High Performance Mindset | Learn from World-Class Leaders, Consultants, Athletes & Coaches about Mindset - 657: Growing Your Business without Growing Apart with Kelly Clements, Business Coach and “The Entreprenewer”

Episode Date: January 3, 2025

Kelly Clements is the creator of The Entreprenewer, a marriage centric coaching program for entrepreneurs. Her professional experience working for world class coaching programs like Strategic Coach and Lifebook have taught her how to work with driven entrepreneurs, but it was her personal experience that underscored why it was so important for both the entrepreneur and the spouse to have a coach. Kelly can seamlessly help bridge The Ambition Gap that many entrepreneurial couples experience, as well as giving relevant perspective changes to help couples connect at a deeper level. Her Relationship Spectrum™ helps couples identify ways to create a healthier power dynamic, and her Presence Principles™ will help both parties get more enjoyment and intimacy out of the relationship. Author of The Power of Play, Praise, and Purpose, and Grow Your Business Without Growing Apart, Kelly provides actionable strategies to help entrepreneurs WIN at work and home.  In this episode, Cindra and Kelly discuss:  The 6 Presence Principles Her DANA Acronym and how it relates to you How your Reticular Activating System impacts relationships  Her “Alpha-Omega Spectrum” and why you should understand it  Most importantly, how to grow your business without growing apart HIGH PERFORMANCE MINDSET SHOWNOTES FOR THIS EPISODE TO LEARN MORE ABOUT KELLY   TO GET 10% OF KELLY’S COURSE, USE THE CODE: “MINDSET” AND CLICK HERE REQUEST A FREE MENTAL BREAKTHROUGH CALL WITH DR. CINDRA AND/OR HER TEAM TO LEARN MORE ABOUT THE MENTALLY STRONG INSTITUTE Love the show? Rate and review the show for Cindra to mention you on the next episode.    

Welcome to the High Performance Mindset. This is your host, Dr. Cendra Kampoff, and thank you so much for joining me here today for episode 657, where I have the amazing privilege of interviewing Kelly Clements. Kelly is the creator of The Intrepreneur, a marriage-centric coaching program for entrepreneurs, and her professional experience working for world-class coaching programs like Strategic Coach and Lifebook have taught her how to work with driven entrepreneurs. But as we discussed in this episode, it was her personal experience that underscored why it was so important for both the entrepreneur and the spouse to have a coach. In this episode, Kelly and I talk about the presence principles and why you need to know all six of them. Her Dana acronym and how it relates to you. How your reticular activating system impacts relationships.

Her Alpha Omega spectrum and why you should understand that. As well as probably most importantly, how to grow your business without growing apart. If you'd like to see the full show notes and description of this episode, you can head over to cindracampoff.com slash episode 657. All right, without further ado, let's bring on Kelly. Welcome to the High Performance Mindset. Thank you so much for joining us today, Kelly. How is everything going? Fantastic. Thanks so much for having me. Absolutely. I can't wait to talk to you about your book that you just released called Growing Your Business Without Growing Apart. And today we're going to be focusing in on relationships and how can we continue to strengthen our relationships with those that we love and those that we lead. So let's just start and tell us why people who

are listening should care about the topic that we're going to be focusing on today. Yeah, you know, I think when we think about relationships, it's something that we're all thinking about on some level anyway. And it's either how do I get into one? How do I get better at this? How do I get out of this? Am I in the right one? I think being, you know, our relationships, especially our personal romantic relationships, tend to occupy a lot of time and energy in our minds. And so my hope is that today we can really uncover some ways to think more productively about relationships and also instill some habits that are more productive in growing a relationship. Yeah, perfect. So tell us a bit about why you wrote the book, Growing Your Business Without Growing Apart.

So this is actually my second book. My first book was The Power of Play, Praise and Purpose. And it was really developed. It was really geared towards spouses of entrepreneurs or high performers. And that work was good, but there was still this whole missing piece of, well, great, this is like helping me. But like, what about this whole all the dynamics that my partner brings to the table as a driven entrepreneur? You know, there's his or her own set of what I lovingly call mania that they bring. And like, there's nothing in this book to really talk about that. So Grow Your Business Without Growing Apart is really geared towards the individuals in an entrepreneurial couple. And so when I say entrepreneurial couple,

