Episode 274: Unlocking Leadership: Tackling Ego and Enhancing Self-Awareness with Jay Scherr

Hey everybody. This is Dr. John back with another episode of the Evolved Caveman Podcast, I'm sitting down with someone who knows business from the inside out where most of the real problems hide. Jay Scherr is the founder of Jay Scherr Business Consulting and the host of Business Minds Coffee Chat, where he digs into leadership mindset and what it takes to build a business that doesn't fall apart.

Jay spent more than 30 years in the corporate world before launching his own consulting firm, and along the way he's become a master at helping leaders confront their blind spots, habits, and inner narratives that quietly shape and sometimes sabotage. Their results.

What I love about Jay is that he's not just talking strategy. He's more in my sweet spot of self-awareness, personal growth, and the kind of leadership evolution that turns good businesses into exceptional ones. So today we're gonna dig into the human side of leadership. The fears, the breakthroughs, the, oh wow, I didn't realize I was the problem moments, and how those internal shifts ripple out into culture, performance, and impact.

Jay, thanks so much for being here. How you doing?

I am fantastic. What a beautiful introduction. Thank you so much for that, John, and it's also fantastic to see you and looking forward to

the conversation today. Yeah, it's always great to see you. I always enjoy our conversations. We've been on each other's podcast a couple of times and I value the friendship, so thank you.

Likewise. Absolutely. So let's get into it.

So you talk about, Building businesses brick by brick. And what were some of the first personal bricks you had to lay down in your own leadership evolution and which ones were the hardest to confront?

Good question. So you had mentioned in my intro that I had a 30 plus year corporate career, and during those 30 years.

A couple of bricks that I had to not only lay down but also learn to work through was my own ego. So when I first got into my corporate role. I had never been in the corporate world before, and for many years prior to that, I had suffered with, self-esteem, my own self value, things like that, and just didn't feel that I was good enough.

So when I finally landed that first job. It was almost like an acknowledgement that, hey you're, okay, right? You can do this. And what happened though is I really, I moved up the corporate ladder fairly quickly within this first organization, but as that happened, my. Ego, which I had not confronted in the past, just got bigger and bigger, and that caused a number of problems.

But of course, I didn't know that at the time and I didn't know what was causing the issues. So anyway, ego was the first that I had to deal with. Then it was really just a matter of self-evaluation, really assessing my own internal narratives, dealing with that ego. Jay let me pause you for a second

because I wanna go back and ask how did you identify that ego is part of the problem?

Because I think that's a really common issue for a lot of guys that are coming up the corporate ladder. And many, if not most, never realize that there's a problem with their ego.

for me, it was around other people holding a mirror up for me, because I didn't know it myself. I certainly didn't have the tools. I didn't really have the self-awareness at that point. So it really was thanks to other people who were surrounding me, who were shining a bright light on the things that I was doing, the way I was hurting relationships, the way that I was showing up and thinking that I was.

Bigger than I actually was, and that instead of really working together collaboratively as a team, it was really more about me. What can I get out of this situation? How can I benefit myself? And the more. Rewards I received, whether it was financial, whether it was titles, trips, things along those lines.

It just continued to build that need of self-preservation and to show that I was somebody that was worthy.

How did you. Respond initially to that feedback or the constructive criticism. 'cause I think this is where a lot of us really I've struggled with this in the past.

I'm good at it now, but it took 50 years to really get comfortable with it.

So the short answer to the question is not I didn't handle the feedback very well. I certainly didn't handle the conversations that I felt were really just tearing me down versus looking at the successes that I had and really that's what I was hoping I was gonna receive was the attaboy or wow you're, amazing.

You're doing such a great job. So having that type of feedback was, it was very painful, and so I didn't handle it very well. I shut down. In certain cases, I would become defensive as opposed to just allowing the conversation to settle and then to ask some clarifying questions. Now, I will say that some of the conversations early on when this was first brought to my attention Could have been handled differently, but that's on me, right? The issue was me and I wasn't accepting that at the time, so I had to learn to listen. I had to learn to just pause. Listen to what was being shared with me and ask for some specific examples that would help me better understand, because this was the first time that I'm hearing this type of feedback and I just didn't get it.

