THE NO BULLSHIT JOURNEY TO SELF -  UMA THANA BALASINGAM

CHARLES REED ANDERSON: [00:00:00] Uma, welcome to the TechBurst Talks podcast. UMA THANA: Thank you, Charles. It's great to be here with you today. CHARLES REED ANDERSON: So Uma, last time you were on the podcast, we talked a lot about your technology career and the success you've had over the years. Today, we're not going to talk about tech. UMA THANA: We're not. CHARLES REED ANDERSON: We also talked about a lot of the progress that you've made. Thank you. With Lean In over the years and how you've grown that community in Singapore, but we're not gonna talk about that UMA THANA: I'm not talking gender today CHARLES REED ANDERSON: What the hell are we gonna talk about? UMA THANA: I don't know, Charles. Should we talk about life for a change? CHARLES REED ANDERSON: That sounds good. Let's talk about life. . UMA THANA: You and I are Hoffman graduates. Yes. And, I don't know about you, but after I completed the Hoffman process recently, a lot of people reached out, curious about what it is, and had a lot of questions. Yes. And. I think this is going to be a great conversation [00:01:00] to hopefully shed some light just to share our experiences. I mean, I went partly because of you. CHARLES REED ANDERSON: Hopefully not because I was causing the things you wanted to address, but because I told you about what a great experience it was. UMA THANA: Absolutely. CHARLES REED ANDERSON: But before we go down that path, we probably should explain. So, what is the Hoffman process? How would you describe it? UMA THANA: Well, I think the word process is important. Because what I found in experiencing it was that for every layer of thing that we would work on, you think you are done with it, and then they add another thing, and then another thing, and then another thing. So these layers. I think demonstrates the word process. So, for example, in trying to understand [00:02:00] my parents, I thought the first exercise would be, Okay. done and dusted and then there's another process and then there's another process. So, I think the word process is important. I know that the one word for it is psychotherapy, but I think having gone through it now, I don't know if a lot of people understand that word. So if I had to find a way to describe it, I think it's seven days where you get to look deep into yourself and bring out some of the most invisible things that you don't even know is sitting in your body, sitting in your soul, sitting in your mind. And by doing that you get to unblock a lot of things [00:03:00] that might be preventing you from living your best life or what you might want to become, which is the path I'm on. CHARLES REED ANDERSON: I think when I first heard about it, I thought it was interesting because I like trying to understand myself better. And, I think I'm pretty well self-actualized. So, I know my strengths and my weaknesses. And I wanted to go through this to try and help me understand why do I carry certain baggage from the past, and how can I become better? I used to always think that, professionally I'm doing well, but if I could master this other side and, learn why I react the way I do in certain situations, I'd become a better person.it is quite an intense week. And we can't talk too much about what happens during the week. But I think we now know a lot of people who have actually gone through it. But the question is like, Why Hoffman? Or why a process like this? Or why look at yourself and why now at this point in your career? UMA THANA: Yeah. I think that is the most important question to ask yourself before you consider something like the Hoffman process. [00:04:00] Is to, why would you do it? For me. Because I had time, I would say in the last two years, and leading up to December of last year, I've introduced space in my life, which opened up some questions, and led me to a great exit from corporate. And I think, That plus my personal life was also I guess in a matter of six weeks, Charles, my whole life turned upside down, my corporate career and my marriage. And so, I think for me, well, I've done like you, some work on myself with therapy, et cetera. So, I have strong roots and, you know, you kind of know the motion you want to go through. I was more [00:05:00] interested in how did I want to shape the next phase of my life? And I think that for me, I believed I needed something more tangible, more, you know, hard. And after hearing about Hoffman from the people who've done it, people like yourself and. Wilma, et cetera. That's why I chose to do it. So, I wanted to figure out what is it that the universe has in store for me? Because I believe that life has dreamt a bigger dream for me. And I think my number one job is to figure that out. And I know I cannot figure that out if I don't first look inside. And I needed something major to look inside. And that's why I chose the Hoffman process. CHARLES REED ANDERSON: I found it a fascinating week because 7 days, and it's pretty much from 7 in the morning until 10 o'clock [00:06:00] at night every day. You're going deep inside yourself. You're cut off from all technology. You're cut off from the outside world. And you just spend time trying to understand yourself better. What drives you? What makes you tick? What baggage you're carrying and how you can eventually become a better person going forward. And I think what's, what's fun about that is, we're lucky because it's so hard with corporate life and just when you're working to find time to spend time focusing on yourself. And how did you do this before? So, when you were working, how did you find time when you were busy with work to find your you time? I was quite blessed in the recent. time leading up to the exit of corporate. But if I had to look before that time, how did I find time? Or did you, UMA THANA: yeah. Okay. So one of the things I would do was like, I would have no meeting Thursdays, but simply [00:07:00] because I couldn't just keep up with, okay. You know, the follow up messages and emails and all of that. So, a lot of it was trans sectional. What you are asking is, how do you proactively make time for yourself? And