How to Eradicate Stress Without Burning Out (Lori Saitz)

[Dana] (00:00)
That is awesome. Welcome to Phoenix and Flame. I’m Dana, and this is my podcast on pushing through and transforming even when you feel like a pile of ash. We have an amazing guest with us today. Her name is Lori Saitz. Now, I will have to tell you one of the reasons that I was attracted to Lori originally was her podcast, which is called Fine Is a Four Letter Word. And that just drew me in like a magnet to flame, because to me she seems like someone who’s going to be transparent, who’s going to be authentic, who’s going to be genuine. And I love talking to people like this, because that’s the way I am. We just need to say it and be real about it and stop dancing around the truth and dancing around the topic. Let’s just get in there, because we’re all thinking and feeling it anyway. We might as well attach words and talk about it. So to give you just a brief background about Lori: she is a stress eradication expert, which, oh my gosh, we’re going to get back around to that, certainly. But let’s back up for a brief moment to 2003. She launched Zen Rabbit, a baking company, and introduced the world to the gratitude cookie. And being a psychotherapist, again, I was very much drawn to the gratitude cookie, I’m going to want to talk about that later. Now, Lori has had many speaking engagements, and of the 16 that I was able to find, just four of them are Women in Technology, the Power Conference, Empowered Women International, and I really love this one, the Badass Business Summit. That is fantastic. Now today Lori is working in what she calls her zone of genius, helping her clients learn to be calm and grounded no matter what’s going on around them. Lori, welcome to Phoenix and Flame.

[Lori] (02:02)
Thank you so much for having me. I’m overjoyed to be here. I don’t know, can you be overjoyed? Like that’s too much joy. No, I’m thrilled to be here.

[Dana] (02:07)
This is awesome. So I’m trying to figure out where even to begin, because I have so many questions. Let me just ask you, do you have a place that you would like to begin your story? And then we can kind of file around from there, or I can just start writing with any number of questions that I have.

[Lori] (02:36)
I’m going to let you jump in wherever you’d like.

[Dana] (02:38)
Oh my gosh, this is like I feel like I’m standing at a buffet. So first of all, you call yourself the stress eradication expert. And I know from looking at your biography that you have a history of working like 60 to 70 hours a week. So you have been there. I’m imagining I have listeners who are just up to their eyeballs, or actually feel like they are drowning, like they look up

[Lori] (02:41)
Ha ha ha. Mm-hmm

[Dana] (03:05)
to see the surface of the water and wonder if they’re ever going to break the surface. And truthfully, to be honest, I myself have felt on occasion where I was just about to break the surface of the water, and somebody grabbed me around the ankle and jerked me right back down. And it sounds as if you know exactly what that feels like, and you kind of were able to weave your way around and discover something that you call the sabbatical life.

[Lori] (03:09)
Mm-hmm.

[Dana] (03:32)
So I think that would be a great place to start, and then we can just weave around however we want to.

[Lori] (03:32)
Yes. Absolutely, that is such a good description of how people feel. And a lot of us were raised to be high achievers. We’ve been programmed since birth to believe that hard work leads to success, that if you are not working and being productive, then you’re a slacker, you don’t have any worth, your worth is based on your achievement. And so all of these beliefs that are programmed into us from day one cause us to live this way. And then let’s layer on top of it, it doesn’t necessarily matter where you live, but for me, I live right outside of Washington, DC, nation’s capital, where there are hundreds of thousands of type A’s. We have to be going all the time.

[Dana] (04:36)
Yes, like mach two with our hair on fire, just going.

[Lori] (04:38)
Yeah, right. And that’s just how we operate. And nobody ever really stops to think, is there a different way? They don’t necessarily like it, it doesn’t feel good, but they never stop to go, well, maybe there’s something else, a different way to live. They just think, this is how life is.

[Dana] (04:58)
Let me ask you, what do you feel like, as you have been observing these people and their life situations, and also from your own experience, what do you feel gets sacrificed? Because there is a price to be paid. We could all choose to go mach two with our hair on fire if we wanted to. We can choose to work the 80 hour weeks. We can choose to try to do whatever it takes. And that kind of gets back to what our goals are in life. But having said that, there’s a price. There’s a price to be paid, no matter which lane we choose in life. So from your observation and your personal experience, what do you feel like have been the sacrifices that have to be made when people are living that kind of just production, production kind of mentality?

