Embracing Authenticity and Overcoming Challenges with Kat Torre | Ep 12
From Darkness to Light
In this episode, Kat Torre, CEO and founder of The Brand Architect, shares her inspiring journey of overcoming a toxic, abusive relationship to become a successful entrepreneur and advocate for personal branding and leadership. She delves into the crucial moment of decision-making on October 10th, 2018, when she chose to leave her toxic environment and start afresh. Kat emphasizes the importance of doing the inner work, understanding oneself, and taking ownership of one's role in any situation. The discussion also touches on emotional regulation, community building, and the importance of personal branding as tools for empowerment. Kat provides insights into her strategies for dealing with life's challenges and maintaining a positive trajectory. This conversation is a testament to resilience and growth, offering inspiration and guidance for anyone looking to pivot towards a better future.
Timestamps:
(00:00) - A Life-Changing Moment
(01:54) - The Journey Begins
(02:56) - A Pivotal Night
(04:24) - The Aftermath and Healing
(09:38) - Taking Ownership
(15:15) - Empowering Others Through Personal Branding
(20:32) - Emotional Regulation and Deprogramming
(24:08) - Advice for Young Entrepreneurs
(27:00) - Embracing Disruption and AI
(29:02) - The Power of Community
(31:50) - Personal Strategies for Overcoming Lows
(38:44) - Final Thoughts
Welcome to the LFG Energy podcast! Your host, Arjun Dhingra, is a two-time Taekwondo world champion and the former Team USA co-head coach. He is a 23-year mortgage veteran of the industry who loves influencing change in people.
This podcast is about the stories and lessons of those who have had their backs against the wall and have ultimately overcome. Former Olympians, coaches, entrepreneurs, and incredible human beings will share their experiences of resilience and beating the odds in spite of adversity so that you too can learn to start doing the same in your life.
Connect with Kat:
▶️ Instagram | LinkedIn | Website | Podcast
Connect with Arjun:
▶️ LinkedIn | Instagram | Website
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Transcript
I think it was the first time in my life I actually thought that I wasn't going to survive.
Kat:It's him.
Kat:It's his fault.
Kat:He made me the victim.
Kat:He's the bad guy.
Kat:He's the narcissist.
Kat:Jealousy or envy, right?
Kat:Any of those things that crop up, I'm human.
Kat:I feel them.
Kat:I just don't react.
Arjun:Guys, I am super excited to bring to you this episode, episode today with my really good friends who I only met just a couple years ago, but we've become really good friends.
Arjun:Kat, Tory, who's got an amazing story in terms of how she ended up where she's at.
Arjun:But let me just tell you briefly where she's at.
Arjun:She is the CEO and founder of the brand Architect, which is an agency that empowers lots of people, but also third culture entrepreneurs to help ideate, expand on, and push their brands, unleash it out to the world.
Arjun:All the power and I, you know, joy and light that it brings.
Arjun:And if you're around Kat and you spend any time with her, you know that she is just.
Arjun:That she's a light.
Arjun:But this podcast, as we've talked about, shares the stories of people that have come from either dark places, lonely places, and emerged so that we see them now in this light that they bring out to the world.
Arjun:But it wasn't always like that.
Arjun:And there was a pivotal moment or a point from which it started.
Arjun:But, Kat, you work with the largest and most recognized real estate brand in the world, with Sirhands, not to mention other multimillion dollar brands that you've helped fuel and push out there into the marketplace.
Arjun:Like, this is an amazing record of accomplishment.
Arjun:And I feel like you're only just getting started.
Arjun:But share with me where this all started, because there was probably a moment when you decided to do what you're doing or you wanted to fully embark on it and let go.
Arjun:And that's what I want to get into today.
Kat:Yeah.
Kat:Well, thank you, Arjun.
Kat:I feel like I just need you on retainer to always introduce me in anything that I ever take part and collaborate on a privilege to be here.
Kat:And to answer your question, when did I embark on this journey?
Kat:I think it began.
Kat:There's a very specific date, but it's really funny because I don't think I knew at the time that I was embarking on this journey, but I got to take us all back.
Kat: ,: Kat:And I think it was the first time in my life where I actually thought that I wasn't going to survive.
Kat:Like, I wasn't going to be able to see the next day.
Kat:And I know that that sounds dramatic, and I'll provide more context.
Kat:And I want to preface this conversation with saying all of the things that I have accomplished since are fantastic.
Kat:And everything that you can look up about me, you can google on me.
Kat:But I think it's really important to share the story now because I've done the healing, I've done the inner work, I've done the therapy, and I want to be a voice and an advocate for people who might not feel like they have a voice right now.
Kat:So I don't want you to feel sorry for me, feel pity.
Kat:It's really contributed to everything I have in my life today.
Kat:So I'm grateful now about it.
Kat: ,: Kat:And it's funny, when I share this story in smaller circles and, you know, with friends or with certain trusted colleagues, you know, they asked me, they're like, oh, well, was it a personal or professional relationship?
Kat:I was like, it was both.
Kat:It was a double whammy.
Kat:It was my boyfriend at the time, who was also my business partner.
