s Brick of Wisdom.

(51:25) Outro and secret bonus insight from Janette on what dance is like for her.

LINKS

Janette Manrara’s book.

Janette on Instagram.

Mandy Lehto on Instagram.

IG video of Lenny Kravitz discussing his moments of self-doubt.

Poet Alix Klingenberg on IG.

Episode 64 on Imposter Syndrome.

In this conversation, Emma and I dig into what’s keeping us “bound”, overwhelmed, and feeling not-enough. We touch on the types of happiness (Emma’s been researching happiness for 20 years) and why a contemplative practice is the foundation of having a more life-affirming relationship with yourself. You’ll hear about how people get “committed to burnout,” and how to break out of what Emma calls the “Matrix” that’s keeping you stuck and exhausted. There’s also a cameo from Dr Anna Lembke, best-selling author of Dopamine Nation, and Stanford professor. Emma and I get into the programs that are running our behaviours and thoughts – including one scenario where a salesperson insulted me, and I opened my wallet, fully aware of what I was doing (and I did it anyway!). Emma, why do we do this? Emma’s practical, evidence-based suggestions give you a path back to freedom, energy and your power. 

Links

Emma Seppälä’s website (and books)

Emma on Instagram

Mandy on Instagram

Sky breathing technique

Anna Lembke’s book, Dopamine Nation

How many Mondays do you have left? You’re about to find out. Coach and author, Jodi Wellman and I hang out with the Grim Reaper in today’s conversation. We start with a pre-mortem, a pulse check of where you are right now, while you’re still on this side of the lawn. What areas of your life are in the Dead Zone? What teeny tiny steps can you take right now to zhuzh up those parts that are ho-hum? You’ll rate yourself on Jodi’s Astonishingly Alive quadrant and discover if it’s more meaning or fun (or both) that will defibrillate your existence. Uplifting and thought-provoking. 

Links

Jodi Wellman’s website (includes book and QUIZ)

Jodi Wellman on Instagram

Mandy Lehto on Instagram

Zizou and Roger Federer video

Episode 62 of Enough, the Podcast

We Croak app

3:11 Jodi and Mandy riff on why they think so much about death.

10:11 “Fine” is the most dangerous f-word. The three stooges of bore-out, and how our lives grow stale.

13:06 Only 16.6% of people Jodi polled would feel like they had lived fully if they died tonight.

16:48 Use the pre-mortem to diagnose the “dead zones.”

19:11 Jodi’s Astonishingly Alive framework

21:45 Are you Meaningfully Bored or Vitally Empty?

23:52 Jodi’s alive-alicious sentence stem to play with.

24:50 Start small – don’t go gangbusters!

32:13 Zizou & Roger Federer story.

35:08 The Astonishingly Alive Zone (do we have to live here? Sounds exhausting).

38:38 Sometimes we don’t take action on a dream because it’s safer to keep it pristine…

43:03 Calculate how many Mondays you have left & Brick of Wisdom

As a high achiever, you’ve probably spent your career optimising for productivity, efficiency, and the bottom line. But there comes a time when that old winning formula no longer cuts it. Maybe you’ve been promoted, or you’re leading a bigger team. Maybe you’ve been told to bring more energy, charisma, and presence to your leadership so that others want to follow you. Research shows that bringing play, fun, and creativity to work can help to retain colleagues, and inspire more innovative ideas. Before you freeze and say, I’m the most un-fun person I know (shriek emoji), stay with me. I promise, there’s no juggling or stand-up comedy required. Today’s guests are going to teach you how (and WHY) to bring more energy and fun to your leadership. Richard Medcalf is an author and coach who heads CEO circles with fun and a lightness of touch. Consultant clinical neuropsychologist, Dr Antonia Kirkby explains our brains on play, and why you want to be optimising for connection in meetings. The episode is full of ideas you can try right away.

Richard Medcalf

Dr Antonia Kirkby on LinkedIn

Video of the Restaurant of Mistaken Orders.

Forbes article, “Elevating Leadership Through the Science of Fun.”

Forbes article, “The Forgotten Art of Having Fun.”

HBR article, “Leading with Humour.”