I mean at least one of you is an entrepreneur. For some of my couples, they work together. For some of my couples, they have their own separate businesses. But anytime entrepreneurship or any really anything that's really high performance, whether it's high levels of athleticism, music, anything that really demands high levels of elite performance, that dynamic does come into a personal relationship. And so Grow Your Business Without Growing Apart covers all of those bases. And what I appreciate that you and I talked about is that if you're the spouse of an entrepreneur, your mental strength is equally as important as theirs. Right. So if you're the one supporting the business or not building it right. And I think of this as like every day we perform Kelly. It doesn't matter if we are an entrepreneur or a leader or, you know, we're a stay-at-home mom or dad. You know, we all lead because we lead ourselves and our mental strength is so important because our energy is contagious, you know. So what is your response to that? Because you had a really good point about that when we chatted earlier. Absolutely. So the spouse of an entrepreneur, I think, is the, like,

most unsung hero in business. A lot of times entrepreneurs talk about how being an entrepreneur or being the business owner is lonely. And that's true. And we have tons of networks, podcasts, books, blogs. There's tons of ways that we can connect with other entrepreneurs to at least round out those edges of loneliness. For spouses of entrepreneurs, there's not that much to support them.

EO and YPO do have spouse forums, so there are certain networks that are addressing the spouse. But when it comes to the unique realities of a spouse, having that mental toughness of like, OK, I may not know the exact financial situation of the business. Maybe my husband or my wife isn't telling me the exact financial situation of the business. Maybe my husband or my wife isn't telling me the exact status because they're trying to protect me. Or maybe we're doing super, super great and they think I'm going to spend it all. Like, so there's some mental toughness that spouses of entrepreneurs have and it's beyond the finance. It's, you know, this is a really busy season. My spouse has gone a lot. So I'm at home doing, you know, are personalized

by myself alone. So the mental toughness there is really important as well. Because when one person is growing, i.e. the entrepreneur, the business owner, and the spouse isn't, that gap can only widen. So it's really important for the spouse to be growing his or her own skills alongside the entrepreneur. Kelly, I know you work with couples, you know, who one might be the business owner, entrepreneur. Sometimes they're working together in the business. What are some of the sort of issues that you see come up in your work? What are their pain points or where's where's people's friction? That's a great question. And it's, it's twofold. And so there's run the gamut. It can be anything from sex and intimacy to finance, to purpose,

to family engagement. But I will also tell you that when I, cause I work with my couples as individuals and they both have, they're both working to solve very different problems. And there's a lot of nuances in this. So I'm going to speak generally. I trust that your audience is smart enough to twist this to make it relevant to them. So I'm going to speak from the general frame of male entrepreneur and supportive wife only because that's mostly who I work with. And you can imagine that there's nuances with same-sex couples or when the female is the entrepreneur. You and I are both business owners, so we can have our own conversation on that as well. But generally, if the entrepreneur is a male and he's a strong provider and the business is

doing well and he's been able to create a certain lifestyle whether that's sending kids to private school retiring parents vacation homes like name the way that he's been able to design a lifestyle and the wife still isn't happy he's like i just i just don't think she's capable of it i just like there's nothing else of being happy yes i mean being happy and she is like he keeps like producing more. And he's like, yes, he has, he has given us a ton of options and he's created a ton of opportunities. I want him. I want to raise my kids with him. I want to like rehab the bathroom with him. I want to do life with him. And if he's a, if he's a successful entrepreneur, chances are he's been really good at delegating. You know, he's adopted the who not how mentality that entrepreneurs love to delegate out their

weaknesses. And it's like, well, that should translate to the home. And a lot of times it doesn't because they've delegated themselves out of building life together. So we're not always solving the same problems. You know, there's a disconnect or the entrepreneur is really driven and he's like, I just want her to have her purpose. Like, I want her to have drive. And she's like, where is it going to fit? Like, am I going to go get a job and now I can't travel every time he wants to take extended vacations? Am I going to start my own business and have my own clients that are taking away attention from my kids or him? Like, you know, when the rubber meets the road,

where is actually all of this going to fit? So, and that's exactly why I work with them as individuals, because I believe it takes two happy, healthy people to create one happy, healthy relationship. So I'm working with them as individuals, not only to like develop their own habits, but also to broaden their perspectives on one another. Yeah. And I think about, you know, what you just said is like you and I are both the entrepreneurs in our relationship. And it helped me just talk to you to kind of take a step back and think about my husband, Dan, and what it's like to be on the other end of an entrepreneur. But how do you think that changes?

And again, we could go into the nuances, but if the female is the entrepreneur. If the female is the entrepreneur, chances are she's using a lot of her masculine drive. You know, we have a lot of masculine energy. We're always driving like we're using that like penetrative, creating, building energy. And that's masculine energy. And it's necessary. That's how businesses get built and so when we go home if we're not careful it's really easy to just take that energy

home and like okay let's go let's go let's go and when we present with that much masculine energy it forces our our partners our men like to the size kind of like okay get out of her way and so then there's this undercurrent that we're experiencing at home as partners like well why isn't he leading like why isn't he protecting why isn't he taking charge why isn't he taking initiative and we can we can start to judge when really he's like I'm just stay out of your way like you have the plan and so I've learned in my relationships it's really important for me to like ease into my feminine because when I'm in my feminine, it allows space for my partner to rise up.

