Redefining Stress as the Fuel for Your Success -66
Feeling stressed, overwhelmed, or burned out? You’re not alone—and stress isn’t your enemy. In this compelling episode of the Marli Williams Podcast, Marli welcomes Dr. Rebecca Heiss, author of “Springboard,” to unpack how “life will life you” and why stress is actually an essential ingredient for meaningful, purpose-filled lives. Together, they challenge cultural myths that stress must be avoided, explore the science of stress physiology, and introduce the notion of “post traumatic growth.” With powerful reframes and practical strategies, they tease a step-by-step process that transforms stressful moments into a springboard for growth, resilience, and even excitement.
If you’re an authentic leader, facilitator, or simply craving actionable ways to turn stress into your superpower, you won’t want to miss these insights. Ready to shift your relationship with stress forever? Tune in for inspiration, laughter, and brand-new tools for thriving under pressure.
About Dr. Rebecca Heiss:
Dr. Rebecca Heiss is a stress expert dedicated to transforming our fears into fuel we can use through her T-minus 3 Technique. Her research has been designated "transformative" by the National Science Foundation. When she's not on a stage, she is happiest when hiking or surfing with her two spoiled rotten dogs Guinness and Murphy.
To learn more about Dr. Heiss, visit her website at rebeccaheiss.com. Her brand-new book, Springboard, is out now and ready to inspire you—find it wherever books are sold! And you heard it here first: Rebecca has a brand-new course launching next week, created especially for younger generations. Don’t miss this chance to learn directly from her latest work!
Marli Williams is an international keynote speaker, master facilitator, and joy instigator who has worked with organizations such as Nike, United Way, Doordash, along with many colleges and schools across the United States. She first fell in love with transformational leadership as a camp counselor when she was 19 years old. After getting two degrees and 15 years of leadership training, Marli decided to give herself permission to be the “Professional Camp Counselor” she knew she was born to be. Now she helps incredible people and organizations stop waiting for permission and start taking bold action to be the leaders and changemakers they’ve always wanted to be through the power of play and cultivating joy everyday. She loves helping people go from stuck to STOKED and actually created her own deck of inspirational messages called StokeQuotes™ which was then followed by The Connect Deck™ to inspire more meaningful conversations. Her ultimate mission in the world is to help others say YES to themselves and their big crazy dreams (while having fun doing it!) To learn more about Marli’s work go to www.marliwilliams.com and follow her on Instagram @marliwilliams
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Transcript
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Marli Williams [:I'm wondering how many of you out there are stressed out, maybe overwhelmed or burned out. Well, good news, my friends, is number one, you're not alone. And number two, you're human. And on today's podcast, we are going to be talking about how to transform our stress into a springboard for our life, for building and creating meaningful, purposeful lives. Stress is actually an essential part of that. And Our guest today, Dr. Rebecca Heiss, is going to bust some myths about how we've been taught to deal with stress and really reframe and rewrite our own stories of how we look at stress and how we transform it to create new trajectories in our life. This is a powerful, super fun, super engaging conversation with the amazing Dr. Rebecca Heiss, author of the new book out Springboard. And I cannot wait to dive into this conversation today. Let's do this.
Marli Williams [:Hey everyone, what's happening? I am super stoked to welcome you to the Marli Williams Podcast where we will explore authentic leadership, transformational facilitation and how to create epic experiences for your audiences every single time. I am your host, Marli Williams, bringing you thought provoking insights, expert interviews and actionable strategies to unlock your potential as a leader, facilitator and speaker. Thank you for joining me on this journey of growth, transformation and impact. Let's lead together. The Marli Williams Podcast begins now.
Marli Williams [:Let's dive in. Hey everybody, what is happening? Welcome back to the Marli Williams podcast where this week my friends. Oh my goodness. I am so stoked to have Dr. Rebecca Heiss here. She is in the house all the way from North Carolina joining us to share about her new book Springboard and help us deal with the stress in our life differently and better because life can be hard and stressful sometimes.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Yeah. Thank you so much for having me. I'm super excited to dive in with you because. Oh, is anybody not having a stressful moment right now?
Marli Williams [:Like, yeah, one of the things I say is life will life you.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Life has been doing a lot of life in recently for sure. Yeah.
Marli Williams [:So it's, you know, what do we do? What do we do when life lifes us, Rebecca, we where do we begin? And I would love maybe for just to get the conversation going, maybe share a little bit about who you are, your work in the world, what you do, what your jam is and what led you to the world of being an author, keynote speaker, talking all over the world about stress.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:I am an author, keynote speaker and I talk all over the world about stress. That's the summary of It. I'm a stress physiologist by trade, so I have a PhD in stress physiology, which is just like understanding the hormones, the way we behave under stress. My background before that is in evolutionary biology and behavior. And before that, if you want to, like the deep cut, I'm a bird nerd. I'm an ornithologist. So I. I truly have a master's degree in ornithology.