I, I think, I only recently appreciated introducing solitude into my life. And I only appreciated it after, in the last two years or so, That I had the time, it's almost like I had to get the time to then figure out. Oh, now I have the time. What should I be doing with it? Meaningfully versus I made the time and then figured things out. So leading up to the exit, I didn't work more than three days a week. UMA THANA: because I just ran the business differently. We were going through an acquisition. I [00:08:00] outsourced most of the work to my right hands because I knew they were going to take over and I focused the business on three things and that freed up time. And I think what I learned from that is time is one thing, but the freeing up of your mind and just this space that you can feel in your life. the one that is the most magical thing because in the most random of moments, when you can tell the universe, okay, you know, I'm starting to, you know, like the business that I'm starting up now, the idea of the 10 companies over 10 years came to me while I'm sitting on my luggage in a train in France. So it will come to you at the most random moments. It's not like, okay, today I have 10 minutes of space and then suddenly all these [00:09:00] things are going to come to you. It actually takes time. Yeah. What about you? CHARLES REED ANDERSON: I think I've always been pretty good at finding time to do certain things. I'd say, especially over the last seven or eight years before that, I did get into a very bad rut where I was traveling 40 plus weeks a year. Working 80 hour weeks plus, I was miserable. I ran myself into the hospital basically because I had just, I worked myself into pretty bad health. So, I realized at that point I had to take a step back and do things differently. That's part of the reason I went out on my own, so I can work more on my terms. But it is, it's a challenging one because when you're, when you're locked up in it, and I, I started out my career in investment banking, I worked in consulting during the dot com. I've worked in a lot of high pressure, long hour environments where you're expected to do your 60, 70, 80 hours a week. So it's very difficult to find that time to, you know, have the freedom to just kick back and relax a bit. But now I basically, I, I make it integral to my life. I know my body's not meant to work that way anymore. And especially at my age, I, I need to be more careful with how I do [00:10:00] these things. So now I build it in and, you know, exercise is important, stretching is important. Time to yourself is important, but what I've actually realized, I used to say I'm such an introvert, I don't need to be around people. I realize I actually really do need to be around people because that's where I get a lot of my inspiration. UMA THANA: I would have to say the most convincing thing that led me to go onto the website and book it was the night I was here having dinner on your patio. And you're sharing your experience. And you're talking about your father. And it was the first time I saw you cry that it made me cry. And I thought, well, if that is the impact of this, then I'm sold. So, you know, my gratitude for that evening, because that was when I was like, Oh my God, , this is [00:11:00] it. This is what I have to do for myself. CHARLES REED ANDERSON: So, let's switch tack a little bit here. In the workplace, if you would have gone out and said, I'm going to go to something called the Hoffman Process. It's kind of like a hundred hours of group therapy in a week. How would that be perceived by your colleagues, do you think? Because this is, we've talked about this before. It's that perception of doing it. Like, I think it's great now that I've done it, but I was a bit, I didn't want to tell people what I was doing before I did it. UMA THANA: Yeah. What would be the perception? I guess people might think, Oh, what's wrong with you? That might, I think that's probably the default position. Something's wrong with you. Therefore you need to go get help versus in actuality. It's, well, you're making this big investment to grow as a person and you want to be You want more out of life. You know, [00:12:00] I think that's the actual narrative, but it's not the default one. I think they would be like, you mean you have seven days and instead of taking a vacation somewhere and relaxing, you want to go punish yourself through something like this. That might be the second thing. And I think if I was verbalizing it, let's say you're a colleague, a peer, and I'm saying this to you now, I can imagine a physical reaction of, like, oh my god, Uma, are you okay? CHARLES REED ANDERSON: Yeah. That's kind of how I felt, like, when I was doing it. So, what I would tell people about it is, I'm doing it to better myself because I know I can compete intellectually but I know I've got certain things like, you know, on the personal side where if I could top that it could make me into, this type of a person where nothing affects him, you know, and I'm very calm in every situation. If I could work on that I'd be even a much better person and a much better professional. So I used to pitch it that way instead of admitting that, yeah, I've, you know, I've got stuff from my past that I, wears me down, that I, it's been baggage for me that I've [00:13:00] probably haven't properly addressed. And I just wanted to become a better person because I'm at an age now where I'm looking at this next phase of my career. It's probably the end phase of the career. So what do I want to do for the next 10 or 15 years? And if I'm going through a transition, the best thing you can do is start with yourself. Like, who are you and what do you want to be? So I think that's what really led me to do it. I honestly didn't think I would get some of that other baggage ever lifted. I went there, I'm like, I'll do the other stuff, but that's never going to get fixed. And I was amazed by the progress of what happened. And I think I was just worried about the stigma, especially on the men's side. Like, for men it would be like, you have to be macho, everything's okay, you know, just soldier on, you'll