[Lori] (05:28)
Any number of sacrifices. You see a lot of people sacrificing their health, their sanity, their relationships. From personal experience, I pretty much sacrificed a marriage. Everything, you hear all these stories about people who get to the pinnacle of success, and I’m putting this in quotes, success, because we all have to define what success is for ourselves, and it’s not necessarily what other people tell you it should be. But they get to what outwardly looks like the pinnacle of success, and they’re not happy. They’re taking their own lives, or they’re depressed, and they are just living a sad existence, but they supposedly got there, and they never stop to ask, you know that story about, they climbed the ladder, but was the ladder leaning against the right wall?

[Dana] (06:54)
Oh, that’s a good one. That’s a good one. And as you’re talking, I’m imagining, I try to put myself in other people’s shoes. And I’m imagining that a certain contingent of people, certainly not all of them, but a lot of them, even if they had achieved these things, let’s operationalize it. Let’s say that success would mean a large brick house and a gated community. Success would mean having three cars, one of them at least being a sports car,

[Dana] (07:24)
having a yacht, being able to go frequently on trips to tropical places or going on international travels, these kinds of things. The thing of it is, if you’ve sacrificed what you talk about, if someone has sacrificed their health, some of their sanity, their relationships on this road, yes, they have these things, but how long can somebody sit in a great big house or drive around in a fancy car before they habituate to it? It’s nice having this great big house, but we as humans, we habituate. So it’s like, okay, this is great, but how many times am I going to drive up this driveway and walk through this front door and cling around in this big house before it’s like, okay. How many times is somebody going to lay around on a yacht by themselves?

[Lori] (08:03)
Right, well, all of those things are fantastic if those are what you want. There’s nothing wrong with having them. But if you’re walking into an empty house because your spouse left, because you never had any time to spend with them, because you were so busy working to get to the corner office to be able to afford all these things, that’s not necessarily success.

[Dana] (08:42)
I like that. I like the way you’re trying to help people define what they view as success. And I say frequently on this podcast that everyone is on their own path, and we each have a right to define what we mean as success, and where our personalities are different. So what our friend might find is successful, we might be like, man, I’m not really feeling that so much. So it’s just kind of what does each person define as success, and what’s the price that’s going to take to get that.

[Lori] (08:51)
Absolutely. And you can have success, again, defining success for yourself, and I’m sure we’re going to get into talking about tapping into your own inner voice, but what is success to you, not what your parents told you success should be, or what society’s telling you success looks like, what is it for you? And then going after that in a healthful way, but in a way that doesn’t sacrifice all of those things, because you can have all of those things and not have to sacrifice your health and your relationships and your sanity. It’s possible. It’s just that most people don’t do it the quote unquote right way. And it’s funny, I’m laughing because I just finished writing show notes for my next podcast episode, where we were talking about, there is no one right way, but in a way that allows you to still have health and good relationships and good mental health.

[Dana] (10:08)
That’s true. Yes, it does. And I think what I really liked, what I’m sure you’re going to be talking about, and I really liked what was in your biography about looking at the overall picture, is what does each person want? If somebody wants, let’s say you have a person who doesn’t really care that much about relationships, and they want to work all the time, because that’s their safe place. Personally, just saying, as a psychotherapist, there’s some pathology in that. I’m just going to have to say that out loud. I’m trying to be honoring of everyone’s path, but if someone is using work and all those hours as an avoidance tactic, I just have to say that. Part of me wants to say, well, everyone can do what they want, but if we’re doing something as an avoidance tactic, then there’s a problem there. Get your ass in therapy, just saying.

[Lori] (10:49)
Yes, yes, yes. Yeah, I agree.

[Dana] (11:18)
Looking at the long haul, and that’s one of the things that I think what you stand for and what you talk about is so amazing, because it seems like you are helping people to look at, to help them go the distance, because they might be able to do what they’re doing for the next year, maybe, and even if they do it for the next year, they might sacrifice, like you said, their health, their sanity, their relationships. They might end up divorced. They might have terrible relationships with their kids.

[Lori] (11:34)
Mm-hmm.

[Dana] (11:48)
They might lose friendships. It could go on and on. So what does the person want to do in the long term, and how to help them realign so they can go the long distance?