Yeah. And it is Painful. since it took you, 50 years, and I would say sometimes it's something that I still work on, how did you respond to feedback early on?

thank you for your honesty. because I think it is a huge deal, and I'm not sure I, think it's, there's two parts to it, right?

One is I've gotta build up a thicker skin. I've gotta work on my self worth in order to receive it well, at, my age now I look at everyone that I deal with as exquisitely sensitive like we are all emotional and we all feel things deeply and we all struggle with self-worth.

So the other side of it is, how can I phrase this as gently as possible in order to give this other person the best shot at hearing it. Whether that's in my relationship with my wife or in business or with a client. I think it's really a skill on both sides in order to be able to receive the criticism well, or feedback well, and then to frame it as gently as possible.

So for me, I think. I got better at receiving feedback in a professional setting. Where I struggled with it the most was in my romantic relationship, because I realized that, and I think this is true for many of us, that it brings up shame if we're really honest, I don't like to let people down.

I don't like to disappoint people. And when they say, John, you disappointed me. I go back to, I don't know, 5, 6, 7 years old. I think there's this part of me that goes to, I'm all bad, which is shame versus I did something bad or wrong, or I just need to prove something. And so to be aware of that difference of I'm all bad versus this is something I just need to work on.

It's not a indictment of my character, of my whole being. It's just an aspect of me is something that takes some time to develop. Yeah. Thank you for your honesty. it's a critical point.

I would completely agree. And I think also when it comes to communication, understanding how different people have different communication styles, right?

So when we talk about not only giving feedback, but also receiving feedback, make sure that you understand the communication style. Of the person who you're giving feedback to. Perhaps they may have a certain. way that they receive and understand information And it could be partially in written form, it could be verbally, but even in verbal communication, understanding the right time to communicate, how to connect with that person, using words that are gonna resonate, making sure that the person understands what was shared with them, giving very specific examples as opposed to being very general.

In nature. General, information often isn't enough to be able to sink your teeth into and walk away with an understanding. And these are all things that I had to learn over time. But you bring up such a great point about shame and about attaching the message that's being delivered to our entire self as opposed to being able to separate that and assigning it to something very specific.

'cause it's too easy for us to hear something negative like that and to Say. that just describes me in general, right? I always show up this way, therefore, I am this, I'm this negative person or this person who has this, huge ego and, doesn't look out for other people or doesn't care about other people.

And that's tough to deal with and that's tough to work through, but it's also absolutely necessary. Yeah. Good Question. does that help answer the

originally asked and, I wanna move on to self-awareness a little bit 'cause that dovetails with this nicely.

you and I are both big believers in the idea of cultivating greater self-awareness. And one of my favorite statistics, which I say. Probably too frequently is Tasha EK's. Research shows that 95% of us think we're highly self-aware, and the research shows that it's about 12% of us. to my way of thinking, this is a huge issue for us as individuals, but also as a species.

how do you think of self-awareness and why does it matter for business leadership?

First of all, that's a staggering statistic, but I can completely understand it as well, because I think when you ask the question around self-awareness, so if I asked a coaching client, do you feel that you have a high level of self-awareness?

Of course they're gonna respond. yeah, of course I do. How could I not? And the reality is so many of us just don't. And that statistic you just gave. Proves that, and I look at my own life and I certainly didn't have that level of self-awareness. I had very little self-awareness. the only thing that I was aware of, which was not the truth to begin with, was the storyline around, and I mentioned this around lack of self-worth, low self-esteem.

And John I, and this is not uncommon, but. I could find the evidence to support that story and that belief that I had at that time, right? I would go to the ends of the earth just to be able to give an example of where I was not worthy or where, yeah, I just had a very low self-esteem. With that said, I think the, self-awareness piece starts with reflection.

It start, at least for me, and from what I've seen, it starts by taking a step back and really working to clear the storylines that we've been telling ourselves and reflecting on Who I am, what I've been capable of doing, looking for the things that have shown that I know more about my own self.