be fine. Instead of admitting that, I'm like, yeah, there's certain things that I think I should actually deal with, and it'll make me a better person. If I understand myself better, and what makes me tick, I'll be better to myself, and I'll be better to those people around me as well. , you see, everybody can have things they need to work on. we're all perfectly imperfect. So, but it has been an interesting chat about this sort of the topic, but what I want to talk [00:14:00] about next is what else are you doing outside of your Hoffman experience? Cause you have been quite busy over the last few months getting ready for your new venture. So I'd love to hear a little bit about that. UMA THANA: Okay, so I'm working on building a group of companies under the umbrella name of Elevate with the singular vision of social justice and inclusion for women in Asia. When I say the word justice, people might think of the weighing scale or a judge putting a hammer down and it's got this interesting reaction. Because it's such a strong word, but actually the word justice means that yes, we can have diversity, equity and belonging, but only when you can do that structurally and scale that, will you achieve justice? So it's actually another way of using the word [00:15:00] justice. Three of those companies will be launched this year and The first one is a private network. I've always wanted to solve for what I felt as a senior executive female leader. I felt lonely. I would travel and I can't meet peers in cities that I would travel in. I didn't know where to go. I wanted to talk about stuff. Like perimenopause and ask some questions about it. And I, I wanted to know if I was fairly paid. So that can only happen in a network of peers and a lot of networks out there are quite diluted. So something like this doesn't exist in Asia yet. So that's the first business we're launching. And when I say we, I'm doing this with Jingjing Liu. The second is elevate the business, which is B2B, where we bring [00:16:00] everything on helping women thrive in the workplace. Like, how do you make assertiveness work for you and lead like a woman? Because everything today is measured to what masculine traits look like and sound like. The second part of that is then for companies with senior leadership and managers. Okay, now you've got the women. How do you make sure more women still want to join you? They want to stay and they thrive. So that's inclusive leadership. And the third this year is Elevate the Mind. So every company as you see is called Elevate the something. And Elevate the Mind is rethinking how we bring learning in an immersive experience through gaming. Okay. Behavioural psychology to help women get ahead of what is about to come to them. So if I am a person that just finished school and I'm in my first job, I'm going to give you [00:17:00] content through gaming that's going to tell you when you go into that meeting, you will be interrupted. And so you can try Action A, Action B, Action C. Let's say Action C is I'm just going to keep quiet because I'm shocked. Then, you know, in the next meeting that you go to, you will also be interrupted again. So you can, in a safe environment, figure out what's going to happen to you and play around with it before you get out into the real world. So that's anything from being interrupted to how do you secure sponsors for your career. And within that is also my podcast, Raw with Uma, which you and I have an episode together. And I'm doing that simply to scale myself because I get 15 to 20 messages a day of women wanting to meet. And I can't get the time, but they all have the same questions. So by recording the podcast with women that have these questions, I'm hoping I can help at [00:18:00] least 100 others. So that when they listen to it, they can get the tips necessary for it. CHARLES REED ANDERSON: I'm going to have to go back to this now. So you were just talking earlier about how the importance of me time. Yet, you've now gone out there and you didn't just start one business at one time. You've started three, plus a podcast series. And plus you're having that many meetings with people. How do you schedule this all in and how do you actually find the me time after that? UMA THANA: Yeah, well first it's good to have a founder with you. So. You're not doing it alone. And I think that's such a huge difference. I'd say the second thing is I've always only built for others outside of leaning, which is a nonprofit. And for the first time I'm building for myself. And I think that has a different energy to it that I was on vacation recently. Okay. And when I said to someone, my best friend, [00:19:00] I'm going to do a couple of hours of work tomorrow. She said, Oh, you have to work? And I was like, Oh, like, I actually am looking forward to doing it. It's not, it doesn't feel like the traditional word work to me. So I have non negotiables like I've, I've just come from the gym. I've squeezed that in before coming here because I know I'm going to be busy. So that's one non negotiable sleep is a non negotiable time for myself. I now have unrushed mornings, which is one of my definitions of a rich life. . And so I do a walk in the morning where I have solitude and I can just think and. to something inspirational. And then Emmys am I spending time with people I like and love who like and love me back. So those are non [00:20:00] negotiables and then everything else is a bonus. But I would say I'm redefining hustle with Jim Jim. We are not hustling the way you think entrepreneurs are hustling that you work and grind yourself. And I say to Jingjing, we're rich entrepreneurs, rich in experience, we have funding ourselves. So one of our KPIs is patient growth. And in our founder's KPI, the first thing we say is we will build a business around our lifestyle and not the other way around. CHARLES REED ANDERSON: That's amazing because We work in a city, we're both based in Singapore, and it's a very hard working place. Let's face it, in the roles that you were in before, and the roles I think I've been in before you're expected to work long hours and travel a lot. And everyone, it's hard to