[Lori] (11:51)
Right. Yeah, it starts with, and this is where I start in my program when I work with people, is: what are your values? Again, defining what is important to you, what are your values, and then what does your calendar look like, and are you matching what’s on your calendar with what you say your values are? For example, if a lot of people say family is one of their top values, great, do you have time scheduled in your calendar to spend with family on a regular basis? Because if you’re working 85 hours a week, and sitting on boards of different organizations, and you don’t have time to spend with your family, then don’t tell me that family is one of your top values. Either it is, and you need to clear your calendar and put more time in there for family, or you need to admit that family is not one of your top values. Either way is okay. Just don’t try to fool yourself.

[Dana] (13:03)
Yeah, be honest, and don’t judge yourself, just be honest, because you’re going to get hamstrung if you’re not honest. So Lori, let me get your take on intention, because I know sometimes we have these ideas in the abstract and we want them to happen. So I’m really curious about, from your experience and your wisdom and what you have learned and what you teach people, about the role of intention

[Lori] (13:09)
Yeah.

[Dana] (13:33)
in all of this.

[Lori] (13:36)
Again, it’s about sitting down and thinking about what’s important for you. Where would you like to go? What would you like to manifest, or if manifest is too out-there for you, what are the goals that you would like to achieve? Really the same idea, different words. And then what needs to happen in order to get there. So you’re putting your focus, your intention, on what you would like to have happen. As opposed to, it would be nice to have this, I don’t know if I could really get there, but it would be cool, but I’m really worried about this other thing happening that’s not going to allow me to get there. People tend to not put 100% into their intention.

[Lori] (14:34)
What is it you would really like? Believe that it’s possible, because everything is possible. I believe that you would not get the idea to do something or have something or be something if the way to have or be or do that thing did not also exist. You might not know what it is right now, it hasn’t shown up yet, you don’t know how. And I always talk about, the how is the domain of the universe, higher power, God, whatever you want to call it. You don’t have to know how. All you have to know is, this is what I would like. And that idea of what you would like was planted in you because how to get there does exist. So it’s a matter of asking then the question, what needs to happen, or who do I need to meet, or what connections or resources do I need to find, to bring this to reality.

[Dana] (15:33)
I like that a lot. What I’m hearing you say is it requires us to be honest with ourselves. And in my psychotherapy sessions, I’ll say, why don’t you observe your behavior instead of judging it? Let’s not, what I call, take a shame shower. Just be honest and just observe, so that you can really see. So I’m really

[Lori] (15:43)
Mm-hmm. I like that.

[Dana] (16:03)
thinking about your take on honesty and being authentic, and thinking about the title of your podcast. And I know from having a podcast of my own, it takes some thinking and some time to come up with a podcast title, because there’s so many, and you want to have something that really reflects your intention and your authenticity as a person, and it’s not something that just pops out for most people, it takes some time. So for your podcast to be called Fine Is a Four Letter Word, I really see how that aligns with wanting people to be honest. Because how many times, I’m thinking, we say, how are you? Fine. How is that fine? And we’re just lying, that is not the truth.

[Lori] (16:55)
Yeah. Right, people are lying either to the person they’re talking to, who asked the question, how are you, or they’re lying to themselves, with their belief that everything is fine.

[Dana] (17:11)
Yes. And I want to add a third one, or they know they’re not lying because they know things are not fine, but they don’t feel safe in that environment to share the truth of how they are really feeling. So I think that too could come along in this journey that you’ve been crafting and helping people with, finding those safe places to be honest, who to reach out to,

[Lori] (17:22)
Mm-hmm.

[Dana] (17:40)
who to avoid, who are going to be people that are going to drag you down. And I really would like to hear your thoughts on that, because that’s going to be a big deal.

[Lori] (17:48)
Yeah, yeah. And it’s often people that you think would be supportive, because when you start changing, it often triggers them to look at themselves, and they don’t want to have to do that. People don’t like looking into themselves and seeing what they might need to change. So those people that you think are going to be really supportive of you, or that you think should be supportive of you, are not, because you start changing, and that starts changing your relationship with them, and they start looking at the behaviors and attitudes and beliefs that they have, and it doesn’t reflect well on them. And now they’re thinking, well, you’re rocking the boat, I don’t like that, I don’t want to have to change because you’re changing. And so they try to pull you down, to stay where you are, so it doesn’t change their world.