Things that have allowed me to move my life forward, looking for wins, and really reframing the storyline that I am telling myself and building a framework and a social circle around me that is inclusive of people who love me, support me, but are also gonna tell me the hard truth.

But the reason I say it's people who love me and support me is because if I'm hearing the hard truth. From someone who I don't really know, they may only know me peripherally. Chances of me really taking that information to heart and being able to do something with it is going to be at a much lower level than if it's somebody who really does know me.

They know. You know how I show up in the world. We have a relationship and I trust them. I trust that individual and I trust what they tell me. But I need those people, John, around me because you mentioned about blind spots earlier. I know I have them there.

Everyone has them. But you have to have the right. Person or the right people who can help you identify them first and then start to work on ways that you can remove those blind spots, new skills that you can learn, better ways of developing, higher levels of self-awareness and not allowing. To derail you, but hopefully helping you to be able to grow and to build on some of those areas that you may be falling short today.

Yeah, I think that's an excellent answer. your point about having people around you that you trust, in all capital letters is key. it made me a little sad thinking about. The number of people out there that don't have anyone around them that they trust for a variety of reasons.

and so critical information doesn't get into them. to me, self-awareness, I think of it as, having an awareness of what you feel, what you think, what your values are, how you impact others. I think I would add interoception in there. an awareness of the internal workings of your body, because that's how we figure out what we feel.

and I think one of the things I've learned over the years is to. Tell myself, I chose to be intensely curious and I can be curious about other people, but I can also be curious about myself. I look for the feedback now, whereas before when I was in my twenties, I think I dreaded the feedback.

I feared it, right? Because it did become soul crushing. It did shut me down. I'd get flooded. and it's funny 'cause I think about a lot of times I'll work with clients on taking in the good, like how do we take in the compliments that we get?

This is on the other side of the scale. How do we take in the really the negative feedback, the criticism and both are equally as important. So how do you see some of the self-awareness kind of impacting business leaders or the lack of self-awareness?

Sure. So first of all, I just wanna speak to the point that you just made about being able to receive the compliments as well as the criticism or the, feedback that maybe isn't so positive.

And interestingly, I look back over, my early career I talked about ego of course, but for a long time I had a very difficult time as much as I wanted it. I had a very difficult time accepting the compliments. I would always, I would just push it off to the side and say, oh yeah, it was nothing, or it was everybody else, or we have such a great Team.

I accept that and I appreciate it. That was so difficult for me, yet I craved it, which is the craziest Thing. dealing with that was really interesting as well. going back to your original question around, leaders and how you help leaders or how I help leaders become more self-aware.

Usually it's, we start with where I talked about self-reflection. We go through a values exercise. I ask them to create a paragraph for me on who they are. I want them to describe for me. More from the inside, what type of person they are, what is important to them, the things that really drive them, and the baseline that defines how they make decisions,

How they go through that process, and then I ask them to give some thought to how other people see them as well. I actually then ask them to go to five people and ask them. I'll give them a very specific set of questions to ask those five people, because I want them to think about how other people see them and what they think they value, and what's important to them.

That's their own self-reflection. But then I want them to get the actual information from those five individuals. And we do a comparison, which is really eye-opening because I'm sure usually it is wildly different from what I think that other people think about me versus what they think about me

in what direction?

'cause I, one of the things I could see is, 30 years ago, I could see me underselling myself. Then getting feedback from other people, and they would think much more highly of me than I did of myself. Now I would think it'd be pretty much more balanced, but I could also see it going the other way too.

Like I have an inflated sense of self, and they're like, no, he is not that good at this. Which way do you see it going more frequently?

Yeah, usually they undervalue, which is really interesting. So I'd say, let's

narcissistic.

Yeah. And that's of course out there. But really I think based on what I've seen, and this is not scientific by any stretch of the imagination, but it is based on.

Numbers, right? Yeah. So I look at the total number of clients that go through this exercise, and when the majority of them come back and they realize that, wow, I was considerably off base. In these certain key areas. And it helps you better understand that your perspective is very different from other people's perspective.

Now, does that mean that it's an issue? It certainly can be. So what we want to do is we want to make sure that there is parity between the two when we can. Now, of course, we don't have control over what other people think, but if somebody's looking at me as an example. They may say that, you don't do a very good job of communicating vision and mission as an example.