Kat:And that night, things had devolved to such a point.
Kat:We'd been together for about three years, to the point where it was very physical.
Kat:It was very scary, and I thought that I was truly not going to live and survive that night.
Kat:Like, that's how scary it was.
Kat:And I was checked out at the time.
Kat:But looking back now, I recognize the gravity of it.
Kat:But that was the night that I made the decision to leave, to leave the relationship, to leave our dog, who I still miss to this day.
Kat:And I think of him fondly.
Kat:To leave our multimillion dollar business that I had dropped out of nursing school and moved cross country from Portland, Oregon, to Miami, Florida, to launch with him and leave with nothing more than what could fit on a bellhop cart.
Kat:Like, that was like my bell hop cart moment, where everything I owned could fit on it.
Kat:I fled.
Kat:I had to get a restraining order.
Kat:I had to completely start over.
Kat:And this is only, like six years ago.
Kat:This is not a long time ago.
Kat:But, yeah, I remember thinking, I haven't had a very hard life.
Kat:There's been things that I've navigated and lots of loss that I've dealt with in my adolescence and in my early twenties.
Kat:But this was a moment where I was like, if you stay, you might not make it out.
Kat:And I had to change the story.
Kat:That was huge for me.
Arjun:Was there something that you knew that was waiting for you better on the other side of this hard decision, or were you just focused on life or death?
Arjun:Because I don't.
Arjun:And I don't mean to make it sound grave, but it was grave, right?
Arjun:Like, it was.
Kat:Yeah.
Arjun:It was that kind of a crossroads you felt you were at.
Kat:It was.
Kat:And I think at the time, I didn't know what weighted me on the other side, but I knew that it wasn't going to get better where I was.
Kat:And I want people listening.
Kat:Like, if you're in a relationship that has become toxic or that is abusive, whether it's mentally, emotionally, or, heaven forbid, physically, like mine had devolved into, it never starts that way.
Kat:That's one thing that I really found in that it snuck up on me that when we started dating, there were red flags that I kind of looked away from.
Kat:There were things that I made excuses for.
Kat:I was very much a people pleaser at that point in my life.
Kat:I was in my mid twenties, and we met at a dog park, and he had a boxer, and I had a boxer.
Kat:And it was like this rom.com moment that I over romanticize.
Kat:And so it started great.
Kat:There were cracks that didn't really expose themselves into fissures until later on.
Kat:But I think over the course of the three years of being together, I had slowly given up.
Kat:I won't say he took it, because I now know, like, it was my entire choice to do that.
Kat:I'd given up pieces of myself.
Kat:I'd given up pieces of my identity to the point where I didn't even really recognize myself in the mirror, like, toward the end.
Kat:So to answer your question of, like, did I know that something better waited on the other side?
Kat:My thought was, it's not going to get better where I'm at.
Kat:So let me try something different.
Kat:I had been trying to make it work.
Kat:You know, we had been going to therapy, and it wasn't working, and it was only getting worse.
Kat:And I just knew that I couldn't go on.
Kat:I had hit that point.
Kat:And this is obviously a very dramatic example, right?
Kat:Like, of a personal, romantic relationship that was also a business partnership.
Kat:These types of situations where there's manipulation, there's gaslighting, there's these exploitation of who you are.
Kat:It can come in so many different forms.
Kat:It can come in friends who don't want you to grow, or it can come in the form of family members who you owe them.
Kat:Right, for them bringing you into this world and you need to honor them and your friends.
Kat:Like, we've been friends since we're five.
Kat:How dare you want to leave this relationship?
Kat:And with my ex, it was, we moved here together, we're in this together no matter what.
Kat:And I'm like, well, we haven't had each other's backs.
Kat:We've been at each other's throats.
Kat:It's so funny because what I realized after was that I had to literally, like, nearly destroy myself in order to understand and find myself.
Arjun:It was a bit of like a rock bottom moment, if you will, to oversimplify it.
Kat:Yeah, it was.
Kat:Thank you.
Kat:That's a much more concise the way.
Arjun:You said it is.
Arjun:It's so much more visceral, because that's your experience, and you're the only.
Arjun:This is your story, right?
Arjun:You're the one who's gone through it.
Arjun:So to say that you had to, like, break yourself down, or you had to be completely broken down to a point where there was maybe nothing left in, nothing left to break before you could kind of build yourself back up again.
Arjun:And I think for everyone listening, the whole spirit of this podcast and the theme of this show is the dark and lonely and sometimes tragic and very scary places that things start from.
Arjun:They don't always have to, but a lot of them do.
Arjun:And for me, the beauty in all of it is the journey, the triumph, the movement out of that and not accepting that, not saying that this biography of mine is going to be my destiny, like, this is how my life is always going to be.
Arjun:It's a decision, which is what everything come, you know, these big decisions in life come down to one moment, one expression, right?
Arjun:And yours, October, like, you have it nailed down as a date.
Arjun:Like, this is a mantra.
Arjun:October.
Arjun:I'm going to think about October 10, which is actually the day after my birthday.
Arjun:I'll always think of that.
Arjun:This was Kat's day that she made her decision.
