Leaving Corporate to Build Relay Recruiting

You said you had to grieve your old life before you could build a new one. And that's not something like most people would admit. I named it grief because I realized I left a great position, great income, great colleagues, a great reputation. So, it's not like, oh, thank God I got out of there. It was just truly betting on myself and knowing that there was something deeper. He did die, but he was brought back, right? I mean, every year they celebrate his death day. Yeah. To a degree.

We call it a death day where we do something really hard to celebrate life. When that happened back in 2017, it really put into perspective what matters. What lie did you tell yourself about being an entrepreneur before you actually became one? I didn't think I was ready and everyone else was like you are ready and I didn't think I was ready and then I just did it and then you figure it out. So the point is you're never ready and you think you will be. I want to start with something Lauren said in her intake that I have not been able to stop thinking about.

She said she slept perfectly the night before she quit. No restlessness, no anxiety, just peace. and she said that surprised her more than anything else about making the leap. That is our guest today. This is outside the corporate box. But before we get into today's show, a quick thank you to the partners who make this possible. Wise agent, Subi, and the CE shop. These are the companies that believe in what we're doing here and we are grateful to have them in our corner. The playbook is changing.

The question is, are you changing with it? This is outside the corporate box. Real conversations with real leaders who broke the mold and built something better with your host Jay Man and Jeffrey Scott Stanton. Today we're sitting down with Lauren Duncle Dugos. She spent nearly a decade building a career at someone else's firm and she was exceptional at it, but the question everyone around her kept asking eventually got too loud to ignore. Lauren, welcome to Outside the Corporate Box. Thanks, guys. Excited to be here. Yeah.

So, we're glad you're glad you could make it. Now, paint the picture for us. Uh before relay recruiting existed, what was your day-to-day actually, you know, look like? Yeah. Where were you working? What were you doing? So before relay, I worked at a local firm in Rochester. And it was great. I had an amazing life, great routine. Uh worked with some really great people who are now my long-term friends. Hopefully for a long time after this, we'll be close friends. And to the outside world, it was probably the perfect position.

And honestly, it wasn't that bad. I probably could have kept my head down and kept the grind going for much longer than I did, but I was ready for a change. So, decided to shake it all up and go off on my own. Yeah. So, you were a top billing recruiter, right? And what does that actually mean? Like, what does your day-to-day work look like? Because I think we have so many different, you know, professions on here. Yeah. What was the work like? You were you were exact like recruiting who and and for what kind of companies?

Yeah, good question. So a typical recruiter is probably billing anywhere, so charging a client or an employer anywhere from 200 to 300,000 and I was regularly billing 550,000 and up up to probably about 650,000 or so. So did really well in my firm. And what it looked like from dayto day is you typically are selling yourself, the firm, recruiting services. So I work with employers throughout the country. probably 85% are going to be in Western New York, but yeah, outside of that, I've worked as far as Alaska and Colorado and with different industries as well.

So, a lot of nonprofit, higher ed, manufacturing, energy, everything in between. And I started off in the executive recruiting space. So, CEOs, seuite, everything that's a senior leadership role. And then from there, it's kind of grown just because when you place a leader, they usually want you to build out their team. So, I've done a lot of work in that capacity. And with the firm that I had left, it it was great, but it felt like Groundhog's Day in a sense that I would sell. I would recruit on the position because it's called a full desk.

So, I'm doing everything in between of reaching out to candidates, getting interviews facilitated, helping with negotiations, anything administrative, and then doing it again, rinse and repeat. again really great job but I am definitely someone who is a visionary very creative so I was kind of getting the itch that I needed to do something else can I can I ask you back a little so what did you do anything before you did the recruiting was there any other position you did before that you just went straight into Yeah so I actually started my career in fundraising with the American Cancer Society and then moving into the

University of Rochester's medical center doing fundraising events like golf, golf tournaments, gallas, things like that. And then moved right into high-end donors. So asking for six figure plus gifts from uh natural yeah netw worth individuals in the area. And then I got into recruiting because I was being recruited for a fundraising position down in Texas. And when I decided it wasn't wasn't worth relocating and moving to go to Texas to do fundraising, the owner of the firm asked me if I ever thought of recruiting and said I would be a perfect fit.