Yet. I think that's one of my strong points, right? That every meeting I'm talking about our vision, every meeting I'm reinforcing our mission, why it's important, what our core values are, things like that, right? I'm a great communicator. That's what I think. But I'm hearing from somebody else based on those five questions that, or the, questions that we're asking those five people, that isn't necessarily the case.

That is, that's a blind spot for me, and it's an opportunity for improvement and growth. Okay. So How do we build the necessary skills to become a better communicator?

And then we go back and we ask for more feedback. Have you noticed any changes? And we look at this over a 30 day period, a 60 day period, 120 day period, We have to have the information first because otherwise, go ahead. Sorry. Otherwise we just don't have any baseline

Yeah. And I love the process. I also love the example because one of the ways I think about self-awareness is it's not a unitary, monolithic construct. It's not like you're self-aware or you're not. It's context specific, it's niche specific, it's skill specific. And what we're trying to do is chip away and find those little pockets where we aren't self-aware and shore them up or correct for them.

that example fits right in with that idea.

Now one of the thing that tends to happen when you start asking questions and you're reaching out to these, five individuals, let's say. When you start to get the feedback and you start to realize there's differences between the way that I see myself and the way that others see themselves, and you start to make the corrections, you want more of it because you start to see that every time I have a conversation with someone else and they're holding a mirror up for me.

That it really does help me improve my skill sets. I become a better leader. As a result, I become a better manager, better business owner, better husband, better father, right? That begins to happen, and as you start to see and feel, talk about feelings here. When we start to feel the improvements, it's going to the gym it takes a lot of work. You don't see the results immediately, but once you start to feel the results, you walk by a mirror and you realize that maybe you look just a little bit different than you did six months ago. Other things start to change as well. You're changing your eating habits.

You're changing the materials that you begin reading. You just feel better. And the same thing happens when you become more self-aware. You want more of that self-awareness. That's what I've seen.

We're working on a book right now for relationships, and we've come to the conclusion that emotional safety is really the gold standard that we're looking for in a romantic relationship. If you have emotional safety, a lot of things spring from that, I think it's the same in. Corporate teams, and we know this is true to some extent, at least from the Google study they did years ago, looking at what are the traits of the most successful teams at Google?

And the number one trait was psychological safety. That's right. and so it strikes me that we need some degree of psychological, I would say emotional safety in order to give and receive feedback In an effective way. What do you think?

I completely agree with that.

That's a fascinating study. And when you don't have psychological safety and that's not part of your company culture, people shut down. Because they feel that it's not an environment where they can be open, where they can be candid, where they can be vulnerable, where they can ask for help.

We have to have that. Feeling that it's okay and it's safe, and that if I bring something up or have a conversation or share something that's very. Personal, but I realize that it's affecting my work, my ability to be able to lead. If I can't have those conversations Then I can't change, I can't grow.

I can't, I don't feel safe enough to have those conversations with anyone in the work environment. So what do we end up doing? We either shut down or we try to find. The people elsewhere where we can feel safe and have those conversations. It is a huge factor today in company culture. Now I've seen a shift.

At least in some of the companies that I deal with and then other companies that I study. But a shift moving more toward psychological safety, more toward having open, honest conversations. Conversations that quite frankly we probably never would've had years ago. But today we realize the importance of it, and it enables employees and other stakeholders to thrive in an organization, right?

You no longer feel like I can't, like I'm weak, or I need to push these feelings down. I can actually. Create an environment where I can have conversations like this, learn from others, and not feel the shame that I would feel by not being able to have those conversations.

Yeah, and it makes me think of, old school business cultures that run on fear and intimidation and power what we know from psychological research is that activates the people that are lower in the hierarchy.

It activates their. Sympathetic nervous system, the fight, flight freeze response, that stress response, so that's gonna limit the actions available to them. the different ways in which you can think are limited in a similar way to fight flight freeze. so you effectively cut out the possibilities of innovation and creativity as well as personal development.