Arjun:And you highlighted something that I think I want to spend a moment on before we get into all these great things that came in your life.
Arjun:And just not that long ago, actually, as you pointed out, but you said, you did the work, you've done the healing.
Arjun:How important is that for anyone who's listening, who's in a dark and very difficult situation in place to recognize?
Arjun:Yes, there's a decision that has to be making.
Arjun:You need to move on at some point, right?
Arjun:Hopefully sooner than later for those of you listening.
Arjun:But then there's work.
Arjun:There's real work to do, and it cannot be ignored.
Arjun:Otherwise, certain things might repeat themselves, or you might find yourself right back in a similar situation.
Kat:Yeah, you hit the nail on the head.
Kat:One of my good friends who I work with at Sirhant, Ryan J.
Kat:Coin, he says the pain will leave when it's done teaching you its lesson.
Arjun:Yeah.
Kat: ,: Kat:I would have cursed you out.
Kat:I would have said, how dare you?
Kat:It's him.
Kat:It's his fault.
Kat:He made me the victim.
Kat:He's the bad guy.
Kat:He's the narcissist, or the one suffering from, you know, narcissistic personality disorder.
Kat:You know, however you want to say it, I would have taken no ownership whatsoever.
Kat:I would have made him the villain.
Kat:And I totally understand Kat's reaction then.
Kat:I understand if somebody is listening and you're in a toxic situation where it's just really weird and stuck and manipulative, and you're just, like, frustrated.
Kat:I understand the inclination to want to villainize the other person or your job or your friend or your spouse or your brother or your father, whoever it might be.
Kat:But the work that you mentioned, which, honestly, it's probably the most important work that you will ever do, the work of yourself rising from the ashes of your choices and the decisions that you make now, I know that certain things that I did, certain ways I was.
Kat:Were calling in somebody like that.
Kat:My ex was the perfect lesson to teach me to never compromise my boundaries, pretend to be someone I'm not, allow somebody to want to tell me how to wear my makeup, style my hair, and the clothes that I was going to wear.
Kat:Like, it got to that point where now I'm like, fuck you.
Kat:I'm just going to wear a leather jacket and, like, tell you I'm an outlaw, right?
Kat:But whatever it was, the mosaic of my experiences as a kid, as an adolescent, being raised in the home that I was in, being exposed to the individuals I was growing up, the loss that I suffered as an adolescent, I pinpoint that in therapy as my fear of losing people.
Kat:What created this very anxious attachment style, even understanding your attachment styles is a thing that you can learn in therapy.
Kat:I was so afraid of losing someone and being alone that I white knuckled and held onto anybody in my life.
Kat:What's so funny is that if you do that to the wrong people, they're going to lash out or lash back at you, they'll end up leaving you anyway, or you'll end up leaving.
Kat:I think now, looking back, I've taken ownership for my part in perpetuating that situation.
Kat:I definitely fed into it.
Kat:And I think anyone that I've had conversations with who's been in toxic situations, whether it's a business partnership, you know, one of my.
Kat:My good friends ended a toxic business partnership of almost ten years just a few years ago, or you're in a toxic, you know, personal, romantic relationship.
Kat:You are partaking in that you are co creating that you are choosing to stay there.
Kat:There is something.
Kat:There's some wound, there's some story, there's some trauma that you have not healed, that you've looked away from that this person, this partnership, this experience is trying to teach you so you can heal it and change it.
Kat:I understand that now.
Kat:I can articulate that now.
Kat:I can talk about these situations.
Kat:I can talk about that night where my ex got very physical with me.
Kat:He threatened to kill me.
Kat:He did all of these things.
Kat:And I don't feel that, like, sense of being triggered.
Kat:You know, like, when your autonomic nervous system triggers, you feel that pita in the bottom of your stomach.
Kat:Yeah, I can talk about it and be fine.
Kat:Now, that took months, hours.
Kat:And, Arjun, I can't tell you, like, I was in the midst of building my creative agency at the time, and I wasn't taking a paycheck, so I was working in hospitality to make ends meet.
Kat:And any spare money I had that didn't go to rent or groceries, went to paying my therapist.
Kat:And she was down in Miami beach when I was living in Fort Lauderdale at the time.
Kat:So I would have to drive down and see her.
Arjun:I.
Kat:And it was a journey.
Kat:Like, if anybody's ever from South Florida, it's like, driving is an extreme sport going from Fort Lauderdale to Miami.
Kat:But I spent every spare bit of money because I knew that if I didn't spend that money on myself and heal myself, I was like, it was going to happen again.
Kat:It was going to be deja vu.
Kat:To your point of patterns, the patterns in your life are telling you exactly what you need to either change or do more of, right?
Kat:Depending on the outcome, depending on what's useful and what's joyous and what you want to see more of, or what you want to see less of in your life, but you're entirely in control of it.
Kat:Whoever you think is victimizing you is not.
Kat:Actually, you're allowing yourself to be the victim.
Kat:Like, you're putting yourself in that role.
Kat:Yeah, like, I put myself in that role.
Arjun:It's huge.
Arjun:And just the ownership that you take, extreme ownership, because we all have a role to play.