Today's guest is Jen Mann, ex-ballet dancer and co-author of the international best-seller, The Secret Language of the Body. In this conversation we discuss how Jen’s early life contributed to the perfectionism, people-pleasing and self-criticism that would ultimately end in chronic illness that traditional medicine was unable to solve. Frustrated and anxious, Jen started connecting the dots between the mind-body cross-over with the clients she was supporting after her ballet career ended. She pieced together insights on how to heal herself by increasing her vagal tone and somatic experiencing, alongside talk therapy and physio. She shares 3 key tips for longer-term healing, as well as 5 practical things you can do right away to decrease your perception of stress during days of back-to-back meetings.

3:52 My childhood was a perfect set up for anxiety

9:21 Jen becomes a professional ballet dancer

13:31 What came after Jen’s ballet career 

14:50 Jen spots connections between her clients’ work stress and their physical pain

16:00 The symptoms she was seeing in her clients – and how her own chronic illness symptoms started

20:50 Unresolved feelings of not-enoughness and emotional repression cause illness

25:40 Jen’s body said “Enough!”

28:42 Window of Tolerance

35:17 Conventional medicine didn’t work for Jen, and what she discovered instead

39:57 Vagal tone

44:39 Three tips for longer-term change

51:15 Five strategies you can use at work to soothe your nervous system during hectic days

1:03 Jen’s Brick of Wisdom

Links:

Jen Mann and Karden Rabin’s website (with book and program)

Jen Mann on Instagram

Mandy Lehto on Instagram

Episode 55 with Tatiana Poliakova

What are sub-routines? Author, coach, and “CEO Whisperer” Jerry Colonna adopts a term from computer programming, referring to the software that runs under an application, likening this to our belief systems laid down early in life. Jerry uses radical self-inquiry on me (unexpectedly) to probe my belief of “I must be constantly productive to be worthy” – a common sub-routine in high-achievers. Jerry invites us to consider the beliefs we’ve inherited from our ancestors in attempts to belong (as well as the subroutines those ancestors might’ve been running). How might these sub-routines be running under your leadership? We end with Jerry’s suggested practice and the core question to use in your own self-inquiry. The vibe of this episode? Deep, reflective, thought-provoking. 

*Explicit. Mentions suicide. 

4:03 Mandy’s Sedona ancestry experience

9:54 What does ‘belonging’ mean? – “To whom do I belong as a white, cis-gender man?”

11:50 Radical self-inquiry

14:55 Who am I? How did I come to be? Why do I do things that I do?

15:24 Sub-routines

17:20 Jerry’s career in VC (and working himself to death)

20:25 Examples of sub-routines

24:30 How Jerry worked through his sub-routines

30:00 Jerry does radical self-inquiry on Mandy

35:07 Behaviours persist when they provide a benefit

47:09 Relevance of sub-routines to working life

47:45 Jerry’s suggestion of what you can try – his core question to sit with

52:55 Jerry’s Brick of Wisdom

Links:

Jerry Colonna’s Reboot website.

Jerry Colonna on Instagram.

Mandy Lehto on Instagram.

Jerry Colonna on LinkedIn.

Gay Hendricks’s book The Big Leap.

What is high-functioning anxiety? Dr Lalitaa Suglani takes us through everything you need to know – how HFA shows up day to day; where it comes from; and what you can do if you think you might have HFA. Dr Suglani is an award-winning psychologist and author of High-Functioning Anxiety: A 5-step guide to calming the inner panic and thriving (Hay House). We get into Dr Lalitaa’s own story of how HFA masked her dyslexia, ADHD, and how perfectionism and people-pleasing were running her life. She shares key actions you can start implementing right away if you recognize HFA in your own life. Poignant and practical. Join us!

1:43 What is HFA?

3:14 What would you be seeing day to day at work with something who has HFA? 

4:28 Does HFA show up the same way for men and women?

6:38 Where HFA might come from.

8:06 Lalitaa’s own story.

15:48 Steps to kick off the “unlearning” part of the process.

19:51 Noticing when you’re catastrophising, and when dysregulation. Shadow work.

22:35 Conscious change. Learning to connect with the body.

26:13 How to sit in difficult emotions.

29:45 Coaching question 1 about people pleasing, being taken advantage of, and resentment. How to shift this.

32:22 Coaching question 2 about fear of confrontation and never learning to use one’s voice.

38:18 Coaching question 3 about having ridiculously high standards. Lowering those standards feels like “I can’t hack it.” Intention instead of anxiety.

39:46 Lalitaa’s brick of wisdom.