So that's kind of how I made the jump. So couple things I want to mention. You said Groundhog's Day. It's one of my favorite movies. But you say Groundhog's Day and then also I think it's a generational difference where we've had older people on who say like keep your that was a thing. keep your head down, grind it out for 30 years, get the pension, retire, but I love that you said like I could have, but I'm not but I didn't. And and was it something that you realized like I'm not going to I can't do this forever anymore, you know, like was it a

slow burn where you finally said this is it or did you plan it for a while? Like walk us through the transition there. Yeah, I think it was, if I had to categorize it, probably a slowburn where you start to see a couple signs. You ignore them because again, it's a great job. I'm doing just fine. Everything's fine. This is what I'm supposed to be doing. Yeah, I was really great at it. And I think what bothered me the most, and I know there's a couple other industries like this, is I was full commission.

So, if I wasn't recruiting or selling, I wasn't making money. And I had so many ideas to improve the business to train some of my team members to implement different technologies and AI and everything that would make the business more efficient. And while I had full reigns to do that and I did a lot of it, I wasn't getting paid for it. And that bothered me, right? Like I'm doing all of this extra work. Did it ever just click as like, hey, I'm doing all this stuff and I could just do it for myself.

Yeah. So it I had a a very So I'm an open, honest, transparent person. Let's lay everything on the table, work together, move forward. And I had had those conversations about what does my future look like here? How can I make a really great impact on the company and be compensated for it? And it just wasn't part of the owner's vision of what I had, which is completely fine. No hard feelings there. Um, she worked really hard for what she built, which I can completely respect, but I still had that feeling of, well, I still need to do this.

I still need to try this. And that's when I'd come home and I would talk to my husband, who's my biggest supporter, and he's like, so then do it. Just just do your own thing. I I don't understand why. And he's been pushing me to do it since COVID. And I just wasn't really ready for it. And so, he was the one that's been in my ear this whole time kind of whispering in. And so I finally allowed myself probably last year around this time to think about okay what would this actually look like?

What would be the path? How do I do it? Starting putting to starting to put pen to paper of that plan and execute. And then it just made sense that yeah I have to do this. Yeah. I mean you had mentioned you said everyone when you did it everyone around you could see it before you could right. Right? They're like, "Oh, yeah. Of course, it totally makes sense that Ben included, your husband." Uh, what does that tell you about how we see ourselves versus how others see us?

Well, that's really funny because say, "I don't want yes men around me. I want people that challenge me, that push back, that make me think differently. That's how I've always hired people is just how do we work together and fill in each other's gaps." So, it was really interesting to me when I did start to plant the seed of talking to my friends, talking to my family of, "Hey, I think I might do this." And everyone was like, "Yep, about time. I figured. Why haven't you done this?" Right?

And so, to that point, I think it's just different because we can always see the potential in others. But imposttor syndrome is real when it comes to yourself or taking the chance because you're the one that might have something to lose. It's different when you're like, "Yeah, friend, go start your own company." But when it actually comes to your dollars, your reputation, it's a little bit different. So, I just feel like um you know, we believe in others, we'll do more for others, and we can see their potential so much quicker.

I don't know what that says about why we can't do it ourselves, but it's also worthwhile where when I think about what advice would I give someone else, I just give it to myself and then you got to do it. A lot of times it's easier to give other people advice because then we don't have to deal with the ramifications of it ourselves. And I think that's why a lot of times we don't see like you said it was a slow burn. And I think for a lot of people leaving the leaving the corporate box is that slow burn and then it's usually like one

thing that usually hits that's like enough's enough. It's you think it was that one event but it really was all the little things that led up to that big event. Yeah. You mentioned AI and of course that's my love language. How was AI in the workplace? saying that. I love it. I just love it. I like what you say. A hi to me. Yeah, I get it. I mean, it's so funny to see everyone's different pallet for it, right? I haven't heard so many people up until this week with some push back to me about AI and it's the younger generation, which I thought is

really interesting. Very true. Because usually they're the ones to learn it quicker. Um, but as far as my space, a lot of the recruiting aspects that we do is really administrative heav heavy. So, it's reaching out to candidates, writing them the messages, a lot of administrative tasks of scheduling, uh, following up with action items to them, all of which can be automated relatively quickly. So, those were things that I was seeing all over the place that I wanted to implement. That wouldn't take away from the human touch.

should still my messages, my followup, everything that would go into finding the candidates and then being able to just work more efficiently was huge for me and that's also where I could see if I started my own recruiting company, I can do less of that and way more of the work that actually matters along the way. Yeah. And if you know if they're answering questions with Chad GPT, why can't why can't you figure it out for yourself, right? Yeah. I mean, if you already know the answer.