Arjun:There's two roles in every relationship or dynamic.
Arjun:That's one on one, never one side.
Arjun:I appreciate and respect so much that you're saying and using these ownership statements, right, of like, what was my role?
Arjun:Or what did I do?
Arjun:How did I enable?
Arjun:Because that's the only thing we have control over ultimately, at the end of the day.
Arjun:So again, for those you guys listening, like, this is a really beautiful thing that Kat is highlighting here.
Arjun:Right in the wake of a very tragic situation, emerged this opportunity or gate, put light on this opportunity for this huge journey of growth and exploration and inquisition within herself to answer some questions that needed to be answered and pinpoint some things and have these aha.
Arjun:Moments, right.
Arjun:Of like, oh, okay, I get it.
Arjun:Right.
Arjun:And that's real work that we all need to be doing.
Arjun:There's this great Bruce Lee quote that I repeated in a podcast episode previously that Bruce Lee said, and he was very wise beyond his years, right?
Arjun:Like 32 years.
Arjun:He said, human beings are all mirror, are all works of progress that mistakenly think from time to time that they are done right.
Arjun:Like, we all think that sometimes we're done when the work is never really done.
Arjun:So kudos and even more respect to you, Kat, for all that work that you've done and continue to do.
Arjun:And I want to get into your work, work that you do, because this is the impact now, of course, the impact you're going to have for listeners who might be coming from a similar place, I think is going to be profound and guiding them and inspiring them and letting them know that there is hope, there is possibility here.
Arjun:And you don't have to stay in the situation you're in.
Arjun:You can decide and pivot, but in terms of what you're doing and what excites you and what light you now bring to the world, because everyone, again, who comes in contact with you, and this is evidenced by all the brands you work with, the huge, huge names, the global names that you work with and that you empower, that have your name on their back or somewhere on their jersey, as Pat was responsible for some or all of this.
Arjun:What is exciting you the most about what you're doing and this purpose now that you have such a great question?
Kat:I just got chills.
Kat:So I love working with individuals now.
Kat:I used to work with larger companies.
Kat:I still do work with larger brands.
Kat:But I really enjoy working with people and I love working with people in helping them cultivate greater awareness, greater autonomy, greater leadership, greater momentum, energy, focus, clarity, creativity, all of those things.
Kat:And I use the vehicle of personal branding to do it.
Kat:A lot of people will, will think that personal branding is a business strategy.
Kat:It is.
Kat:A lot of people will think it's a buzzword.
Kat:It is.
Kat:A lot of people will think that it is a logo.
Kat:And then I will roll my eyes and try not to immediately get all, not nice, clever all over them.
Kat:But I look at it this day and age as, yes, it is all of those things, but I look at it as a way to better and more clearly understand yourself.
Kat:And the more that you understand yourself, you understand your story and how to articulate it, like I've done here today.
Kat:You understand your personality, you understand your quirks, your traits, your voice, your tone, your wardrobe, your language that you use.
Kat:Right?
Kat:The more that you understand yourself, the better you can communicate that to others so that they can understand you better.
Kat:And the firmer you are in that understanding, the less likely you will end up in weird, toxic, misunderstood, damaging situations because you will have held the standard of who you are and who you do business with and how you do that business.
Kat:And you will be unafraid to fire a client or to say no to an opportunity, because not all opportunities are created equal for everyone.
Kat:All humans are created equal, but not all opportunities are created equal for everyone.
Kat:I look at personal branding as a way to develop yourself that also then by consequence, develops your business.
Kat:And the other two things that I'm really, really excited about are really just applying the mindset, frameworks and strategies that I've used to overcome my situation to really just help with the day to day of business.
Kat:You mentioned working with Sir Hanton and real estate agents.
Kat:I've worked in a bunch of different industries, from luxury wellness to lifestyle, fitness med, spas, hospitality hotels, all of that.
Kat:I've been very humbled in working with agents in how insane and lenders too, like yourself, how insane your day to day is, the situations you have to deal with, the client stories, deals falling through your income, looking like the stock market, and what that does, you know, making you wonder if you're going to be able to provide for your family.
Kat:At the end of the day, it's been very humbling.
Kat:And so I think using mindset techniques, using things like emotional regulation techniques to buffer yourself against all the ups and downs, can help you really keep your eye on the prize.
Kat:And the other thing that I mentioned leadership that I'm really excited about is because I think people often want to go to being like, they want followers, right?
Kat:Or they want to be seen as a leader.
Kat:They want to be authoritative, they want to build credibility, all of those things.
Kat:And I totally get that.
Kat:They overlook that they first need to lead themselves.
Kat:How you lead yourself is how you will lead others.
Kat:How you talk to yourself is how you talk to others.
Kat:How you treat yourself when nobody's looking, when nobody's watching is how you treat others.
Kat:And so it all goes back to that.
Kat:Like you said, the very important work, the inner work first, and whatever that inner work looks like is reflected outwardly, whether it be good, bad or ugly.
Arjun:You talked about emotional regulation.
Arjun:Just highlight that a little bit more and why that's so important in the work that you or the people that you're working with and what you see out there.