But when I'm charging and I'm in my alpha mode, he's like, I'm staying out of your way. Otherwise we tangle. And it's like, so he just, he'll, you know, he just, he'll take a more like allowing space, which always puts me like, well, you do it. I make decisions all day. Like, you do it. And he's like, I'm trying. I need to let go of the wheel.

So it takes both partners. And it's really important for men to be willing to step up and, like, no, sit down. I've got this. Like, take a leadership role and be willing a little bit to hold boundaries so that they can have their masculine space because otherwise we just kind of take it over. So what would be an example of connecting with more of the feminine energy and how might someone do that? It's there like, OK, good idea, but how? Yeah, I think the first thing is really understanding the energetic differences between the two. Feminine energy is playful. It's allowing. It knows the difference between acquiescing, which is like, okay, fine, I'm just never going to stand up for what I want. I'm just always going to do it your way versus allowing. I'm like, you know what, there might be more magic or there might be more wisdom in his way. I'm going to let him take the wheel and I'm not going to be like, you're doing it wrong. You know, there's not judgment on it.

It's not harsh. It's very fluid. It allows, it's fun, it's playful, it's restful. One of my favorite avatars of what feminine energy is, is Goddess Kali. And she is like known for her anger. Like she's known for like, if she gets angered, she'll like burn a city down.

But when she's not in like this fighting, like protective mama bear mode, she's like lounging in a hammock, eating grapes, like getting fangs. She's in her pleasure center. And that to me is like the perfect balance of feminine because when feminine does get into anger, like we have this powerful rage that can make tremendous significant changes when we use it well. And when we're not always in that mode and when we can really get into the fun and the ease and the relaxation of it. Yeah, absolutely. Thanks for sharing that. And then, you know, just to be inclusive of all people, like how, you know, if you're in a same sex relationship and you're you're an entrepreneur, like then, you know, what kind of trends do you see there? one of them will always have to be in the masculine role. And it's like when I talk to a woman who's who's taken more of the masculine role, it's like I just want somebody else to like cut

the grass and hang the pictures. And so in that circumstance, I always recommend like in that like in that case, hire somebody like get a handyman to do it, like have somebody else do it. So you can like that, you know, that's where who not how dynamic might really work is so that like somebody else can take care of it it doesn't necessarily have to be your partner as long as when you're delegating and this is for all couples when you're delegating at home that extra energy is being redirected to your family because if you're delegating all of these things at home and it's like good now I have all this extra time and energy. I'm going to put it back in the business.

Of course, your spouse is feeling like business is getting the best of you and they're getting the rest of you. So when you delegate at home, redirecting that energy back into the family, having fun together, you know, creating other things together so that it doesn't feel like, you know, you're not actually doing life together. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you so much for sharing that. One of the things I really loved about your book is, again, Growing Your Business Without Growing Apart. What a great title, Kelly. And you talked about six presence principles. Tell us about these six, where they came from, and then how they apply to us as we're thinking about building relationships in businesses. Sure. So I came up with the presence principles because a lot of times entrepreneurs, when they take time off or they're at home, it's like, oh,

I got to go. You know, it's like my family knows I'm home. We got to do, you fix the sink, do the carpool and go do all these things that I don't want to do. Like I'd rather be at work. And so I came up with the presence principles to help entrepreneurs really get dialed in and put the same intentionality into their their family as they do the business, because that's what this really comes down to. Partners will look at a business owner and see all of this time and energy and ideas going out into the business. And it's like, if I could get a 10th of that into the family, this would be a game changer. And a lot of times the entrepreneurs are like, I don't know what that looks like,

you know, short of doing all of these things that really frustrate me. So the President's Principles are designed to make family life as enticing and compelling as business life. And so the President's principles are play, praise, and purpose, provision, protection, and pursuit. And play, praise, and purpose, as I mentioned before, that was my first book that I wrote, and that was really geared towards wives of entrepreneurs. Because again, that's speaking to the feminine energy play praise and purpose so play is making sure that we're having fun plays where love grows when you look at your dating