meet up with people because someone's always flying here or there, and no [00:21:00] one's ever in town at the same time. And now you've made this major flip. Going from corporate exec, and to be perfectly honest with you, you could have probably gone to any of the top technology firms and got into a very senior position and made a boatload of money. And instead, you've said, no, I'm stopping, I'm taking a break, and I'm going to do these three startups for now, why now, and why this path? UMA THANA: Why now, a big reason is because of the financial exit I got. Right. So I want to be transparent because I am now not depending on money for a while because of that. And that gives you a lot of freedom. And if I don't do this now, second reason, when would I do it? And so I had the perfect storm, I guess, you know, off. Okay. The exit is going to happen. I'm asking all these questions [00:22:00] about life and myself and I don't need to work for a while. Is this really what I want to do going back? And if I don't try this, I don't know. Like, you know, I didn't appreciate on rush mornings. I have now experienced it for six months and now I'm going to value that. And what's the worst case scenario? That's the third thing. That I'm going to learn tons fail miserably, but I gotta give it at least three years. I Can just take another corporate job. Yeah, so I It's all upside from my point of view But I have the luxury from a finance point of view From the corporate exit to be able to now Do this and do this in a way that? It's not Well, CHARLES REED ANDERSON: what I would say is I'm not banking on you failing on this one. I think you'll do okay. But even if you [00:23:00] do, you learn a lot more from failure and mistakes than you do from success. So, maybe you should try and fail on at least one of them. One out of three. You know, maybe two out of three would be a good hit rate still. UMA THANA: Yes. It's good to fail. CHARLES REED ANDERSON: Yes. UMA THANA: I mean, I think it's good to fail well. And you have to, you know, Because like it's just like, you know, cause I was in sales, right? So you always look at your numbers per quarter and if you wanted to try and pivot the business, you always look for spikes. Right, but when you go down to the baseline sort of run rate kind of guaranteed, almost guaranteed business, you never want to go as low as the previous one. So you always want to introduce spikes and then hit the low and then. Take another spike because eventually, the baseline gets higher. So I think that's failing well in that you intentionally [00:24:00] try and know that something's not going to work. So we are forever AB testing something, something as small as this week, Jingjing and I for five days on LinkedIn, We write the same call to action with different content, but she's got a different link and I've got a different link to see that should we, we be using a LinkedIn link so we don't get penalized or an external link when LinkedIn penalizes you to see what happens. Like, so I, so I, and one of us is gonna fail, but we failed well because we learned from it. Yeah. CHARLES REED ANDERSON: Okay, so now you're looking at these businesses. How has this time you've spent going deep into yourself and understanding yourself better, how has that prepared you for this and how does it make you even more prepared than you would have been just coming out and doing it straight from your last job?[00:25:00] UMA THANA: I have to say one of the biggest learnings from Hoffman is you. My emotional child and in Hoffman, they talk to you about the four parts of you, your intellect, the cell, which is the logical self, your emotional child, your body and your spiritual self. And I love the way where they explain it. So for everyone listening to your podcast right now, if you think of a horse carriage with a passenger and a rider. That entire carriage is your body, right? So you got to take care of your body. The horse is the child, the emotional child. It can go off. It needs to play. It needs to be out in the open field. It doesn't know where it's going. It's being directed by the rider, which is your logical intellect self, which is telling it where to go. But actually [00:26:00] the light bulb for me was the passenger. That's your spiritual self. The passenger is telling. The rider is then telling the horse, which is then moving the carriage where to go. So one big revelation from Hoffman is that, you know how we had to do this exercise every morning and write down the notes. When I first started Hoffman, my emotional child was in tattered clothes, scared, and hiding in a dark cave. By the end of Hoffman, my emotional child was sitting with my parents in my sanctuary. And it doesn't mean that, because life starts after Hoffman, right? So I have days where my emotional child just disappears and my logical self takes [00:27:00] over. So now, especially as founders, Jinjin and I have a different level of emotional connection. A lot of people don't talk about this, but as entrepreneurs, and if you have a founder, ideally you should with you. The most important thing is the bond that you have with each other that you never have to guess. What they're thinking and feeling. And neither one party should ever feel shortchanged. And you must be able to look at each other at eye level. And when we started, Jing J looked up to me and so we spent months together. So I used a lot of the tools from Haman 'cause I had to look at myself, either because I'm judgemental and critical, which I learned from my mother. So in our interactions, . That would be coming out and the difference is I now go, Oh, I see it. I see the pattern. I know [00:28:00] exactly where it comes from. And I have a range of tools to recycle it immediately. And I'm expressing that to Jing Jin as well so she can also catch me. So I think at least the immediate effect for me is that I'm building different relationships versus the ones I use. corporate, where it's, yeah, of course you care about your people, but I didn't, I didn't know myself as much then, so I ignored all of my triggers and I was focused purely on the employees. CHARLES REED ANDERSON: What I find interesting about that is that if you look at just the intellect portion, and we can lead our lives like that and be very successful professionally. And in my worst times during my work, when I was pushing myself beyond the limits, it was impacting my health, I was still getting things done. I was completely numb outside [00:29:00] of my brain functioning. My body was falling apart. My heart didn't even know it was there anymore. I just, I was just in full on delivery mode and, you know, you get lost. You don't know who you are. You don't know what city you're in anymore. You don't know what hotel you're staying in. It's amazing how that can happen. And I think that's what I really wanted to understand is like, how do you have that better balance? And the funny thing is that I'm not a religious person but I do feel like I'm very spiritual. So I like reading about how things actually impact you. And, you know, I like trying to understand how my body should be talking to itself. And it's, it is funny because, you know, I'm, we were talking about this earlier. I'm in a situation now where there's a lot of things going on and a lot of moving parts. A lot of uncertainty and a lot of complexity. And some days I feel like, you know, I'm just clinging on to like, you know, get through it. But what I do is I go back and talk to people, like yourself, or like, we were just talking about Adrian earlier. And I can walk through these things. And we, then you, it always goes back to the same thing. Well, how is your body working together? And it's, what I realize [00:30:00] is when I get into these stressed out times, I'm forgetting to do what I should be doing, which is getting out of my head and then remembering that the whole thing needs to be working together. So, it's a challenge to do, it's not easy. But it's very beneficial when you can do it, because it almost helps me, I've learned how to walk myself back from the edge now. Like, when I get to those points where I would normally just keep going until something crashed, I now recognize those traits in myself, and when I'm being triggered, I know how to walk back from it. UMA THANA: Yeah. And I think what you say is so right. And most days I feel disconnected. The four elements are disconnected for me just to be completely transparent. And, and then it gets to a state where I go, okay, I think I haven't done my quadrinity check in and I need to get back there for me to feel all four connected again because I really struggle with play. That was one [00:31:00] of the things that came out as a. You know, like half a day about this part of you. And again, it's a process. So they made us do one exercise and I thought, okay, well, that's it. And then, and then another exercise and another exercise. I was like, Jesus, like how much can you do? But because it was layered that way, at one point I was like, oh my God, I actually love dancing And When I came back and told my best friend, she was like, I have never seen you dance. And so I still haven't intentionally introduced play in my life. And I need to. CHARLES REED ANDERSON: I think when our bodies and ourselves are most happy is when we have a balance. Because you want to be intellectually challenged. But you want to have enough time to take care of your body physically. We want to make sure that you're taking care of your Inside self as well. And you want to make sure that you're just trying to be a better person. [00:32:00] It's nicer to go through life like that. But of course, when we work sometimes, pressure kicks in, timelines kick in, travel kicks in, jet lag kicks in, which I'm spending far too much of my life jet lagged right now. But it's like, it's being able to have the tools to remind yourself to not get stuck in that rut. I mean, it's gonna happen. It's not like, We're fixed. Everything's great. It's sort of like, you know, we, we know what we need to do going forward to have a better balanced life, and we've made that decision. But on that point, you were in a great situation because you were leaving, you had an exit, you had the time to go and do this. I was in a privileged situation because I was on a sabbatical. So I just had time during that to actually go and do this. What advice would you give to people who are saying, you know. I'm in that rut. I'm locked in my head. I'm just working. I don't have fun. I don't have time for myself. What advice would you give? UMA THANA: I think I would ask them to think about a question and the question would be, which is the question I asked [00:33:00] myself a while ago is, do I want more out of life? Because It's also okay not to want more out of life. And for me, there was no question. I absolutely want so much more out of life and I want to live it well in a way that I'm doing big, big things. That's for me personally. So I think that's the first question is do you want more out of life? And then the second question, if that is a yes. Is, do you know what you want? And if you, I'm still figuring out what I want, but I am now very clear about three things that I want. . . And you know, like one of it is I am very clear. I want to come home to somebody. for [00:34:00] example. I'm very clear about elevate. So what is it that you want? And if you would like to do the work to get there, there is actually some backtracking to do. You have to look backwards in order to accelerate forward. And I think this is the best, at least that I have experienced in a tool to be able to do that because of the . You know, I, I, I had no idea, for example, that I was holding on to not grieving for my father when I thought I grieved my dad and he passed in 2012 And then I had all these tears that came out and I was in such a shock. And imagine that's been sitting in my body since he passed, and you don't know how it manifests. So. even for the sake of your health, it's just [00:35:00] worth figuring out, right? Like from the book, the body keeps score. Your body is keeping score. Everything of every run you do in the rat race of every unwanted comment you receive or everything you might say unkindly to others, it's just your body's keeping score. So I feel