Kat:Huge.
Kat:So I would say that the biggest thing that it delivers is teaching you to not take anything personally.
Kat:Anything really key these days in these senses, very sensitive.
Kat:Like, we can't even have a difference of opinion without it devolving into trolls going off in the comments.
Kat:And I'm just like, can we all, can we just play the Taylor Swift song?
Kat:Be like, you all need to calm down.
Kat:Like, just calm down, right?
Kat:So I think emotional regulation, don't take it personally.
Kat:If I can encapsulate emotional regulation in one sentence, it is nothing anybody ever does, says, thinks, wants about you, has anything to actually do with you.
Kat:It is all just a reflection of them.
Kat:We're taught, though, that from the time that we're little, like, you know, be a good girl and you'll be able to have dessert after dinner or, you know, give mommy a kiss.
Kat:Like, be a good boy.
Kat:Like all of these things, like all of the programming of our adolescents that helps us survive to adolescence, which is great, doesn't really serve us as an adult, because then when somebody says something or does something, we immediately feel threatened.
Kat:We go on the defensive.
Kat:Blood flees our brain.
Kat:Our jaws clench, we are fists fall up.
Kat:Like, men seem to feel this more so than women.
Kat:Women feel in the same way.
Kat:And I don't know about you, Arjun, but, like, I don't think very clearly when blood is fleeing my brain.
Kat:It actually robs me of my ability to think logically, to think strategically, to be creative, to have energy.
Kat:Using emotional regulation to deprogram yourself and to not take anything personally, that's where I would start.
Kat:If anybody listening hasn't heard of that, or they've heard of it, but maybe they haven't dived into it.
Kat:There's so much more to it.
Kat:But that's where I would start.
Arjun:And when we talk about, like, certain traits of success, like you've had exposure, you've got a wide, wide frame of reference of various CEO's, entrepreneurs, leaders of real estate companies, huge, huge brands.
Arjun:What would you say are some of the consistent traits amongst them in their day to day and how these people are being as human beings as well?
Arjun:You touched on people, if they're going to be effective, they have to be able to lead themselves, if they're going to lead others, right?
Arjun:If they can.
Arjun:Huge incongruency there.
Arjun:But what have you seen as kind of some consistent underlying traits amongst all?
Kat:I would say some of the greatest leaders and CEO's I know are excellent listeners.
Arjun:Okay?
Kat:They're very present when they're with you.
Kat:Which presence and focus in a world of distraction in the age of information is a gift.
Kat:Being able to see you and hear you and understand you.
Kat:Because the caveat that I hear a lot, even when people reach out to me, they're like, I know you're very busy, but if you have time.
Kat:And I'm like, no, I'll find time.
Kat:And when I give you that time, I'll be present.
Kat:I'm not just going to go through it for the sake of going through it.
Kat:I think CEO's and leaders say no very often.
Kat:They say no more often than they say yes.
Kat:And again, that goes back toward knowing their boundaries, knowing what's a focus, what's a problem, what will go in the calendar and what gets bumped out based on priorities.
Kat:And I think really effective leaders also observe and are often the last to speak.
Kat:They do not react.
Kat:They allow everyone to have their say.
Kat:And I've observed this, too, and I've kind of taken on and adopted this trait when I'm in group settings and collaborative settings, where I'll ask a question will be posed and there's always these people, like, ready to jump off mute or they're, they're answering the question before you've even done asking the question.
Kat:Right.
Kat:The leaders I know will hear people out.
Kat:They'll hear multiple perspectives.
Kat:And what I found that that has given me is that it helps you identify patterns and it also helps you identify maybe what are people's blind spots.
Kat:Then when you are making the decision as the leader, providing the direction, it kind of removes your own biases too.
Kat:A little bit of not completely, but it reminds you of why you're here, like, yes, you need to lead yourself, but you're also there to lead the others.
Kat:And the others need to be able to be seen and heard and understood in order to want to rally, in order to want to show up beyond the paycheck.
Kat:Right.
Kat:So I think that's another aspect also.
Kat:They take very good care of themselves.
Kat:They understand entrepreneurship is an extreme sport.
Kat:Your mind is your muscle is your weapon.
Kat:It is your greatest asset.
Kat:Also your energy.
Kat:And if you are not keeping your mind sharp and your energy maintained through healthy eating, through exercise, through massage, through checking your blood levels, through whatever it might be right to maintain your health, you will burn out and then the business along with it.
Arjun:Evan, I hope you guys are all taking stock of this, because I think burnout is something people are feeling.
Arjun:And this comes with kind of the times when we were talking about sensitive times.
Arjun:And I think people feeling hyper anxious, you know, whether it's what's going on in the news and in the world today.
Arjun:And it's hard, like, in entrepreneurship in this world to, like, make a name for yourself and get people to notice you.
Arjun:And so people are fighting for that stuff, but that leads to all kinds of anxiety and insecurities.
Arjun:And I think for maybe people that are starting off in careers, like younger entrepreneurs, what advice do you have for them?
Arjun:You know, where they're coming up now, whether that's in the creative space or just starting a company or whatever, I of some key things to take stock of right now at that stage.