So keep going on that point, I'd love for you to expand that out a little bit further. 'cause I want to hear your thought pattern there.

One of the things that I, got into positive psychology, I don't know, 25 years ago, and one of the things that we couldn't figure out in psychology for many years was if positive emotions are selected by evolution to continue on in our species.

Why is that the case? What do positive emotions do for us? They feel good. Okay, but it's gotta be more than just that. And so Barbara Frederickson, many years ago came up with this broaden and build theory that says that positive emotions, they undo the physiological effects of uncomfortable emotions, so it reduces your heart rate.

Breaks up, the cortisol in the blood, reduces pulse, reduces muscle tension. But more than that, when we're safe, we can think more creatively outside of the box.

We can innovate. We have space to do that. it also gives us enduring internal resources to help support other people around us. Now, on the flip side, with those negative or uncomfortable emotions, anger, guilt, shame, sadness, fear.

What those do is they tend to shut us down. They limit the ways in which we can act. You can run away, you can freeze or you can fight, but it also limits the ways in which we can think, because I can tell you if I'm being chased by a bear, I'm not really in the mood to think creatively about a marketing plan.

Sure. a lot of the things that we respond to in this day and age, our emotional mind is responding to it as if it's a life-threatening situation. you were talking about getting negative feedback or constructive criticism. A lot of us will react to that emotionally as if it's a life or death situation, and we get flooded and then you're next to useless.

I think to have greater awareness around what are the impact of emotions on us in terms of our actions and our thought processes, and then to try and take that into account, I think we as individuals have to work on our own emotional management skills and shoring those up and getting a thicker skin and learning how to deal with compliments and criticism more effectively.

And then I think on the other side, we also have to learn how to communicate more effectively so that we're not triggering people where possible. Again, back to that kind of idea of general communication.

Definitely.

Now I'll share with you that I have a client who when I first started working with this client, it's a larger organization, two hundred, a hundred fifty, two hundred employees.

And one of the things that I had asked of this client was to. Send a self-assessment survey out to the employees to find out. We wanted to find out what type of leader this individual was and if there are any particular areas that the employees would provide some room for improvement. Let's say how does this client do with communication?

How does this client do With. carrying on one-to-ones and evaluations and sharing the mission and vision of the company, setting specific goals, things along those lines. So the client said, absolutely not. I'm not doing, I'm not gonna send that survey out. And the more I probed, the more I realized that in this particular case, he just did not.

he was scared to receive the feedback and didn't know what to do. Had he received negative feedback, which in his mind he thought that he was automatically going to receive negative feedback. Now imagine for a moment that. You are leading a company and you don't want to hear from your employees about how you are doing as a business owner or as a leader.

Are you connecting well with your employees? Do they feel valued? Do they feel seen? Do they feel heard? Do they feel like they have opportunities to be successful in the organization? I would want to understand where I am today. So I have a benchmark to begin to work toward.

and a lot of the feelings that were tied up in this from this particular client go way back to, his childhood and the way that he was being spoken to and the way that he thought about himself. it doesn't matter how successful you are, it doesn't matter how much money you have in your bank account or what the rating is of your organization.

This goes back to psychology. If you don't feel good about yourself, if you feel less than the money and the way the business is doing. that's not gonna carry as much weight and as much meaning. 'cause you still, at the end of the day, no matter what on your bank statement, you still feel like crap about yourself.

I, to quote John Cabot, in wherever you go, there you are, right? So you can't get away from yourself and you can't get away from the feelings of low self-worth. and I've met with dozens of men over the years that are worth a lot of money and highly successful. And I would say are miserable.

But they did it all right. they did it according to what we were taught to do as men. And yet we're not taught the skills of how to show up better in relationship, how to have positive relationships, how to manage yourself emotionally, how to increase your self worth, how to deal with your attachment style.

That goes back to zero to two years of age. it's not our fault. But I would argue that it is our responsibility to learn the skills simply to be happier, because that's my bias for everyone is I want them to be happy and successful

or happier.

But we do need to take responsibility, right? Yeah. So what do we do about it? Once we have the self-awareness, how deep are we willing to go? How much work are we willing to put in? And is it worth it? Because I think that, at least in my experience, what I've found is that it. I know you've heard this a million times, but you really do have to meet people where they are.