Absolutely. Now, you mentioned a non-solicitation agreement. Um, walk us through like what who do people who don't know like who aren't in industries that that that actually exists? Yeah, good question. Like what what do you walk away from when you have something like that? So, this is not legal advice, right? No, no, we're we're not giving legal advice, nor would we ever play an attorney on a podcast. Yeah. Right. So my understanding is so you have non-competes and non-solicitations. Non-compete is a lot more strict. Both are really hard to hold up in court, but it's about protecting the company that you're leaving.

And so a non-compete is you're not competing in their industry. You might have to take a break for a year or two doing something else and then you can come back in. Yeah, I have a non-solicitation. So that means I can still be a recruiter. I can still be in the space, but I cannot solicit clients, candidates that I used to work with at my old firm for about a year. So in essence, you have to ghost the people that you've built relationships with over however many years you were at that firm.

Yes. Think of it this way for the for the real for the real estate agents. Imagine you have a huge CRM, a huge network, a huge database of all your past clients, all your past customers and someone says you can't call those people. That that that's the real estate equivalent of it. Like your CRM just gets shut up. Say for a year, sorry, you can't go find new business. Go find new people to talk to. Yeah, you got it. And I've had clients that I was working for for years that I didn't say goodbye to.

I couldn't I was lucky in the sense that my boss kept me on for a couple extra days longer than the other. So there were a couple other recruiters that were essentially just walked out that day. Had no communication or correspondence with any of those people where I really advocated the smooth transition of let's make the introductions to who's taking over the accounts. Now, that didn't work for all of my clients. In fact, most of them it didn't. But there were a couple that were active that I was working with where I got the blessing to make that connection.

But that being said, it was probably three clients out of a hundred plus that I was working with. So, that was probably the hardest part because I pride myself on the relationship piece being Yeah. closing the loop and not not being able to to close that with them was really hard. Yeah, that seems so challenging just to walk away. I mean, forget about the income for a second. Like, these are relationships, like you said, that you've built over the years and just not not to be able to contact them at all.

It now you call them golden handcuffs. I love that term, by the way. I've heard it before and I love I love that terminology. What does it feel like to know that you're in a golden cage, if you will, and and and how how long do you tell yourself it's still worth it? Yeah. And for those who don't know, because I know a lot of people Yeah. on that are Yeah. Um in the search world, so I I work with hiring and candidates who are in really great positions.

They want to make a leap or a change. And golden handcuffs is essentially you have really great benefits or really great pay or whatever it may be that is handcuffing you to that job that you can't explore or make those changes. So to the outside world to a degree again I know all my friends and family were rooting for me to make the change. It was kind of crazy for me to walk away from the setup that I had. But what I thought about was the potential of where this could go because at the worstc case scenario, I just had to get another recruiting job

at another firm and doing what I already was doing, which wasn't that bad. So for me, it was just kind of weighing the pros and the cons and then believing in myself. Although that was a roller coaster of can I do this or not? Absolutely. and lots of tears were shed and questions were constantly being asked. But at the end of the day, if it doesn't work out, I just get another job again. Not that big of a deal. Yeah, we hear that often with people like, "Oh, well, it just stayed on for a little while longer because of the benefits or the the extra

things." Golden handcuffs. Well, and I also say you have to lay out your values and what's most important to you. And that also might determine whether you have golden handcuffs or if you if you really should just stay. And for me, my values revolve around having complete autonomy over my time. Being remote, I'm a huge traveler, I love adventuring, and not having to ask for PTO was worth more money in my opinion. So, I thought if I have to take a pay cut that I can do what I want or take a walk at noon because the sun's finally shining in Rochester, that's worth it

to me. Yeah, you can do that. Yeah. And and I think uh it's worth me like you're one of my you inspire others I feel like with the quality of life that you guys lead and just give them a just a little taste of what you guys did last summer because they don't they think time off you guys went to you know a theme park or something. Just give them tell them what you did last summer. Well my husband and I live a very a life with intention I'll say and it's not just because we like a vacation.