Arjun:I hate asking the question, like, what do you wish you knew back then?
Arjun:But, you know, if you were just talking to them, if I brought you in on career day to talk to, like, a bunch of 21 year olds that are about to graduate college and they're all in the entrepreneurship program, right.
Arjun:What would you like?
Arjun:And you have just a couple minutes with them to give them just a few tidbits on what they should and shouldn't be doing, that could save them some time here and shorten their curve.
Kat:Well, I would say if you're going to work a nine to five while you're building your business or building whatever entrepreneurial venture it is, do that, but do it concurrently with building your brand and building your business.
Kat:Because even if that side business doesn't work out, which it might fail, and that's okay, that's just information, which with you can use and pivot and iterate personal brand.
Kat:This day and age buffers you against getting laid off because it makes you very visible, demonstrates your authority, it helps build parasocial relationships, it helps make you be seen as a leader within the company.
Kat:So even if you don't want to leave the nine to five, build your personal brand because it will help you with whatever pathway you go.
Kat:I wish I had started doing that when I was, like, in my early twenties.
Kat:I started in my mid twenties, right when I was building my agency alongside my personal brand.
Kat:I would also say, too, you're going to fail a lot.
Kat:And this is a generalization.
Kat:This is through the lens of my own experience.
Kat:So take it with what you will.
Kat:But the twenties are, like, the decade of, like, the messy experiments, truly.
Kat:And if you feel messy, if you feel like you're barely holding it together, like you're.
Kat:You're resonating with every crazy meme that is shared on Instagram, like, for Gen Z, cool.
Kat:You're right where you need to be.
Kat:Time does speed up as you get older.
Kat:I'm in my thirties now, but it's also slowed down in such beautiful ways because I have more resources, I have more wisdom.
Kat:I've learned a lot of lessons by, like, fucking up a lot in my twenties.
Kat:Like, a lot, a lot.
Kat:Like, $8 in my bank account.
Kat:No sense of my identity.
Kat:I dyed my hair platinum to stick it to my ex and then couch surf for a couple months and then finally got my life together.
Kat:It's all good.
Kat:Jokes on him, right?
Kat:Like, no, truly, I.
Kat:You know, the restraining order has lapsed and.
Kat:Yeah, jokes on him.
Kat:You know, great things.
Kat:We're on the other side.
Arjun:I'm curious as to, you know, what we might have touched on a little bit earlier, what you're working on now and what really, what you're excited about in the way of the future.
Arjun:Because LFG, energy and overcoming in spite of winning, in spite of beating the odds.
Arjun:Like, there's a lot of things now that are obstacles that people are seeing as threats to achieving success.
Arjun:Right?
Arjun:Like, a lot of people are feeling like AI is this huge threat and it's going to replace me.
Arjun:It's going to take over.
Arjun:Curious to get your thoughts on either how this enhances.
Arjun:I know where you stand with it, on how it's going to actually, you know, aid your business, but how should people view this right now and all the disruption that's going to come now going forward and space?
Kat:Great question.
Kat:I think disruption breeds opportunity.
Kat:Chaos breeds opportunity.
Kat:The ones who see where the puck is going are going to be the ones that win the game.
Kat:And I think AI is a tool, just like money is a tool.
Kat:Money helps you get shit done.
Kat:AI helps you get shit done.
Kat:If it does collapse society and it does cause, you know, judgment day, well, you might as well use it for its fullest extent until that happens.
Kat:But until then, like, let's not catastrophize and think, worst case scenario, I would rather.
Kat:Rather we retool our brains.
Kat:This is something that you learn in emotional regulation, because as a species, as a human species, we are trained to look for the threat because our biology still thinks we're living in hunter gatherer eras and about to be threatened by saber toothed tigers.
Kat:And I just uber eats my lunch to my high rise apartment in DC, right?
Kat:Like, our programming has not caught up with the society that we're living in.
Kat:So I think it's important to reframe any negative thoughts or any negative question that you might have that come up.
Kat:And it's kind of like a game of whack a mole.
Kat:And a lot will pop up in great frequency, but through the practice of, like, batting it back down and reframing it, positively less moles will pop up.
Kat:Right.
Kat:And you don't have to play the game of whack a mole too much.
Kat:The other thing to address your question of, like, what can people do?
Kat:Like, people are seeing lots of obstacles and threats.
Kat:A huge initiative in my own life and in my own business for the next year at least, is really going to be about getting in community with people.
Kat:Intimate community, intentional community.
Kat:Because the larger thing that I have seen go on is, let's just take the last hundred years, for example.
Kat:The world was really small, pre industrial era.
Kat:And then the industrial era kind of changed how we were connecting as a species.
Kat:We were traveling.
Kat:We were getting out of our hometown.
Kat:We didn't just, like, marry our cousin or marry the kid that, like, you know, grew up across the street anymore.
Arjun:Unless you're a Targaryen.
Kat:Yeah.
Kat:Unless you're a Targaryen.
Kat:Oh, I'm rewatching season two right now.
Kat:That's so good.
Kat:So the world was small.