relationship it likely started with the concerts and kayaking and tailgating and all the fun things that get us to the altar that tends to go away in adulthood so making sure that there's constant sense of play is super important to keep couples bonded. Praise really speaks to affirmation because for all of us, whoever we're talking to are equal parts daughter goddess and jackass for lack of a better word. And so it's really making sure that we're speaking to the person that we like, the highest version of our partner. Because when we speak to the lowest version, the part of them that's harder to connect with, it's not their best traits, that comes through. And I really learned this in my relationships, like how important it is, like the tongue of a woman and how she speaks life into her partner truly, truly is life-changing for men,

you know, especially for men. If we're speaking to our men and we're speaking life into them, they believe it. They want, you know, a lot of times entrepreneurs will be like, yes, I know I get a lot of recognition at work. I only want her affirmation. Like hers is the one that matters the most to me, but I don't get it. It's like she doesn't respect me. And so having attention, I'm a compliment to criticism ratio so that we're speaking more life than criticism into our partners. And the other thing is in the absence of praise, everything can feel like criticism. Like if there's never an appreciation, even suggestions or questions can come across like criticism. So

having high degrees of praise and really recognizing what we love about our partners is important. Purpose is having some kind of shared purpose as a couple. You know, again, both people would have their individual purposes and then they have a shared purpose as a couple. Purpose is seasonal. So this doesn't necessarily mean that they're like working to create some mega foundation that's going to change the world. It might be like right now our season is our purpose in the season is raising kids or taking care of aging parents or selling the business, whatever it is, but they come together with some kind of third point of attraction outside of just themselves. As we move over to the other side, provision,

protection, and pursuit, those are the more masculine traits. And so when I talk about provision, I'm talking about beyond the finances. You know, there's what else are you bringing to the relationship? Is it intellectual stimulation, emotional attunement, social interaction, spiritual leadership? Like what are the other ways that you're showing up and providing to the couple, the family, or the relationship? Protection is making sure that, you know, not only her physical being is safe, but the home is safe, the community is safe. This could look like anything from making sure that there's always gas in her car and the tires are filled up, walking on the other side of, you know, between her and traffic. It's those little gestures. And it's also the bigger ones of like, here's the business life

insurance policy. You know, I'm protecting you from ill-meaning in-laws or whatever that might look like, you know, that he's really there to protect her spirit, her soul, her well-being, and then pursuit. And that's how we keep it like hot in a long-term relationship. Are you always flirting? Are you always trying to find ways to make her happy and like really pursuing and staying in that sense of pursuit so she always feels desired, which of course will translate into intimacy. And so when the masculine part is focused on provision, protection, and pursuit, that helps the woman stay in her feminine. Nice. So when you were talking about this in the book, one of the things I appreciated you said, and tell me if I got this right, like women tend to, and again, we don't want to generalize completely, but like women tend to look for provision, pursuit, and protection in a relationship versus men tend to look for the praise, play, purpose. Is that right? Yep. The second in the book, His Needs, Her Needs, the second need for men in relationships

behind sex is like a recreational partner, somebody to play with, whether it's pickleball, skiing, but somebody that they're having active fun with. That sense of recreation is really important to men. And again, it's a feminine trademark. You know, that's where we get into our feminine is when we're at ease and we're playing. Absolutely. Well, and something you just said related to the praise is this like compliment criticism ratio. I've read quite a bit about this, and I want to ask you, you know, what, what do you think that compliment to criticism ratio is in relationships? So I have learned that this is so, so, so deeply personal. It's, and it's personal two ways like I am effusive with my praise like every everything that I see and appreciate like I am wired to speak into it it makes my partner super

super super uncomfortable he's like I get it like it's too much and so I've really had to dial it back and like wait till like like the big what I call like the heart slams like that was mega thank you and so now he knows if I'm like saying it it's but you know but he doesn't want to hear all of the little thank yous throughout the day um and there's I have some couples that are like he needs to be praised for everything or she needs recognition for everything. I would say I'm probably more on the side of like, I want to know, like, if I'm doing this for you, I just want to know that it's landing for you. You know, like, just so I tend to want or need more than him.

And so it's very, very personal to the couple. The other thing on this is really making sure that you're appreciating your partner for what they want to be appreciated for. So many times my clients will be like, Kelly, I praise her all the time. Like I tell her all the time that she looks amazing or, you know, she looks beautiful. And the wife is like, yeah. But I also like made a big, massive decision at the doctor today for his mom. And he had nothing to say about that. Or he had nothing to say about the fact that I made this big decision and saved us tons of money or taught the kids to read. And so really understanding what your partner wants to be recognized for.