Force someone to make a change or to do something that I fully believe is gonna be transformative for that person until they're ready for it, until they show up and say, I'm ready. Yep.

Yeah.

I think the other part that enters into this, that I see with men a lot is it does take courage. Jo and I are doing a lot of couples counseling these days, and typically it's the woman dragging the man into couples counseling saying, if you don't work on this relationship, I'm outta here.

And so it takes an ultimatum to get them to confront themselves and their fear in terms of going into this world where we're not that familiar of thought and feeling and communication and relationality. I also wanna encourage the listener to have the courage. And the courage Doesn't mean you're fearless.

It means you feel the fear and you do it anyway because you know it's the right thing to do. But to have the courage to be able to look at your own shit, your own issues Your own stuff and how can I improve?

Let me ask you something, what you just said a moment ago, and I see this often myself, but that.

Ultimatum. How do you think that works out based on your own experience and you, the clients that you've worked with? yes. So if an ultimatum is given to the man, let's say that if you don't come to this, if you don't come along with me, if you don't go to therapy, whatever it is, then we're done.

we're over. When an ultimatum like that is given, is the success rate strong?

The success rate of couples counseling in general is about 50%.

Okay.

I like to think that the work that Joy and I are doing with this kind of unique model we have where I see the man, she sees the woman, and then all four of us get together for the relational work is much more effective than that.

I also think that's one of the few things that will help to wake a man up and realize, oh shit, I really need to begin to take a look at this. Now there's a wide variety in that. There are a lot of men come in begrudgingly and then I try and convince them that I don't have two horns and a spiked tail.

and that this actually might be somewhat fun and enjoyable along with a little bit of work. I think it can go that way. I also think that in the course of doing this work, you're gonna be faced with some things that you don't really wanna look at, or maybe you're hard to digest.

I remember I had one client come in and it was a couple's client, and we saw them once.

The second time we saw them, the husband went on a 20 minute tirade about our use of the word trauma, and he was really upset that we were using this word trauma I validated how, yeah, I get that. That's frustrating for you. I'm sorry. And I can change my language and here's what we mean when we use the word trauma and here's why we use it and explain Big T little T Trauma and the accumulation of little T Trauma and how it has an impact on us and how it's basically, I like Brene Brown's definition of trauma as anything that disconnects us from a feeling of safety and security.

Back to this idea of emotional safety, which if you honestly look at your life. Think about what disconnected me from feeling safe. There's a shit ton of things. Now that's a low bar actually that definition's from Faith Harper. Okay, now that's a low bar for trauma, but if you consider it on that level and think of the accumulation of trauma little T traumas over time, and that enough of those little T traumas can create a big T trauma.

I don't know that we get through growing up as men without. Significant trauma. I would agree. Like I just don't see how it's possible. I'm sure there's a few exceptions out there. Sure. But growing up male is inherently traumatic at times. Think of put downs, think of risk-taking behaviors, think of fights.

There's all sorts of stuff. Rejection from girls. I think it's a fascinating question to me. Thanks for the question. I think we men are really resistant to doing this work and looking at ourselves, and that's one of the few things that I've seen really force men to say, okay, you're worth it.

I'm gonna do the work for you.

I think right there, what you just said is the strongest point of all of this that. If the other person, or if the situation is meaningful enough, do we attach enough meaning and importance to it to want to be open to some sort of change, be open to some sort of therapy, whatever it happens to be.

And if we can't answer that question honestly with a yes. But the real change from what I've seen happens when the person finally connects enough importance and meaning.

Pain to the thing that we want to change or transform before it can actually happen.

Yeah, I think you're absolutely right.

can I share a personal story that is embarrassing. so this was maybe three or four years ago and Joy and I were struggling and she made an appointment to see a couple's counselor.

at this point I was a little bit depressed and seeing things through a negative lens. And so we go and see the couple's counselor and we're talking not for very long, and he says, so John, what was it that initially attracted you to Jory? And I had such a negative lens on that I couldn't even access that.