[Dana] (18:54)
That reminds me of, have you ever heard of the crab bucket story? Great minds think alike. I will let you tell our listeners the crab bucket story if you want to do that.

[Lori] (19:01)
Yes, I was just thinking that too. I’m not a fan of crabs to start with, but I…

[Dana] (19:15)
You can tell the story, I’ll be happy to tell the story too. I think it’s pretty awesome.

[Lori] (19:18)
All right, well, it’s about when you have a bucket of crabs, and one’s trying to get out, the others are trying to pull it back in.

[Dana] (19:27)
Yeah, it’s just like, if just the one crab in there will just hang out, you put a bunch of crabs in there, you don’t have to put the lid on it, because that crab trying to get out and escape, the others will pull it back in. That’s why the fishermen don’t even have to put a lid on the bucket, because the other crabs will pull it back down and prevent it from escaping. That’s what I’m hearing you say. And actually, ironically, earlier today, I was in a conversation with someone

[Lori] (19:44)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, that’s exactly what happens.

[Dana] (19:57)
who is having to reevaluate her friendships, because she’s wanting to change her lifestyle, she’s wanting to change the direction she’s going in life, and her friends are not, actually from my perspective, they’re rather narcissistic and selfish and entitled, and I told her that. Being the honest person that I am.

[Lori] (20:19)
Mm. Yeah, yeah.

[Dana] (20:26)
I’m just kind of wondering if that’s something that you have heard your clients talk about, as they go through the protocol that you guide them through, as they’re trying to be successful and to try to do that without going mach two with their hair on fire. Have you heard people talk about, and do you talk to people about, having to maybe reevaluate their social circle, their friend group, and I’m putting that in quotes for the people who can’t see me here.

[Lori] (20:59)
Yes, absolutely, because when you start leveling up, you need to level up everybody that you hang out with, whether that’s in business or in life, in friendships, business partnerships. You really just need to change, and it’s so difficult, because how do you let go of friends who’ve been there supporting you potentially for a long time? At the same time, you have goals. Your soul is growing and expanding, and you need to, this is where you make a sacrifice, a different kind of sacrifice. You can stay where you are and keep all those friends, or you can find new friends or new people to hang out with. This is why coaches are so important, because coaches are helping you, they’re like hoisting you up to help you get around. When I talk to entrepreneurs, the question of what’s the most important advice you can give to new entrepreneurs, I would say this, whether entrepreneurs or in a career working for someone else, is to get yourself around people who support your success. They support your success, and they support you when things aren’t going right, because life is not 100% rainbows and unicorns and happiness all the time. But it’s so important to have people who are going to support you, support your times when you’re struggling, and celebrate your successes with you. Because when you’re with friends that don’t want to see you changing, they may not be so willing to celebrate your new successes.

[Dana] (22:53)
That’s it. They’re not going to want to do that.

[Lori] (22:55)
No, because again, it reflects on them, and they start looking at, well, what have I done? Why do I not have that? And there are a million reasons why they may not have that, but they’re not necessarily willing to support your success, because they don’t have it.

[Dana] (23:12)
That’s true. I could totally see that happening. And being an entrepreneur myself, because I have a private practice and a podcast, and I’m getting ready to really go live with a bunch of online boundaries courses that I’m super excited about, but I’ll tell you something, on the path, any entrepreneur, if they were honest, would have to say there were times when they were just on their knees,

[Lori] (23:41)
Mm-hmm.

[Dana] (23:43)
whether on their knees praying, or just on their knees. I literally, and I’m honest, okay, I literally have been in a fetal position before, on my floor, just curled in a fetal position. And I learned something about that, that when you do that, at least on the floor I was on, your shoulder starts hurting at first, and then you get kind of bored,

[Lori] (23:54)
Mm-hmm. Ha ha ha

[Dana] (24:11)
because you’re just laying there. And then you get kind of hungry. And because your shoulder’s hurting and you’re kind of bored and you’re kind of hungry, you’re curled in that fetal position on the floor, and then you’re like, well, I think I’ll just get up now, because my shoulder’s hurting and I’m bored and I’m hungry. And so you just get up, you know? That’s what I’m saying. There’s going to be times, and you’re talking about your social supports, there’s going to be times where you’re going to be literally, and I’m speaking for myself,

[Lori] (24:15)
Mm. Right.