And that's something that I learned. Like my partner wants to be recognized for what he does contribute to the family. He's the hardest worker I know. And like that's it for him. Like, he doesn't want to be praised for like, oh, thanks for, you know, getting all these things, the thing, the baseball day ready or all that. Like, he's like, that's just what I do. So knowing what your partner wants to be appreciated for is another way to really build that intimacy. I appreciate that. Just like asking them what they need,

right? And having that open communication if it's too much. Hi, this is Cyndra Campoff, and thanks for listening to the High Performance Mindset. Did you know that the ideas we share in the show are things we actually specialize in implementing? If you want to become mentally stronger, lead your team more effectively, and get to your goals quicker, visit freementalbreakthroughcall.com to sign up for your free mental breakthrough call with one of our certified coaches. Again, that's freementalbreakthroughcall.com to sign up for your free call. Talk to you soon.

I read about John Gottman's research. And if I got this right, he can like predict divorce by the positivity percentage. And he found that family, you know, relationships that thrive have like a five to one, you know, and this is, this is not just like verbal, but nonverbal. And, you know, just all the different ways that we communicate, which I think to myself, when I hear that five to one, like five more, five positives to one negative, I'm like, I got it. I got to do better at that. Yeah. Yeah. It's actually once you get going on it, it's not that hard. You know, the hardest thing is like number one, recognizing it and then to like finding ways to do it. But once once you get going, it's actually more fun because the way that and talk about this in my book with the reticular activating system, like what's happening is when we start to notice those annoying things in our partner or the ways that they're letting us down, all of a sudden we're tracking

it. And then we start stacking all kinds of evidence. And pretty soon we're like, God, this, this person sucks. You know, you feel bad, like sitting next to the couch, sitting on the couch next to them. Cause like, you've just been running this story all day about like what they are, are not doing or how, how wrong they are, whatever it is. But when you start to like flip your story about your partner and you start to train yourself to find their magic and you start to train like your yourself to find all

of the ways that they are contributing it's like oh this i've got a great partner and that's what i mean both people can be equal parts like daughter goddess or jackass it just depends on which lens you're looking at them and when you start to train yourself to find the ways that you can really appreciate them all of a sudden you're like, man, I have the best partner in the world because I trained your reticular activator to find evidence of it. Yeah, very helpful. And I love that section in your book. I'm just going to read the little section and square,

just in case people don't know what the reticular activating system is. And you said, complex network of neurons that act like a filter in our brain. This helps us decide what is important to pay attention to. It gathers information from our environment and decides what we should focus on. For instance, if you sense that there's danger, it helps you pay attention to survival. If you're shopping for a new car, it helps you assess the qualities of all the cars around you. But then when the reticular activating system activates in our marriage, right, it looks to build evidence to support the story you have about your partner. So what are ways, Kelly, that you think we can just like get more control

of that reticular activating system? So when you start to pay attention to your thoughts, there's a couple things here. Number one, you don't have to believe every thought that you think. So when you start to pay attention to your thoughts and you're like, wait a minute, I'm telling myself the story that my spouse doesn't care about me. And so every time he comes home 10 minutes late from work, I'm like, see, he would have called if he cared about me. Or every time he's, you know, scrolling on his phone too long, we're tracking all of this. And so the first thing is like, is this true? And is there another version of this story that's just as true or truer?

And this comes from the work from Byron Katie. And it's like, okay, what if I told myself a story that my spouse is totally committed to me? And I started to look for evidence of it. And I'm like, okay, he, and you're starting to find it like, oh, he stayed in bed those 10 extra minutes in the morning and cuddle on Saturday morning because he knows I like it so much. He walked the dog for me. He went to the store for me. She texted me a cute flirty text in the middle of the day. And you start to look for evidence. It's like, oh, there's just as much evidence there. And now you're starting to stack it. So a lot of it is challenging your own thoughts, finding evidence that support

the opposite story that's just as true or truer. And then a lot of you are speaking into it because what we appreciate, appreciates. So when you start appreciating the things that your partner does that you really like, you know, I love it when, I love it when your foot finds mine under the covers when we're sleeping at night. I love it when you leave my favorite coffee mug out in the morning. I love it when you come and help me unload all the groceries. You know, like all, when you start to tell your partner what you appreciate, it's like, oh, now I am doing good. I am doing well. Like she does like me. He does appreciate me. So when you can speak that into your partner, it helps them build the evidence of what's working. And sometimes we just

expect other people to read our mind and like, how do they know that you like help getting the groceries out or, you know, that you really like when they put your coffee cup out, right? So. Totally. Yeah. I love that. What we appreciate, appreciates. Kelly, you also have this concept called the posture of the heart and you have this Dana principle. Tell us about that and how we could apply that to our relationships. to the love relationship what we're talking about here is a heart connection you know like i have a lot of intellectual material on relationships but what we're talking about with romantic relationships is the posture of the heart and so um the acronym that i came up with is called dava d-a-v-a and uh i said dana and rye d-a-v-a yeah that's okay oh i was playing around with some some different postures of the heart and then i heard actually i was at church and