like this inner work is so underrated. And especially for women because women are more unlikely to invest in themselves because they are by default, generally speaking, wanting to care for others and invest in others. When they invest, usually it has to be something physical. Okay. Yes. This handbag costs 7, 000, right? Versus yeah. I spent that much on the Hoffman process and I've [00:36:00] got nothing to show for it. So I think rethinking investments in yourself is another mindset shift. CHARLES REED ANDERSON: , whether it's Hoffman or something else, I do think it's just important that people take time to do that internal self reflection and figure out, what's making me tick am I happy who am I today, and what do I want to be tomorrow, and how am I going to get there? And I think we were talking about this the other day, like, I feel like if someone asked me today, so, tell me about yourself, what do you do? My answer is, Good question. And five years ago, I could have given you an answer, sometimes it'd be a smart ass answer, but I'd pop out something really quick. Now, I just feel like I'm still in this mode of reflection where I feel like, I feel like a kid again, where I'm like, okay, what do I want to be when I grow up? And what's really important? And I don't have all the answers right now, and I mean, I did Hoffman a year and a half ago. But I [00:37:00] think it's, I just. I like this process of constantly asking myself more questions about myself. Because while I'm having less answers and quick things I can explain it quickly, I'm getting a deeper understanding of what I really want to be. And, you know, I showed you the stuff that I'm looking at for how I'm going to take my business forward now. And I'm realizing things about myself that probably most people knew that I didn't know. And what people value about me I didn't understand. So it's, it's, self reflection is an amazing thing. Thank you. And I think it's important to make sure you have time to do it. And when I've been happiest in my career, it's when I've been able to build in that time for time for myself, where I get to look at, you know, what I'm doing, where I'm at in my life, what's making me happy, what's making me unhappy. If you build that in, it's gonna help you in your career, because it's gonna make you less likely to crack, or just be, too frustrated and quit jobs, or miserable, or depressed. So it's like, I think it's great to build it in. UMA THANA: And I think you make a very good point [00:38:00] about that doing this type of work, you must be prepared to sit with the unknown, the discomfort of the unknown, because you will find days, weeks, sometimes months, where you Might feel like you know less than you did before Because you're rediscovering And That's also, I guess it takes some getting used to it. It's, it's not easy. CHARLES REED ANDERSON: Oh, I'll give you a perfect example. You know, I took a sabbatical and we did a lot of traveling, a lot of hiking in the mountains to get back in touch with nature. During the pandemic, being locked down in Singapore was tough. I miss nature. So just being out there in the mountains every day was fantastic. I did the Hoffman process. I spent a lot of time in my own head because if you're hiking eight to nine hours a day, you've got a lot of time to think. And I came back here, and [00:39:00] I'll never forget the first Monday morning when we got back. I sat down at my computer, and I'm like, Holy shit, now what am I going to do? And I realized, like, everyone assumes that you go to sabbatical and you have these incredible moments where everything is so crystal clear, this is what I'm going to be. None of it, I didn't have anything. I loved being in the mountains. I was just relaxed. I wasn't even thinking about what I wanted to do next. And when I sat there, I'm like, oh no, now what do I do? And it just, it went down for a couple of weeks and I started putting a lot of pressure on myself. And I'm like, why don't I have the answers of what I want to do next? And I'll never forget, I was just sitting there one morning, and it just clicked. And I came in and talked to my wife and I was like, this is, this is what's happened. This is what I think I want to do, this is how I want to do it. And it just felt like it was there. And I was just like, like, whew, that was a relief. . But it was amazing how You can't rush a lot of these things. It's not like you do something and in two hours a day it's going to make better, or twenty hours a week, or a hundred hours a week, or whatever it might be. It's always going to get better. You have to want to invest in yourself and be [00:40:00] able to ride through, it could be a very long process, it could be a short process. UMA THANA: Yeah. And I think that's a great example of inviting space into your life. And I find that for myself too, like, long car rides in Kyrgyzstan recently with my nephews and, you know, like six, seven hours. And those are the times when suddenly some of the deepest things will come to me and I have to whip out my phone and write it down. Otherwise I forget. But I think the magic about this type of work and being willing to do it, is you get to create yourself. And I think there is nothing more exciting than that. CHARLES REED ANDERSON: So, I want to, another question about your career and what got you to this point. You know, we've talked about our upbringings quite a bit, so I don't think either of us were brought up very wealthy, to put it mildly. , so I think when we first [00:41:00] started out in our career, the first objective we had was financial stability. For me, I mean, I was like living month to month, you know, paycheck to paycheck for so long. When I finally got to that point where I could actually start saving, it took a lot of pressure off me. But then, of course, pressure builds up. You're like, oh, well, it isn't just that. I want to rise up through the organization. I want to, you know, have a bigger role, cover more regions, whatever it might be. So that builds up for quite a while. And that pressure happens. But then, like, At some point, you also get to a point where you're making