Kat:Now with the age of information and y two k, the world's gotten really, really big again, noticing patterns.
Kat:I study patterns in my own life.
Kat:I study patterns on a macro and a micro scale, because it all affects the human beings that I am in community with and that I work with.
Kat:I think because of the pendulum swinging from one way to the other, people are craving small spaces.
Kat:They're craving intimate community spaces.
Kat:They're craving groups where they can connect and where they can be heard and where they can brainstorm and mastermind and strategize without fear of judgment, without fear of having their ideas being stolen and sold to the next person.
Kat:Whatever you're doing, if you're having these thoughts, it's easier to banish or whack these thoughts down if you're with other people who can hold you accountable, who can see your blind spots, who can be your own best advocate, because we're biologically programmed to be our own worst enemy.
Kat:So I would definitely encourage people, like, if you're listening to this, you're a part of LFG society, which is an incredible space that you've created, Arjuna, but find other spaces.
Kat:Yeah, it's completely undervalued this day and age.
Kat:Like, put the phone on airplane mode and just get in community with your people.
Kat:Get off social, stop doom scrolling.
Kat:You know, having the world in the palm of your hand can be a double edged sword.
Kat:And so I think more awareness around that will create more intention toward the opposite.
Kat:Yeah.
Arjun:There's nothing more powerful than that smark of that spark of, like, actual, tangible, dynamic human connection.
Arjun:Right.
Kat:That's what we crave.
Arjun:Yeah.
Arjun:Being in community.
Arjun:And you don't realize it sometimes how much you were craving it until you reconnect with it.
Arjun:Like, when you take a break, when you've been away from community and maybe been so immersed into the tech world.
Arjun:Right?
Arjun:Like, this was widely felt during the pandemic when we were so heavy on Zoom and then to be around people, you were like a fish out of water for a split second, but then you were reminded, crazy, which is why no one would go back indoors.
Arjun:They couldn't reinstitute lockdowns.
Arjun:Like, everyone was like, screw that.
Arjun:Like, I missed this.
Arjun:You're not putting me back inside ever again.
Arjun:Kat, there's something I want to ask you as we kind of wrap up here about your strategies of what you do.
Arjun:Like, your own blueprints, because of everything you've been through in your life and your amazing and inspiring story.
Arjun:And I mean that sincerely, of, like, making a decision, no longer tolerating what you were getting and starting a new chapter for yourself, which, again, I want everyone to be able to take and draw from.
Arjun:On some level, we all hit dark moments, dark path.
Arjun:Like, it's not to say that the hard times are ever over, but I feel like we get these blueprints that we've crafted for ourselves because of therapy and work we do on ourselves or from that terrible experience that we somehow emerged from, and we're like, phew, I made it, right?
Arjun:I can do it.
Arjun:I can do it.
Arjun:Again.
Arjun:What do you do?
Arjun:Or what's your strategy whenever you hit a low point?
Arjun:Or maybe it was a bad, bad, frustrating week or there was just so much negativity around you or chaos in the workplace.
Arjun:I mean, you frequent New York a lot.
Arjun:It's high energy, but it's high stakes.
Arjun:They're gonna be high highs and low lows, right?
Arjun:Like, it's very much.
Arjun:So what are your strategies for how you get out of those?
Arjun:If you hit them on some level?
Kat:Yeah, no, I do.
Kat:I'm human.
Kat:There are always lulls, but I look at them as dips back on the way up and up to whatever the highs are that await.
Kat:So two questions I ask myself when I find myself losing my center, right?
Kat:Or I find myself falling victim to comparisonitis or struggling with imposter syndrome or burnout or jealousy or envy, right?
Kat:Any of those things that crop up, I'm human.
Kat:I feel them.
Kat:I just don't react from them.
Kat:I feel it.
Kat:I take it in cool, smash it down, work through it, clear it.
Kat:Two questions that I ask myself, and they're going to sound so simple, but I really encourage people listening because I guarantee you 95% of people listening have never taken the time to write down this question and answer this question, at least in the last month.
Kat:And I do it on a weekly basis.
Kat:The first question is, what do you want?
Kat:Second question, how do you want it to feel?
Kat:They're simple.
Kat:But didn't Einstein say that the mark of true genius is simplicity?
Kat:I found when I get down, it's because I'm frustrated that I'm not where I think I should be.
Kat:Oh, by the way, delete the word should from your vocabulary.
Kat:That's another strategy.
Kat:Should is a useless word.
Kat:Absolutely fucking useless.
Kat:If you ever find yourself using the word should, find a different way.
Kat:Use chachi bt.
Kat:How do I say this without using the word should?
Kat:Because I fucking hate that word.
Kat:I'm deleting that from my vocabulary.
Kat:But whenever I find myself.
Kat:That was a little mini, mini ted talk there.
Kat:Whenever I find myself, like, in those lower moments, I often find it's because I'm not focusing on what I want.
Kat:I'm focusing on what other people have or what I think I should want or where I think I should be.
Kat:Being 32, unmarried, I do own a home, but I don't have this or, you know, all of those, like, tapes.