and one of the speakers was talking she just like went on this like stream of consciousness role about like all the all the abilities that the heart has and there were four like she was like just probably blurted out 20 of them but there are four that just went like boom boom boom boom and i was like those are it and so i was looking at them and i went to look like what what is an acronym for dava stand for and it was the name dava means beloved. And I was like, perfect. So what DAVA stands for is the positive of the heart has to be durable, accountable, vulnerable, and available. And so when we talk about a durable heart, I think that's the most important one. And not in a way that it tolerates bad behavior, but just in a way that like if our relationship isn't bad, we're not taken down with it. Or when our partner has to call us on something that's not so great and they have to offer that much

needed criticism or feedback of a blind spot that we have, we can't crumble. You know, like the last thing our partner wants to do is hurt us. So a lot of times if we have like a flimsy or a wimpy heart and feedback upsets us, like, well, I'm just not going to say anything. I'm just not going to say anything. I'm just not going to say anything. And then like problems really start to mount because everything's been getting swept under the rug. And that's when we have major fallouts is everything has been unsaid. So having a durable heart allows us to receive important feedback from our partner that's not so great but necessary without feeling like oh my gosh now we're gonna be in a fight for four more days

or you know she's gonna be in bed or he's not gonna talk to me like it's having a durable heart to be able to metabolize hard feedback. Accountable is we are accountable to ourselves. We're only like we're always looking at how we are or are not showing up for our relationship. So often in relationships, we have a marriage scorecard that tracks your points or my points and your penalties. So everything you're doing wrong and everything I'm doing right. When we're accountable, it's like, okay, how could I be showing up better? Or how could I communicate what's not working more effectively? That's accountable.

Vulnerable is we're willing to bring all parts of us. We're willing to say the things that might be a little embarrassing. Or we're willing to have the hard conversations. Or even bring the best of us. A lot of times the vulnerability requires us to like, hey, I've got this really cool talent and I'm going to risk like the rejection on it because a lot of times that's the thing we want to protect. So being vulnerable is bringing all parts of us and available is keeping our heart open for our partner at a level that nobody else gets. You know, the availability of the heart, the availability of that connection. So our partner gets the, like to get into the inner corners that nobody else in

the world gets access to. So when we think about applying this to our day-to-day, I love the acronym and I love how it came about. Tell us about how we might use it to guide us. So I think as you were listening, as listeners listen to that, you know, is my heart durable? Is it accountable? Is it vulnerable? Is it available? I think probably on some level, people were able to identify like, I'm good there. I'm not good there. And this is one of those areas where we actually do want to work on our weaknesses. You know, I think by at this point, we've all been really engaged in developing our strengths and outsourcing our weaknesses. This is one of those areas where when you know you have a weakness, it's a matter of

getting reps. It's practicing. And that's why I love it because these are all abilities, durability, availability, accessibility, vulnerability, accountability. These are all abilities. These can all be developed. It's a matter of reps. So it's just getting into the practice of it and being open about what you're working on. You know, it builds that internal accountability and a relationship about where you really want to get better. Wow. Thank you. I love that. And so one last concept we're going to talk about is your alpha omega spectrum. And I read about this and saw, you know, your information about this. I thought it was really, really helpful. So tell us about the idea and just how it relates to

our lives. Sure. So the alpha omega spectrum came because most entrepreneurs, which again, that's who I work with, are alpha, some degree of alpha. And alphas by definition are self-preserving. You know, they're going to work to preserve themselves to advance the whole tribe or the whole company or the whole family. And anytime somebody is self-preserving, that can present challenges in a romantic relationship. So I am never going to work to tell an alpha that they can't be an alpha because, again, they're self-preserving. Most alphas are not open to that kind of feedback. And so the invitations for alpha is just to really check in with where you are on the alpha spectrum. And so in my book, I talk about the alpha spectrum going from healthy alpha to unhealthy. So what a healthy alpha looks like is a confident or competitive alpha who, yes, has attention on themselves,

but is also willing to assess what the tribe needs and is willing to make a decision to benefit the whole tribe, not just him or herself. When you start to get further into the unhealthy spectrum of alpha, that's controlling or consuming alpha. And that person is like only focused on self-preservation. They're working to micromanage everybody around them to maintain their posture as number one. They are all about taking, you know, that they're consuming alpha. They're like, they're getting all of their energy and feedback from others with very little output into others. And so if you're on the unhealthy end of the spectrum, it's really about changing some perspectives to get to healthy alpha. Because what I know for sure is that if a partner is on the

unhealthy end of the alpha spectrum and they're controlling and they're consuming and they're, you know, they want to micromanage everything and they're, they're condescending or rude, their partner is most likely almost always in unhealthy beta mode. Okay. So we look at this whole spectrum. There's an alpha spectrum, which butts up to a beta spectrum.