more money, like, oh, I can get more. If I do this, I can make a lot more money. When does the money become less important? And I think it's interesting. The reason I ask this is I think I hit a point where I knew I got offered a position that was considerably more than I was on, like well over double. And I just thought, if I do this, I'm going to be in the hospital because this job will kill me. And I started looking at what's really important to me. And I listed out like the top 10 things that are important to me at that stage. And none of them were money then. It was all these other things. And so I just, but I [00:42:00] think that was later on in the career when I had already built up the stability. How did it happen with you? Was it something similar? UMA THANA: Yeah, I would say it was in different steps. I used to think when I was growing up that, okay, so the first step was I could sleep in my own bedroom in my own bed. But, because in university, I was sleeping on single mattresses on the floor with three other girls in a single room. So, so that was the first. So I think I, I had ladders. And then at one point it was, could I walk into a store and not look at a price tag? So I had all these ladders full of money and then I had more than I could spend. And yes, it's a privilege, but let's be honest. We worked fucking [00:43:00] hard to get there. So so we absolutely deserve it. And I would say when I started leaning in 2016 and to be able to build something bigger than yourself and to see the impact of it on the world, Women, when they come back to you and tell stories of it, I think that was the first taste of, okay, that there is something here I need to think about, on what's bigger than me, because it was all me until then. So I think that was the first biggest pivot. But combined with having the money, I mean I like money. I'm sure you do, too. Well, I CHARLES REED ANDERSON: like wine, and I can't find a way to barter for wine except with money, so I need money. There you go. UMA THANA: So, I love [00:44:00] money, and it helps live the life that I want to live. It gives me the chance to take my nephews on a holiday and spend meaningful time with them. Whatever the definition of a rich life, I think this was the other thing. The pivot. Less than a year ago is rethinking, okay, what is the definition of a rich life for me? And like you, one of it is being able to drink good wine. But the definition of a rich life for me is not buying a house. So I'm happy to rent for the foreseeable future. And so I think moving away from what people tell you are the things you should do. It was, was a big one for me. Like this buying the house, every time I would meet friends who bought houses, they'd be like, you really should be buying a house. Oh, you just took an exit. You really should be putting that in property. And it's just not my definition of a rich life. So I think like [00:45:00] thinking through that is super important. So, yeah, it was having enough money that I didn't need to spend it. to spend on more stuff. And then the impact of lean in Singapore and building something bigger than myself. And then this definition of, okay, what is a rich life for me? CHARLES REED ANDERSON: Okay. Well, let's take that to the next level. Let's look out five years into the future. What will have happened with your startups with yourself that would make sure that in five years you have that rich life. What do you want to happen over these next five years? UMA THANA: I actually have most of it now and it's a working list. So in five years I would say I have a life partner that now that I know myself better and what I want to attract. You know, so, so that, that life partner, [00:46:00] I think that's probably number one. Number two is I can still drink all the champagne, great wines, and I never have to think about the price to enjoy that with the people that I want. I was hoping CHARLES REED ANDERSON: you were going to say I can drink all the great wine and champagne and never have a hangover. I'm like, go for it. Say that one. UMA THANA: Well, so far, the hangovers have not appeared touchwood. Because I think when you drink good stuff, it helps. The third is, I'm healthy. I'm, you know, my parents had high cholesterol, so I'm going to do everything I can not to get on medication for that. So That's going to be a good goal. I'm healthy. I'm fit. I can do whatever I want. I'm mobile. All of those things. Have, I am surrounded by a tribe that I love and love me back.[00:47:00] And I can express that to them. You know, one of the things from Hoffman was to be able to go back to the people you love and to be able to express that to them. Gosh, Oh my gosh, was, was that hard? So I'm hoping I'm going to be much better at that that comes with practice that I am not only surrounded by them, but I can express my love for them. I think that's part of my rich life. And then there's other things, you know, like I want to travel. It's so important to me. If you ask me if I miss anything from my corporate life, It's the travel. Not, you know, that I would fly in at night and then have to wake up next morning for the meeting. But just, I think for me, my five senses activate when I am in different places. CHARLES REED ANDERSON: Yeah. What about you? For me in five years? Good question. Okay, well UMA THANA: what's your definition of a rich life? CHARLES REED ANDERSON: I, I, [00:48:00] I always laugh about this. I think I hit my career goals when I was about 23 or 24. I think And that's not that I was super successful, it's just that I didn't grow up where we had a lot of high aspirations. We didn't live where people went to university or anything, so. The fact that I've lived in all the countries I've lived in, I've done like 300 events now in 25 countries I can rock up to pretty much any major city in Asia, Australia, Europe, and I've got good friends there from either from school or from working over the years. I've got a wonderful partner. Who we've just been on some amazing adventures. We're about to go on another big one, but we won't talk about that one just yet, because it's not publicly announced. But