[Dana] (24:40)
throwing things across the room, screaming, crying, crawling into fetal position. Anyone who’s going to be an entrepreneur, you’re pushing those boundaries, you’re pushing, you’re pushing, and it’s scary. There’s no guarantees. There’s no little lanes and little cubicles. You just jump off a cliff and you hope you figure out the parachute before you hit the ground. That’s what being an entrepreneur feels like.

[Lori] (25:02)
Yes, and I’ve had many conversations with people about how being in corporate is no less risky. It’s actually more risky, because you’re at the mercy of somebody else as to whether you’re going to have a job or not.

[Dana] (25:15)
That’s a very good point. So they might be in a fetal position too.

[Lori] (25:24)
So we’re all in this. Yes, exactly. Everyone listening can relate to this.

[Dana] (25:32)
That’s 100%. And so you guys that are out there, I’m sure there’s people who are relating to Lori, myself, and what we’re saying. You’ve got to figure out who’s around you. And when you’re hitting those hard spots, being a psychotherapist, I’m going to say, you’ve got to talk it out. You’ve got to speak your words. Don’t hold this stuff in

[Lori] (25:53)
Mm-hmm.

[Dana] (25:54)
when you’re facing these harsh things, when you’re facing this stress. And I want to kind of wrap back around, because Lori, being the stress eradication expert, that’s amazing to me. So when you’re facing the stress, from a psychotherapeutic standpoint, talking about it, and having people around you that will hear you and support you, is wonderful. Lori, what have you found to be other key components that has helped you, or that you have witnessed, in helping other people, in terms of eradicating or reducing that stress level, so they can continue to be successful?

[Lori] (26:30)
The two biggest things that I talk about are gratitude and meditation, and they can be intertwined. We can start with gratitude. Gratitude, from an energetic standpoint, and again, this is science, we are all made of energy, gratitude is the highest energetic level that you can get to, with love and joy,

[Lori] (27:00)
all three together up there at the highest energetic vibration. So when you are living in gratitude, when you are finding gratitude in everything, no matter what’s happening around you, no matter how bad the situation looks, if you want to label things good and bad, you can always find something to be grateful for. And we can talk in a minute about an exercise that can help people become more naturally grateful, because I think that gets socialized out of us. When you are looking for things to be grateful for, the things to be grateful for show up. When you are stuck in a place where you are finding tons of things to complain and criticize about, which is where most people live, more of those will show up for you too. Whatever you’re looking for is going to show up to support your beliefs.

[Dana] (28:02)
I love that. I want to support that with a very small example. I was on vacation last week, and my likely soon-to-be son-in-law, we’ll see, but anyway, he’s been in our family a few years, he’s awesome. He was playing golf and not having the best game, and he seemed to be struggling, but I asked him,

[Lori] (28:18)
Okay.

[Dana] (28:29)
what are you doing? He was walking around, and my daughter and myself said, what are you doing? And he goes, I’m being grateful. I’m being grateful. And so he was, and we asked him later, what was that about? He said, I’m choosing to be grateful. I’m at the beach. I am on a golf course that’s beautiful. I’m healthy. I’m walking around. I’m learning how to play this game.

[Lori] (28:36)
Ha ha ha

[Dana] (28:55)
I’m being grateful. And I remember him saying that. So sometimes I would pull that out and just say, what are you doing, Dana? I’m being grateful.

[Lori] (29:01)
I love it. And that’s exactly where I would go with this exercise, the “but I’m grateful for” exercise, which is when you catch yourself complaining or criticizing, and that’s part of human nature, don’t beat yourself up for it, recognize that this is what’s coming out. And, but I’m grateful for, what? For being at the beach, for being on this beautiful golf course, whatever it is. It doesn’t even have to be related to it, I didn’t have a great golf game and I’m angry about that, but I’m grateful I’m on this beautiful golf course. It doesn’t even have to be related to the thing. Just find something that you can be grateful for. And the more you practice this exercise, the more naturally grateful you become, and you just naturally go to, where’s the gratitude here? Crazy things like, your car breaks down on the side of the road, and you can immediately go, but I’m grateful I got off the highway, but I’m grateful a tow truck is coming to get me, but I’m grateful I’m only five miles from home, whatever it is, something that you would not normally find gratitude in. I’m grateful it didn’t cause an accident, whatever.