Links:

Dr Lalitaa Suglani’s website and book

Dr Lalitaa on Instagram

Dr Mandy Lehto on Instagram

Dr Lalitaa on LinkedIn 

Dr Mandy Lehto on LinkedIn

Where did you learn how to be a woman who worked too much? Who modelled it? And if you don’t identify as a woman, stay tuned. The women in your life are likely overwhelmed and constantly doing – this episode will help you to understand why. 

Tamu Thomas is a former social worker, and now a coach and author of Women Who Work Too Much.

In this conversation Tamu and Mandy discuss toxic positivity and self-abandonment, and where these can come from (Tamu shares how she learned to overachieve in her Sierra Leonean family). You’ll also learn how to reclaim rest and regenerative selfcare, and how Grace Jones championed Tamu through hard times (Grace is available for pep talks, by the way). Mandy gives Tamu three real-life coaching scenarios to unpack. Insightful, powerful and radically practical.

2:06 How Tamu learned to work too much

6:37 Toxic Productivity

10:34 Self-abandonment – “It’s not your fault”

11:45 Being “nice” means it’s okay to feel bad, but not to look bad

12:46 How we learn to ignore our needs in favour of people pleasing

13:41 Tamu’s late diagnosed ADHD

15:28 Women and ambition; bossy leadership

17:46 The antidote to self-abandonment is safe community

19:23 Grace Jones gives Tamu pep talks

21:42 Post-traumatic growth and compassion

23:45 Regenerative selfcare – What is it? Why it matters

26:40 Boundaries

28:04 Regenerative selfcare in action

28:50 Good girl conditioning and stepping into bold womanhood

30:58 Regenerative selfcare is reading about political policies and voting

32:46 Coaching question 1: Corporate Armadillo. Woman in her 50s, has spent her corporate career armoured up. Wants to change

36:40 Coaching question 2: Woman of colour in her 40s who’s a people pleaser

40:35 Coaching question 3: I’m a midlife corporate lawyer and I’ve given myself to my job and my kids. I miss ME.

44:08 Tamu’s Brick of Wisdom

44:40 Outro

LINKS:

Tamu Thomas’ website and book.

Tamu on Instagram

Mandy on Instagram

Episode 74: Overcoming Psychological Exhaustion, with Rosie Nixon

You’re not completely burnt out, or incapacitated by work, but you know that something’s not quite right. Perhaps you’re more tired than usual, or you’re having other niggling signs, but you carry on. These things pass; they always do – until they don’t. That’s what happened to Rosie Nixon, author, coach, and former editor of Hello! magazine, whose career — however covetable and glamorous — was starting to feel too much.

Rosie shares the pivotal moment when she knew something had to change. What followed was her getting signed off work and a diagnosis of Psychological Exhaustion (she takes us into that doctor’s appointment and shares what she learned). We get into Rosie's journey of separating her identity from Hello! magazine, and how she’s navigating her drive with a desire for a more spacious, values-driven life in her late 40s. Real, raw, and radically practical. 

Links:

Rosie Nixon’s website.

Guardian article on breaking the burnout cycle.

Telegraph article we refer to (subscription required).

Rosie Nixon on Instagram.

Mandy Lehto on Instagram.

Episode 73:  Unlearning Silence with Dr. Elaine Lin Hering

Have you ever received the feedback to “speak up” at work? Say more in meetings. Turn up the volume. It sounds so easy but speaking up isn’t always that straightforward – or welcomed.

Today’s guest is Elaine Lin Hering, author of Unlearning Silence: How to speak your mind, unleash talent and lead with courage. She’s been a lecturer at Harvard Law School, and a Managing Partner at a global leadership development firm. Elaine’s clients have included Nike, Google and Pixar.

We deep-dive into silence — how we silence ourselves, how we silence others, and how it’s baked into the system. You’ll learn that there’s often good reason to stay silent in some corporate situations — politics, power dynamics, challenging individuals. Un-silencing yourself can be especially challenging if you’re not from the dominant culture...

This conversation feels like master-class--meets mentoring--meets real life coaching session. 

We discuss:

1. A scenario where an executive feels publicly undermined by her boss, and his feedback (when she brings it up) is to increase her confidence and toughen up.

2. A scenario where a senior executive has helped a new colleague and shared her client base, and now he’s getting all the visibility (she doesn’t feel she’s one to speak up and address it).

3. A newly promoted Partner feels like the token woman on the senior leadership team…Have they only promoted me because I’m female?

LINKS:

Elaine Lin Hering’s website and book

Elaine on LinkedIn

Mandy on LinkedIn