I mean, everyone does and if you could take one, of course. But my husband almost died back right before we got married. So, it w he was in ICU. I was told plan the funeral arrangements. It was we were not making it down the aisle. Well, he did die, but he was brought back, right? I mean, every year they celebrate his death day. Yeah. To a degree. We call it a death day where we do something really hard to celebrate life and we often do it with friends.

And so when that happened back in 2017, it really put into perspective what matters. And at the end of the day, it's each other. It's about experiencing things that you normally don't think you can do. And so we go all out with adventures, vacations, um, experiences in general. So what J man's referring to is last last summer we took a camper van and went completely across country. No like no itinerary. We were just going where the wind took us. And fun fact about that I just signed a new contract with someone who I met when I was out on that trip.

So we stayed in touch. He just signed off. I'm meeting with him after this to fill a position for him. Um you just never know who you're going to meet. But we've done that. We've traveled across Peru doing fiveday tracks TNB toward Mount Blanc. We're doing to do Dolommites this summer and that's what's important to us. Awesome. Okay. I just wanted you to share a little more perspective for them. Quick shout out to one of our founding partners, the CE Shop. Look, continuing education doesn't have to feel like a punishment.

The CE shop provides online real estate education that actually makes sense. pre-licicensing, post-licicensing, continuing education, all of it built to fit your schedule so you can keep your career moving forward without putting your business on pause. Check them out at the ceshop.com link in the show notes and be sure to tell them that Jqued sent you. In the we always we send out like an interview form. They call it intake. I don't like the word intake. You had mentioned that entrepreneurialship doing this yourself was lonier than you expected.

What What do you mean by that? Yeah, it's so it's funny when I was filling out this questionnaire that you're talking about how much I had to reflect, right? Because I'm just you guys know you're just figuring out as you're going and it's fine and you don't really take the time to look back at how how far you came and I was really questioning myself like why did I feel so lonely? Don't get me wrong, I'm an extrovert. Absolutely. I was with an office filled with all women.

There was always something to talk about. But I love to put my head down and be really productive and I'm really involved in the community and groups. So I just didn't know why I was so lonely in the beginning. And I think what it boils down to was it was kind of like I was keeping the best kept secret for a couple months because when I left in September of my firm, I didn't announce to the public until the end of December what I was doing.

So, not saying goodbye to people, not having people know what I'm doing. I mean, yes, the friends and family, but I was behind the scenes building the website. Yeah. Going through crazy decision fatigue of how do you want things to look? How do you want to position yourself overanalyzing everything and then by yourself to a degree u was just a totally Yeah. Because it's almost like you you're going through something exciting. It's like a new chapter and it's like you want to share it with people but you really the people you with at your old company for so long the people you would normally have

these conversations with is like oh I can't I can't and I I I relate to that. I think J man can relate to that too especially where we came from but it's one of those where it's like when they you're right I think isolation's a good is a good word for it because you know the certain conversations you can't have or don't want to have with the people or conversations that you want to have with people but you can't have it with those people anymore. Yeah.

people that won't understand, you know, like, "Oh, look at this website. Isn't it great?" Like, "Yeah, sure." Like, how did you get over that? How'd you get through that? Yeah. I I mean, through it just by being busy. I I mentioned I'm really involved with the community and professional groups. And as of re recently, I've really taken some time to dive into some more like recruiting networks and groups, which has been really fun because I feel like I was very much in a bubble when I was at the firm here that again, I knew there was something more to recruiting.

I just couldn't put my hands on it. So, being able to talk shop with different people and have friendly competition has been really exciting and fun. Yeah. Um, but I think I mean, the first few months were the hardest. And you can I mentioned my husband again who's my my biggest cheerleader. I mean I would text him some really great news. I got a new job and then he'd come home and I'd be in tears and I'm like what am I doing with my life? Right?