The beta spectrum has healthy and unhealthy as well. So a healthy beta would be somebody who's supportive and has boundaries, encouraging and his or her own identity. But an unhealthy beta is like exhausted, shell of the former self, feels like a doormat. Nothing lights them up because the controlling alpha has like sucked the life out of them. So if there's an unhealthy alpha, it almost always creates an unhealthy beta in the relationship. And so my call to action is for the betas, who most often is the spouse of an entrepreneur, to adopt an omega persona. An omega is the best of alpha, best of beta.

It's fulfilled and has boundaries, has dreams and knows when to yield, wants to create and also can appreciate and support her partner or his partner. So an Omega standpoint has some distance from Alpha and there's clear lines of identity. Again, this goes back to having that durable heart where when something goes wrong with Alpha, Omega can still stand in his or her own excellence. I love it. So how might we actually do that? Number one is getting really good at communicating boundaries. And again, this goes back to reframing how we look at boundaries. Boundaries, a lot of times when

you're doing relationships with an alpha can feel like an act of aggression. Alphas don't like boundaries. They don't want to be controlled. And so when we can flip the perspective of boundaries are actually an invitation to longevity. When there's boundaries in a relationship, a relationship can be sustained. And so we might call it like this is the board game that we're going to play on. You know, these are the rules of engagement. So the first one is getting good at recognizing what the boundaries need to be and then communicating them and most importantly upholding them. Because when there's boundaries in place, it creates the space, the time, the energy for Omega to cultivate his or her own needs, to pursue their own passions, to have their own fulfillment, which puts them less dependent on alpha for their

own personal fulfillment. So it's really, it really, that part really does come down to the boundaries and personal exploration. Can you give an example of maybe a couple that you've worked with that have, has established good boundaries and like maybe what those boundaries are because I think people might not really know how to do that and what would be some healthy boundaries sure um the first one that comes to mind is normally time boundaries um so um it's home at a certain time and for every couple it's different for. For some couple, it's like, can you just at least be home by nine? For some people, it's like, can you be home by 4.30? So it really comes down to the time boundaries. And then it might be making sure that we're spending equal time with one another's friends and family. And when you're with my family, can you be engaged and not checked out in the corner in your own world?

Like can you come and like engage or like participate in whatever we're doing instead of being checked out? Sometimes there's financial boundaries of making sure that there's at least this much liquid at all times. We're making sure that we're reinvesting this much into the house before we reinvest this much into the business. What about like communication boundaries or like how people treat each other? Because I feel like that could be something to be really helpful for people to establish even more stronger boundaries around that. Definitely. So this has been really interesting in the last four or five years, like when, you know, really watching terms gaslighting come into the into the land, like not knowing what's abusive, not knowing what's gaslighting,

not knowing what's condescending. So education has been really important. And just saying, like, understanding the difference between truth and facts. So, you know, two people can have very different truths, but what are the facts? And so having an education has been really important and it's been really interesting to watch because when a partner tries to tell their spouse that's gaslighting, a lot of time it gets defensive.

And so the commenter, I've come back to me like, she said this is gaslighting. Like, what does that mean? And that would- How would you define gaslighting? Just so people can understand it. So gaslighting is like when one person knows something to be true

and their partner's like, that's not what happened. And they twist and turn the story. And like the form of reality gets so convoluted. The original person is like, am I crazy? And because the term gaslighting has been brought to light so much now, like I think people now are like, okay, I am not crazy. Like you're not going to take this from me. But really getting good at the facts. And so this would go back to unhealthy alpha. If you're living with somebody who's unhealthy alpha, they probably are gaslighting

and they're probably unlikely to admit that, especially to you. However, when I'm working one-on-one with somebody who's on a healthy alpha, they want to get better. Like they're like, I want to do better. I just don't know how. So there's a lot of insecurity and fear that we work through because that's really what drives people to be on the unhealthy alpha. This is one of those areas where I do not recommend the spouse taking the lead on that. Stakes are too high. There's too much skin in the game. And for an unhealthy alpha, that's just way too much vulnerability. It's going to shock their system. That's the value of where a third party person can come in, whether it's something as passive as a podcast, where go listen to this and figure it