yeah, I think, so I have it already. And I think it's just having these challenges, but it, I think the one thing that is missing right now is that tribe that you're talking about. I think we had it here in Singapore for quite a while, but there's been a big sort of change, or there's been a swapping out of people, a next generation of people is coming in, and I probably haven't been as good at building up that next generation. [00:49:00] So I want to make sure in five years from now I've got more of a close network of friends that are nearby me, or at least in the same city. It doesn't have to be down the block. But now, I mean, my best friends are all in different countries. So it's kind of hard to do it that way. But that's what I would look for, like, over the next five years. Professionally, that stuff will sort itself out. I just want to have fun. I want to keep being a pain in the ass and talking about shit about tech and mocking when we do silly things and praising when we do great things. And just keep exploring the world. You know, the world's a beautiful place. There's a lot more of it I still haven't seen. A lot more hiking to do, as long as my knees hold up, which is why the body is so important. And then, yeah, take it from there. UMA THANA: Yeah. I loved when you and I had a chance to talk about connecting with people, right? So you, with your tribe, and how when we now meet each other, Yep. and we ask, how are you? It's a very different. . How are you? Which [00:50:00] typically would have I mean answered with yeah, I'm good You know had a great week and did this did that? but the biggest difference now is Like today you're asking me. How are you? I would say I've had a fucking awesome week and I really struggled to sleep on some days and I don't know if it was jet lag or I had like a million ideas because I was texting myself. So I wouldn't forget when I eventually woke up. And then I felt like on most days that 24 hours wasn't enough. And it felt like there was a lot of giving that, Yesterday, I had to book myself a foot massage so that I felt like I was receiving. . So, so I was, you know, it's just a different way of answering. [00:51:00] So if I asked you, well Charles, how are you? What would you say? CHARLES REED ANDERSON: The same thing, like, what you brought up. Before, I would have given some bullshit answer. I'm fine, I'd make a smart ass comment or something like that. But now, especially when it's somebody I know well and I know when they're asking me, I'm like, I literally stop and I'm like, How am I doing? And I sit there and it forces me, I've literally got this in my head now, I look into my intellect to see what's going on in my head. I think about how is my heart doing? Am I, am I in balance? Am I taking care of my body? Is, is it all working together? And I'll then give you that answer, which is probably a longer answer than you wanted, but the thing is, when you ask me now, I have no fear or shame in telling you and admitting that. I struggle on certain days. Sometimes pressure gets to me, sometimes I'm, I'm super stressed out, sometimes I can't get things done. Like, I'm not, like I think before I never wanted to admit that because it would make me feel like I was a lesser person. But I think I'm so much more comfortable in myself that I have no qualms about admitting that yeah, I've got issues [00:52:00] from my past that I'm still trying to deal with. That, that sometimes things don't go the way I want. And saying that I need help sometimes and asking a friend for help, is not a sign of weakness. That's a sign that you've got a good friend that you would actually go to them. Yeah. UMA THANA: And I think like for people who are listening and if they've been on a journey to work on themselves on now, hopefully we've inspired them to take some major steps if they want more out of life. The other thing is that you're going to have a different narrative and you're When you interact with people, you're going to be in a different state of mind. You're going to give different energy and don't be surprised if people shortchange that because it does make them uncomfortable [00:53:00] because they're not at the place that you are at. Right, so someone might quickly change the subject, or like, say, great, yeah, I'm doing fine, and then switch to talking about food or something, you know, so they are more comfortable there. You and I now are more comfortable not being there, and we don't want to be there. We actually look for much deeper, deeper, I think we basically CHARLES REED ANDERSON: allocate the first 15 minutes of our conversation to, how are you, and then you're asking me, and then there's 15 minutes gone right there because we can really open up and feel comfortable with each other. UMA THANA: Yeah. Because I think the easy thing to do is when you've done work on yourself is to judge others and you just need to be prepared for, yeah, because you can sit there and go, what's wrong with you? Why can't you answer this question deeper? But it's to have the compassion that you don't know most people aren't [00:54:00] there and that's okay CHARLES REED ANDERSON: I think this is a great way to end the podcast. It's a good reminder for everybody if you've made it this far into it Remember this like next time somebody asks, how are you? Don't just give the flippant answer and say like, oh, I'm fine. Whatever actually ask yourself Well, how am I and look at it take five ten seconds and just think how are you really doing? And don't be afraid to talk to people about it Uma, thank you so much for spending this afternoon with me and talking through these things. It's always an absolute pleasure, and I'm very happy for the progress you've made personally, and what you're doing professionally as well, and I couldn't be happier for you. UMA THANA: And likewise, and yeah, we're always going to be great friends, and I've always cherished that with you and Wilma. . And We'll be making sure that I continue to be part of your tribe no matter where you are. CHARLES REED ANDERSON: That will be a pleasure from our side as well, so. Alright, thank you very much. UMA THANA: Thank you.