[Dana] (30:29)
Yeah, that’s awesome, Lori. And you said earlier that basically we vibrate on a higher level, the energy that we’re vibrating with is higher.

[Lori] (30:36)
Yes. Yes, and so when you are vibrating at this higher energetic level, you are more magnetic to the things that you have intention around, we were talking earlier about setting your intention. You’ve set your intention, you are now more magnetic to that intention. This is where coincidences and synchronicities start happening, things that you could have never imagined start showing up, because you are in a higher energetic vibration, and they naturally are attracted to you.

[Dana] (31:18)
I just love that, that is super. So before we wrap up, I want you to talk about the second part, which was the meditation.

[Lori] (31:24)
Yeah, yeah. So talking about business leaders, when you look at the majority of high performing business leaders and athletes, they practice meditation regularly. Why is that? It’s not because they have nothing else to do, they’re very busy people, or actually, I don’t really like that word “busy,” because it implies that you’re constantly going but you’re not necessarily achieving anything.

[Dana] (31:45)
Yeah.

[Lori] (31:52)
So I don’t even believe they use that word busy. Their calendars may be full, but they are not busy. Anyway, not to get off topic here, they’re practicing meditation because it decreases anxiety, it builds resilience, there’s a big buzzword for the day, resilience, everybody’s talking about that. They spend less time stuck mulling over past mistakes. It’s like, okay, well, that happened, moving on. Meditation helps you perform better in stressful situations, it improves your creativity, it enhances your productivity, which then can lead you to be more profitable, if that’s what you are looking for. It helps regulate emotions, so you have a higher emotional intelligence, you have greater patience with situations and people, and you’re less likely to get drawn into conflict, which means you have better relationships. I can go on, but there are tons of reasons why meditation is so effective for reaching goals.

[Dana] (32:55)
I love it. Lori, 100%. And you talked about resiliency, there’s a term called antifragility, I don’t know if you’ve heard of this before, but I love that. So for listeners who aren’t aware of that, resiliency is when you keep getting hit with things and you keep coming back, you keep coming back. Antifragile is when something hits you and you come back stronger. It’s like a hydra, something can cut off your arm and you grow two in its place.

[Lori] (33:14)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, yeah. Are you familiar with Mindvalley, the company Mindvalley? It’s a personal development company, and the founder, his name is Vishen Lakiani, and he wrote a book called The Code of the Extraordinary Mind. One of the chapters in the book is called something like, How to Be Un-Fuck-With-Able.

[Dana] (33:40)
I just love those concepts. I love that. That is awesome. So, Lori, I would love to just talk so much longer, but I do try to limit it to about 30 minutes or so. I want to make sure that my listeners have a way of accessing you, if they’re like, oh my gosh, I love what Lori has to say, I need her, or I have other people in my life. How did they get ahold of you?

[Lori] (34:09)
Yeah. My website, my company and my website is Zen Rabbit, Z-E-N, and then rabbit like a bunny. So ZenRabbit.com is where you can find all the things. You can reach out to me, you can find all my socials there. And I have a downloadable PDF called The Five Easy Ways to Start Living a Sabbatical Life, and that is also available there right on the homepage.

[Dana] (34:54)
Wonderful. That is awesome. Lori, I appreciate, I know that you have a full schedule, and you have so much going on. I appreciate the time and your energy that you have brought to Phoenix and Flame to share with my listeners. Thank you so much.

[Lori] (34:59)
(laughing) Absolutely my honor. Thank you.

[Dana] (35:18)
Listeners, I know you have heard something today that you’re like, oh my gosh, this blows my mind. This is so helpful. This is spot-on. This is problem-solving stuff. Or you might have a friend or a family member or a co-worker that you’re like, this is exactly what they need to hear. So please take this episode and put it on your favorite social media sites, copy and paste it in text, copy and paste it in email, however you want to. Get the links out there, get the podcast out there, so we can grow our Phoenix and Flame community, so we know we’re all together in this and we’re helping each other. I hope you are having a wonderful day, and I hope you have a wonderful rest of your day. This is Dana on Phoenix and Flame.