out yourself or rabbi, priest, mentor, whomever, coach, therapist. But a lot of times for a spouse, it doesn't translate. The unhealthy alpha will need to do that work on their own individually because the vulnerability and the it's just it's too high to come from a spouse. Yeah. Thank you. Thanks for sharing that. So someone asked me this question yesterday and I thought it was such a great question. And she said, what advice would you give to your former self? You know, like a time, the time where maybe your relationships, you know, it was, there was something difficult about it. How would,

what would you say to that question, Kelly? Like, what advice would you give to your former self about relationships? I think really, really, really getting to know yourself first, you know, getting clear on who you are first, what's important to you first, how to communicate without fighting or without making it about a fight or a threat would have been the first skill that I would have developed. But most importantly, like learn yourself first, fall in love with yourself first. It's just way more fun when you're filled up and you know, your love comes from within and you're not depending it or needing it from your partner. Like then you just get to have fun and love each other without the need behind it. How have you been on that journey of like finding, falling in love with yourself? So that happened for me after my, all of my work comes from my mess. I always, my mess is my message. It comes from my first marriage, which ended in divorce. And then my next relationship,

I married, or I was partnered with the exact opposite of my first husband. And when that one didn't work out, I was like, all right, something's not right here. And so I was alone, a single mom for a number of years. And I remember I heard somebody say, one of the definitions of holy is set apart. And like, sometimes you just need everybody stripped away from you to like, yourself God your higher power whomever like fill up all the holes that have kind of been theirs from relationships so just having myself like apart like alone and hearing my thoughts and not being scared of of the silence and just letting my own thoughts kind of shape and fill out the holes and the edges for me.

It was one of the sweetest times of my life. Well, thank you so much for sharing that and just like being vulnerable with that. I appreciate what you said about like your mess became your message. And I think some things like that happen for us, you know, like it's a gift to help us live our purpose and do what we're doing now. And so obviously, if that wouldn't have happened, maybe you wouldn't be, you know, offering support to entrepreneurial couples. Absolutely. My kids and I talk about that all the time. Like, and it was in that period of aloneness where all my content flushed out. Like, I got to look back and see the patterns and see all the ways that, you know, that I failed or felt disappointed.

And like all of that became what I do now. And it's touched so many lives and it's healed so many families. And that was actually a decision. I remember laying in my bed late at night. It was one of the first, like early, early in my divorce. I was just like getting used to having my own house. My kids were at their dad's the house was like shockingly silent and I just remember like this heavy feeling of loneliness like over my chest my head at night in the middle of the night and just being like

I am not doing this for nothing like this will not be for nothing I'm going to make something of this and here we are because that was so that was a very conscious decision that this will not be for nothing. I'm going to make something of this. And here we are because that was a very conscious decision that this was not going to happen for nothing. Yeah. Well, thank you. Thank you for sharing that, Kelly, and being vulnerable there. So I know you have an online course I want to ask you to talk a little bit about and an offer for everybody. But tell us a bit about your work and where people can follow along with you and just learn more want to serve more. So my online course is available online and your listeners with the code mindset, now I want the SET can get 10% off of that course. I am actually re-recording

it on January 3rd, 2025. So there is a version there now, but there's a massively upgraded version coming January 3rd. I'll record January 3rd, so that should be available shortly. But anybody who purchased the original will automatically get and to share with people as you know they they're high achievers they really want to be their best more often and what final advice would you have for them kelly yeah um so for high achievers what i would tell you is that your marriage is a multiplier you know your man your spouse can see things and can see your blind spots more clearly than you. And if they're offering feedback to you, it might even, even though it might be hard to hear, you're going to be exponentially better if you can lean into that. You know, we're going to trust that your spouse has your best interests in mind. We're going to give them that benefit of the doubt. And if they can help you, if they're willing to give you feedback and you can trust that, what I have found is that when that relationship is locked and loaded and you and your spouse are running life as it's a three-legged race because you have that open communication, it is an absolute multiplier.

And so letting down the walls and letting your spouse be your best friend and maybe even your coach tends to be an unfair advantage to most high achievers. Thank you. Awesome advice. Thanks so much for your great content and wisdom today and practical suggestions on how we can just keep growing and improving. So thank you so much for joining us today, Kelly, on the High Performance Mindset. It is my pleasure. Thank you for having me. Okay. Way to go for finishing another episode of the High Performance Mindset. I'm giving you a virtual fist pump. Holy cow, did that go by way too fast for anyone else? If you want more, remember to subscribe and you can head over to Dr. Sindra

for show notes and to join my exclusive community for high performers where you get access to videos about mindset each week. So again, you can add over to Dr. Sindra. That's D-R-C-I-N-D-R-A.com. See you next week.