I started answering as all the things that were bothering me or annoying me about jewelry. And then we left the session and we ended up breaking up for a few weeks, shortly after that. going into that couple's counseling session, I was at least anxious, if not scared. I was not in a great place.

we went back, after we got back together and we did a couple of six hour intensivess with a. Great husband and wife, couples counseling team, and that did the trick. But it's interesting to me that even I get nervous and scared about doing this work.

None of us like being put on the spot. None of us like being called out on our own stuff. It's not comfortable.

But I think what's really important about what you just shared, and thank you for that vulnerability and sharing the way that you did, For everyone that's watching and listening is that you have the tools, the strategies, the knowledge, the experience that if I'm an outsider, I would listen and I would think to myself geez, John, you have all of these different ways of dealing with situations like that.

That makes me much more. Comfortable knowing that feeling affects everyone. Yeah. And it's not easy to be confronted with your own stuff. And the first thing and I'm just gonna go back for just a moment because for so many years, feelings for me were, they were a no-no. Yeah. So I heard it from the time that I was a young kid, and I'm not pointing fingers or blaming anyone, but I got really good at shoving my feelings down and showing up.

What was your nickname back in the day?

It was, Stonewall. Yeah, Stonewall. Yeah. Say no more. Say no more. Exactly. So it as embarrassing as that. Is to think about now. It affected so many different areas, so many different areas of my life. And it also affected not only me personally, but affected my relationships.

And it certainly affected my relationship with my wife, where if I couldn't show or talk about my own emotions imagine, That's a very difficult place to be. And anytime something that something would come up that required a conversation like that, I would do everything in my power to avoid it, to walk away, to change the subject, to talk about something else.

I was just out of air either mentally or Physically.

and it's interesting to me because I think that's the first strategy of every man, pretty much I've ever talked to, including myself. Suppress 'em stuff 'em down. Ignore 'em. Yeah. I don't wanna deal with this shit. This is painful. This is uncomfortable.

I don't know what I'm doing here. I don't even know what I'm feeling, but I know I'm feeling something and it's bad and it, that's a limited strategy. Like that strategy can only take us so far before we start to erupt and go volcanic. Get really anxious. I think that suppression of a bunch of different emotions can either lead to volcanic anger or losing your temper or a high degree of anxiety, maybe depression as well.

and so I have a lot of compassion for men. I also wanna motivate them to evolve.

and you had said something earlier that if we continue to push them down, if we don't confront our own selves and why we feel the way that we feel each of these different situations stack.

On themselves. And it creates a ripple effect. That really does begin to grow. And that's where you talk about that volcanic eruption, right? And that's so true. And what's interesting, I know you see this as well, but when we have an argument about something with a significant other or somebody in the workplace, and we've had that situation where we've just not addressed.

Typically, the argument that we're having is really not about the thing that we're arguing about. It's more about. Ourselves and the situation that we're dealing with and the way that we feel about, the negative feelings we have toward ourselves. And unfortunately, that ends up coming out in other ways.

And so going back to leadership and working with business owners. Leadership and being an effective leader of others starts with leading ourselves. A huge part of that is self-awareness. Owning our stuff, owning our feelings and our emotions, and continuing to work on those.

Because if we don't, it's gonna affect our ability to. Be curious to iterate, to bring the best ideas, to collaborate with others, to be effective in the way that we show up. It affects everything. That's where it always starts. If you wanna build a successful, thriving business, build you first.

Build you first. Thank you. Work on that. It's interesting as you're talking, it makes me think of this really simple framework that we use with couples, but it's really applicable to every relationship that we have. Leaders as well, where in every relationship there's you, there's me, and there's us.

And so to have clarity about let's say you and I get in an argument, is this about us? Is this about you or is this about me or some. Mixture of those, and it's the most fruitful way to go there is to really focus on what's my part? What can I do better? What can I change to change this dynamic?

Because all too often we see, this kind of dynamic where, I'm mad at you and I'm thinking if you just stop being such a fill in the blank, I wouldn't be so pissed off and you're doing the same. And so we externalize blame, but I can't get you to change. The only thing I can control is me.