Kat:But if you focus on and your only barometer and your only north Star for success is what you actually want.
Kat:It's a lot easier to be clear and focused and know what to say yes to and what to say no to and be like, cool.
Kat:I love that Arjun's crushing it.
Kat:I'm not in that season right now for me, because I am working toward this.
Kat:And what we are working on is different, but that doesn't make me lesser or him better at all, like removing those descriptors.
Kat:And the other important thing is to really understand how you want it to feel, because so many people focus on the masculine, the structure, the strategy, the logic, the software, the schedules, all of that, right?
Kat:The tangible, the measurable.
Kat:They forget about the feminine, they forget about the feeling.
Kat:They forget about the emotions, the energy, the intention.
Kat:And I found even the best leaders do have a nice blend of both.
Kat:And I'm not referring to male or female here.
Kat:I'm referring to masculine and feminine.
Kat:Right.
Kat:The energies.
Kat:Regardless of what your orientation or your gender is, knowing how you want something to feel can really help anchor it in your body so that you can begin to call it in and begin to identify.
Kat:Oh, when I attended that meetup last week, I felt really good.
Kat:I felt, in fact, exactly how I wanted to feel, how I wrote down how I wanted to feel in my life.
Kat:Oh, and also those people were making recommendations and were excited to hear what I wanted in my business.
Kat:They weren't telling me I was delusional.
Kat:They weren't talking down to me.
Kat:They weren't cutting off my sentences or saying how great they were in comparison to me.
Kat:Weekly, daily, practice journaling, what do you want?
Kat:How do you want it to feel?
Kat:Deleting the word should.
Kat:Oh, and the other tactical thing that everybody can implement right now, immediately, they're going to hate me for this one.
Kat:But when you go to bed and you wake up tomorrow morning, I don't want you to look at your phone for the first 30 minutes.
Kat:In fact, I don't, I don't want you to even touch it.
Kat:If I hear rebuttals now of people saying, well, what if my kids call me this or that?
Kat:Cool.
Kat:Put them on the favorites list.
Kat:If they call you, it'll come through.
Kat:But put your phone on do not disturb, do not look at it for the first 30 minutes and just sit with your thoughts and answer those two questions.
Arjun:Beautiful.
Arjun:There's no other takeaway you got from this episode, guys.
Arjun:That right there is worth the price of admission.
Arjun: : Arjun:If it's mine dollars an hour, I can save you the money and just listen to what Kat just prescribed everyone to do every morning.
Arjun:And I think you'll find that it'll make some pretty transformative shifts.
Arjun:That was beautiful, Kat.
Arjun:I'm really glad that you shared that because I'm always curious, what makes high functioning lights?
Arjun:I call them lights, not people lights.
Arjun:Right.
Arjun:Because you are.
Arjun:That you shed so much, like.
Arjun:And you're very magnetic this way, which is what draws people into you, and it's your gift.
Arjun:But I'm always curious, like, what makes them tick?
Arjun:How are they wired to actually get through stuff?
Arjun:Because to people that didn't know you before this podcast episode, they see you as the CEO and founder of the brand architect, the co founder of the Not Nice, Clever podcast, and all this, all the other things that you're involved.
Kat:In, all the titles, all the accolades.
Arjun:Yeah, they see that.
Arjun:They have no idea where you maybe came from, that it wasn't always sunshine and roses.
Arjun:In fact, there were some very dark moments and some serious pitfalls that you had to dig yourself out of and do the work, do the hard stuff.
Arjun:Pit up doesn't end.
Arjun:You're gonna have some things that are gonna continually pop up.
Arjun:It's not a matter of if they happen, but when.
Arjun:But the most important thing is that you've got strategies.
Arjun:You've got strategies for how I get out of it.
Arjun:Like, sure, I get into a low, but I don't stay there, as you said.
Arjun:Like, yeah, I take and I start asking some questions.
Arjun:I get introspective about it, I process it, and then I move forward.
Arjun:Right.
Arjun:It doesn't bring you down the way it might have to.
Arjun:Young cat, you know, ten years ago, baby cat, baby cat, she would have responded very differently.
Arjun:That.
Arjun:So I appreciate you sharing that.
Arjun:That, to me, is my favorite part of this.
Arjun:The last question I ask every guest is, what does LFG energy mean to you, or what is the essence of it in your own interpretation?
Arjun:There's no right or wrong answer for it, but what does it mean for you?
Kat:The first word that popped in to my mind when you asked that question was, it means being unapologetic, being yourself, not saying sorry, not cowering, not waxing, not waning like being yourself, period.
Arjun:I love it.
Arjun:That's a great, great answer.
Arjun:That might be one of my new favorite ones, so I appreciate you being on.
Arjun:I'm looking forward to all the stuff that you're going to continue to do and that I get to be a fan of, and even sometimes I'm fortunate enough to be part of and collaborate with you on, which I'm always excited about.
Arjun:So thank you so much for pouring into our community today, as you always do.
Arjun:Wish you the best, and I'll see you out there in the streets.
Kat:Until next time.
Arjun:Until next time, my friend.
Arjun:Thank you.
Kat:My pleasure.