Like it was chaos and I am a calm cool person. So that in itself was just wild. But I think you know it's a couple different things. Finding community if you need it find it through the gym through professional networking groups. um I'm on boards, things of that nature. I also think creating challenges for yourself maybe that you feel like you have more control over. So with some of the questions you've been asking me, I'm again reflecting why did I sign up for this crazy big ultramarathon in less than a month.

Like why why did I do that? And I think it also comes down to having a plan, having control. I could check it off. I knew what I was doing because in my daytoday to a degree I have no idea what I'm doing. I've never been a business owner. I can recruit with my eyes closed. I don't know how to market. I don't know finance. I don't know how to do sales. So, at least it gave me something to work towards. So, I would also say that's how I got through it is finding something I could control.

Well, you said you had to grieve your old life before you could build the new one. And that's not something like most people would admit, right? Most people are like, I left and I did this and I'm awesome and 10x. let's go, you know, and and what is what did that grief look like? Cuz I think Jeffrey and I went through a similar struggle where it's it's you have this dayto-day, now you don't. There's a transition period. Yeah. It's it was interesting. And it's funny because I feel like the one day then what it when it really hit me was the first day I went

to the gym and normally I have my bag, I take my shower, I zip across the street and I go to work. Across the street. Yeah. And I didn't have to do that. I didn't pack a bag. I didn't have to shower there. I was like, "What do I do next? This just seems overwhelming." And everyone expects when you tell them, "Oh, you started your own business that it's going to be amazing, exciting, everything's great." And it's at first it's like, "It's fine. It's scary. It's fine.

It's fine." Famous last words. I'm fine. Everything's fine. Um, so it just kind of depended on the day on how I handled that grief. And again, the first few months were the hardest and learning something new. I I actually I feel like it's made me even better at my job because I have that much more empathy for candidates when they're starting a new role of the uncertainty of the questions in your head of the handcuffs you just broke from and secondguessing that. And for the positions that I've placed so far, I I'm Yeah, I can feel that for them.

And I'm trying to be that person to be like, "Hey, it's going to get better. I'm betting your seat, right? Just keep going. Um, but it's hard. Decision fatigue is exhausting. Learning new things is hard. Um, but just building proof is is doing it right. Getting the confidence, doing it, learning it, moving forward. Back to the grief for a second because a lot of people wouldn't call it grief. They call it excite. They wouldn't name it, and I truly believe that's what it is, but they wouldn't name it what it is.

A lot of, you know, entrepreneurs, a lot of founders will call, oh, it was excitement. It was a little scared, but, you know, it was really exciting and it was, you know, my path. Was there a point that you realize that I'm actually going through a grief opposed to the excitement or was it was it no grief? I think I realized that later because I was like why why is and also you you expect you only know what you know right like you just assume this entrepreneur journey is going to be amazing and all these opportunities and you have your control of your schedule and

what are you going to do with it right and you don't realize how overwhelming it is and again scary and uncertain so I I named it grief because I I realized again I left a great position great income um great colleagues, a great reputation. So, it's not like, oh, thank God I got out of there. It was just truly betting on myself and knowing that there was something deeper. So, I had to grieve it in the sense that that's no longer the routine. I left there for a reason.

So, how what life do I want to create? And then again, it wasn't what are what did I run from? It was what I'm running to and towards. And that kind of mental shift that I had to remind myself was was really a game changer because now I design my life exactly the way I want it and my schedule and when I want to take meetings or not but yeah I don't know I think to a degree when you just know something for five years and you don't even have to think about it there's good and bad that comes with it and when you stop

doing it you have to question everything that you're going to do from there on out yeah I think your question I know I had said this in one of them it's like the phone calls stop coming in that you would normally get and it's like one of those weird that it's it's not only grieving their position. It's almost grieving that identity and that life and everything you built for that that period of time. So I I absolutely 100% relate to it. You had said in at one point that you stopped waiting for permission um and just had to believe in yourself like you stopped waiting

for people to even question what you were doing and you just believed in yourself and you just did it. what it's tough for a lot of people to do. You know, a lot of people always waiting for other people like, you know, somebody question what I'm doing just to bring me some sanity to what I'm doing and just do it. What What is it like and what do you think is something about you that you're able to just like, hey, I'm just going to do this and get it done?