And I love that idea of just being clear, especially in romantic relationships of is this something I need to work on, or is this relational work that we need to do? Or is this my partner's work? And just to give you an example, like

yeah, please.

would shut down in arguments with jewelry and I would get flooded.

I didn't wanna say anything in anger, so I'm just like, I'm just gonna shut up. I would just stonewall. So speaking of, and we know, I, when I realized, I was like, oh shit. Stonewalling iss not that's a one of the four horsemen of the apocalypse according to John Gott. That's, it's not a good behavior in no in relationship.

So I was like, okay, so that's on me. Like that stonewalling behavior is my issue. I need to find a way to deal with that. I'm getting flooded. I'm going to shame. That goes way back to my childhood. And, so I, I also love the idea from Terry Real, it's a really simple phrase. It's if it's hysterical, it's historical.

In other words, if your emotional reaction is out of proportion to what's actually going on, like someone putting a dirty spoon in the sink and you lose your mind, that's not about the spoon in the sink. To your point earlier, that's about not being seen, not being heard, not feeling respected, going way back.

That's your issue if you're losing your mind about a dirty spoon in the sink. So I like the simplicity of that because I think we need simplicity when emotions get into the picture.

Absolutely. I love that phrase. And another thing that I think is really important to mention is.

You've been at this for a while. Of course, your knowledge on the psychology side and counseling and so forth is leaps and bounds above where I am, which is one of the reasons why I love being around you and learning from you. But always remember that it takes work, it takes time, it takes commitment, it takes discipline, it takes the self-awareness.

Everything that we've been talking about requires doing the work.

Yeah.

We do the things that are most important, the things that we don't do that we're choosing not to do is because we haven't attached enough meaning to it. So whether it's in leadership.

Business ownership, entrepreneurship in your personal life or professional life, whatever it is that you're working toward, it has to, number one, be important and meaningful to you and to others. I.

Look around a room of business owners and I see just, I can see through the line of questioning, through the way that they're interacting with others. I can see the discomfort. I can see the challenges that they're facing, that they're having a difficult time confronting because they, at that moment in time, although it's.

Painful. They haven't reached the point where it's important enough and they're ready for the help. And if they're not at that point, then I can't help them. I can offer suggestions, but the chances of them committing to doing the work. Is just not there. It's not strong enough. It's fascinating.

Yeah. I think you're absolutely right and as you're speaking I'm thinking, holy shit, like it. It sounds so much like an addict, an alcoholic, right? That we're addicted to ourself, we're addicted to our narrative, and if until it's painful enough to actually address it, honestly, we'd rather do anything else.

That's right.

And John that could be bleeding out on our p and l. It could be destroying relationships, it could be losing, just from a business perspective, it could be losing employees and not caring enough to find out why and realizing that I'm not holding myself accountable. Right.

A-A-C-E-O or an owner could be externalizing blame onto the employees that are leaving oh, they're lazy. Absolutely. Or they're they're young and they don't, know how to work. Again, you, me, us. and I love that. Thank you. I love speaking to you 'cause I'm always learning about business and strategy and I love your view on things.

And before we wrap up with that voice made for radio. thank you. Tell us how people can get ahold of you.

Sure. Thank you. I appreciate the opportunity. So really my one stop shop. To learn more about me, learn more about my coaching, consulting, advising business, as well as check out the podcast, you can just visit Jay Sheer.

And J is J-A-Y-S-C-H-E-R-R business consulting.com. I'd love to hear from you if you have any questions. if something that we talked about here landed with you and you want some additional clarification or context, reach out to me. Highly accessible on all the socials. And also make sure that you check out the episode that John and I recorded together on my podcast, because what I loved about that conversation, John, is we go pretty deep into your personal story that led to the work that you do today and how you change and transform lives

I love that story and I love getting to know you on a deeper level.

Yeah, thank you, Jay. that episode was about self-worth, which was, a topic near and dear to my heart lately. I think we all struggle with it at times, and I think it's important to learn how to love yourself.

so thank you for that. And that's it for this episode of the Evolved Caveman. May you, the listener, have the courage to look at your own shit. Until next time, this is Dr. John signing off.