Oh, good question. Feel like I would want to ask one of my friends or family members who knows me. Um, I think part of it is having fun and it's not that serious. right? Like you just try it, see what happens. Everything can be fixed. An old boss of mine used to say, "As long as you're trying with good intention, it'll work out the way it's supposed to." And yeah, and taking again that seriousness out of it is like so freeing that you think everyone's looking at you or that they care what you're doing and they don't.

and they might remember that you left your job to start your own company, but like more than likely they probably forgot after they hit like on LinkedIn. So, what's the harm in trying a new video or putting a new post out there? Now, I say that, but then I also laugh because I've been trying new things on LinkedIn and you guys know like putting yourself out on a video or a podcast and and doing this is very vulnerable. And I used to tell myself, "No one's really watching because I couldn't tell you what someone else posted.

I forget the moment I scroll past it." But when I see people, they tell me, "I just saw your post. Oh, your your message was really helpful. It impacted me. Oh, I downloaded your resume template." So, people are noticing, but I feel like in a really good way. And it's helping others, too. So, I think also that piece of it of help others. Don't take yourself too seriously. Any lesson is a lesson learned, not a failure. And you just try and keep moving. What's the biggest lie that entrepreneurs or founders tell themselves or what's what's the biggest lie people tell themselves about entrepreneurial founding a

business? I don't know that it's it's funny because at this point I've listened to so many podcasts and books and everyone has I'll ask you the question differently. What lie did you tell yourself about being an entrepreneur before you actually became one and a founder yourself? This probably contradicts itself, but like I didn't think I was ready and everyone else was like, "You are ready." And I didn't think I was ready and then I just did it and then you figure it out. So I I maybe the the point is you're never ready and you you think that you will be.

I don't know if that answers your question, but I think that's probably a big piece of it. Absolutely does. Someone once told me the two biggest lies are that it's easy and that it's not easy. Like that's the two biggest lies of entrepreneur. It's going to be easier than you think and it's not going to be as easy as you think. Like isn't that a contradiction? She's like think I'm like you know I think that is entrepreneurial We think it's easy but then it's not. So yeah I I love your I loved your answer.

Well this brings us to our lightning round. We're just going to ask you some quick questions just off the top of your head. You don't have to go too too deep. Jeffrey and I will kind of switch back and forth. Uh, what's the thing that scared you the most about starting your own company that you'll admit now? Well, the easy answer is money, right? Making sure that you have enough money because that's why we're working. But the real answer is is doing the work. I'm very much a visionary.

I have a million ideas. I have a notebook full of ideas. But sitting down and actually executing executing was the scary part. What's one word that would describe you at your old firm and one word that would describe you who you are now? doer at my old firm creator. No, like that. Best purchase you made in in year one of running your own business. Anyone knows me, they know I hate spending money. I literally cannot do that. And I've really kept this company on a shoestring budget.

So, I haven't done it yet, but I'm going to invest in a coach and I'm really excited about them. What does freedom feel like? So to me it's feeling the sun on my face or whatever weather Rochester will give me in the best snow, rain. Yeah. In the winter because you're outside in all of it. You're outside in all of it. I will always be outside. I'm a tree hugger. I love hiking and camping and I do all the winter near winter winter near winter mountaineering.

There we go. Um that I can. But I feel like the luckiest person in the world when I can look at the count the the weather app, pick out the best window of the day and be able to go out there with my dog. That's what freedom is. England this summer for a recruiting conference. What's the one thing that the UK is doing in recruiting that the US has not caught on to yet? I'll have more for you come July, but from what I'm seeing. So all of the podcasters, thought leaders are all out of UK.

And I think it's just a difference in the respect for the industry. So if you think about it, a company runs more often than not on the people that they have on their team. You need the best talent in order to be the best. And in the UK, they believe in recruiting. And so there are so many really great firms that are ahead of their time where oftentimes in the US, you kind of have to fight for why your service is going to push the needle forward.

So, um I feel like with them, they're pretty saturated, so they have to get really competitive and creative to be the best. And so, that's where a lot of um these different initiatives are coming from. But I'm going early July. So, I'll let you know more after just and I think before I ask another question, I think that's I think a lot of entrepreneurs, a lot of people in business for themselves need to look outside their own little geographic area and even their own business. So, if you can go somewhere and pick up on ideas from, you know, outside of the area you are out

to United States, I think that's a hugely smart idea. Um, ultramarathon. I don't run unless someone's chasing me. And Jman knows that because every time I see JM post one of his running in the rain, I laugh at myself. I I I wish I could. I just don't. Why? Yeah. Just ask the question. Why? Well, when when J man's posting that and he's in the rain and in the snow, I'm usually like right next to him. sometimes on or out of so ultramarathon because like I so I'm I'm big into psychology and I understand like you're at the point in ultramarathon that your body is

telling your brain it doesn't want to do it anymore as a safety mechanism to keep you alive even though it's just psychologically like why would you want to put your body and your mind through some why yeah well I you know two parts so I this will be my first ultramarathon. The most I've ran as a marathon, so this will be new. Maybe my my response to this will change after I do it, but it was signing up for something that scares me. And I heard an Olympic athlete say once like when you when you feel those nerves, you call it excitement and you just

run towards it. And so I use that in everyday life and that including some of these endurance things of just try it. What's the worst that can happen? I get tired, I walk, I quit. No big deal. Um, again, the stress of it, it's it's not the end of the world, but I really love just pushing myself. And I think in tandem with this new business, being able to follow a schedule, knowing that I'm working towards a goal, I know it'll work while I'm questioning everything else as I'm trying to figure things out along the way has been really helpful.

But also, when I look back on memories of when I'm most proud of myself, it's the things that were hard and scary that I didn't realize I could do that I did and I'm stronger for it. Yeah. I think a lot of the and thankfully I think a lot of the traits between someone who can push themselves in that run or push themselves in anything athletic relates directly to entrepreneurialship because you have to push when you realize this isn't going the same thing as that and again I would never run an ultramarathon just wouldn't do it but I understand the psychology behind it and and

I truly think it's the same psychology. It's like I'm going to push myself till not other people can't tell me I can do this but until I'm going to do it like that that you know and I think these two are very very correlated together. Yeah. The mental toughness piece is is a huge part of it. And I think for the gym that I go to I credit that for the last two and a half years of doing these reps when you really don't want to or grinding through this workout that's so hard but you're stronger after.

You feel more proud of yourself. It's just like anything else. You don't want to pick up the phone to make a sales call. Well, after it you're going to be really proud of yourself. So, just getting on your comfort zone. So, every every episode we end it roughly the same way. Um, this question, what what if you could go back and tell yourself something on day one of starting this journey, this entrepreneurial journey, starting your own business, being a founder, what would you tell yourself on day one, knowing what you know now?

Yeah. knowing now and and really getting to know myself over the last couple months, I would say just make it exist and perfect it from there. Because in the beginning, especially, I would overanalyze again that decision fatigue, question myself where if you just put it out there and fix it, you're better off with pretty much anything in life. So, don't overthink it. Just make it exist. Love that answer. Thank you. Thank you, Lauren. And thank you everybody for listening and watching. If that conversation hit you the way it hit us, please share it.

Send it to somebody who's in the middle of their own moment right now. Maybe they're grinding away, putting their head down, thinking Groundhog's Day. Okay. Subscribe if you have not already. Um Lauren, where do people find you? Do you want to Yeah, find me on LinkedIn. I pretty much live on there and it's just linkedin.comuncle. Okay, perfect. We'll put it in the show notes in the description. Uh, and next Monday, we're sitting down with another great guest who is living outside the corporate box. You don't want to miss that.

But before we let you go, we want to say thank you to our founding partners, Wise Agent, Subi, and the CE Shop. They make this show possible, and they're building tools that actually help people in the industry. Check them. Check them out. All the links are in the show notes. And thank you, Lauren, for spending your time with us. And thank you to everyone for listening. That's not something we take lightly. Now, go make it happen and live your life outside the corporate box. Thank you, Lauren.