Marli Williams [:So, like, that is epic.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Super. I love that about. Not everybody knows that about me.
Marli Williams [:So that's kind of a fun, fun facts.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:It's a deep cut. How did I get going in this? I was an academic, I was doing research. And really the short version of a much longer story is life lifed me. And in a single month, I quit my job, sold my house, and divorced my husband because things happened and I was like, I don't want to have regrets in my life and I don't want to live a life of meh. And so I always wanted to speak. I love the stage, I love the drama of it. I love a good story and I love science. And I thought, gosh, you know, if I could combine those two and actually help people, like, take all of this research out of the lab and bring it into people's lives where they can apply it and, you know, actually use it in a purposeful way, that would be cool.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:And so that's what I've been doing for the last decade. Yeah, it's wild to say that, but it's been a great journey.
Marli Williams [:Yeah, you know, it's awesome to think about, like, the journey that got you here. Right.
Marli Williams [:Like, even the moments of stress that you've experienced helped you to pivot, to shift, to change, to put things in perspective of like, I want to live a life that's true to me. But sometimes it's like we need that those, like, whatever you want to call it. Some people hit rock bottom. Some people have like those wake up call moment when life, life says something happens and like, we get to choose. And I think like this conversation around stress of like, it's not about avoiding the hard things in our life. It's like, how do we move through them? How do we grow through them? How do we. I think one of the things I love that you talk about is this post traumatic growth.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Post traumatic growth. Yeah, exactly. We talk about post traumatic stress all the time, but, like, all the time. Well, that's one thing that affects 8% of the population. But if you want to look at the other 80% that experience post traumatic Growth. Maybe we should talk about that a little bit more. Yeah. I mean, to your point, I think, first of all, trying to avoid stress is a losing battle.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Like, you can postpone it maybe a little bit by, like, getting a massage or doing some deep breaths or, like, drinking or scrolling your phone. I mean, there's all kinds of avoidance things that we do, and that's natural. And I'm not trying to blame or shame anybody, but it's going to be weighted on the other side, right? Like, stress is unavoidable. And I think one of the biggest issues that we've had as a society is we've been told the stress is bad and we have to get rid of it. And we try all of these things, right? We, like, we read the books, we do the apps, we do the things, and then we still have stress, and we're like, I am broken. What's wrong with me? And then we create more stress for ourselves because we feel like we're failing. And I want to tell everybody who's listening, oh, my gosh, please. Your stress response is a feature.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:It is not a bug. It is literally helping you to rise to the occasion under that stress, in that uncertainty, in that discomfort. It is literally feeding your body the energy that you need in those moments. So rather than trying to, like, push it aside and say, no, I don't want this, like, we have got to reframe that and use it differently. So, yeah, you're not broken people. You're not broken.
Marli Williams [:You are not broken. I love that.
Marli Williams [:It is a feature, not a bug. There is a reason we are, like, evolutionary, biologically wired that way, right? And it like to rise to these moments and, you know, I got to see you speak and all of these examples of, like, you think about that you shared a stressful moment, like, a meaningful moment in your life, the most meaningful, like, maybe achievement, whether it was getting a PhD, a master's degree, competing in a marathon, whatever, right? Like, was that a stressful experience? So it's like our meaning and purpose in our life, those meaningful moments often come with stress. Most of the time.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Yeah, exactly. And my fear is that what we've been teaching people is to avoid those meaningful, purposeful moments. Right? Like, that is my fear. I'm like, we are running away from the thing that is the actual thing that brings meaning and purpose to our life. So, like, I mean, that's not just me telling a story. That's. That's hard data. So meaning and purpose, the number one correlate to a meaningful purposeful life is stress.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:It's past stressful events, it's current state of stress. It's even future worry and anxiety. So if you're somebody who's sitting there wringing your hands, going, I don't know what tomorrow brings, guess what? You're probably living a really meaningful life. It's like, you know, this is a really important reframe because nobody gets stressed out over their shoe coming untied, right? This is a barometer just showing you this matters, right? I care about this. And that's, again, not a bug. This is a feature. It's a great, like, hey, pay attention. This is important to you.
Marli Williams [:Yeah, I love that so much. So, you know, we're chatting with people that are out there listening to this. Like you said, life's lifing them. Things are coming at them. They have the stresses of running a business, being a parent, having a relationship. Like, I just feel like the expectations that are put on humans in general to, like, be everyone, be everything to everyone. Like, have your shit together. And you have a process that you share, that you teach, that maybe you can share with the folks here today to help them navigate their life in a different way.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:I'd be delighted. And before I do, I have to say, like, I gotta say, as you're describing this, I'm like, yeah, humans are weird. We are a weird, weird species. And I mean this. Like, the example I love to give is lions, right? Lions are great hunters. I don't think I can out hunt a lion. Like, they're stalking gazelles, we're gonna say. Like, they're incredible beasts of predation, and yet they fail 80% of the time they go for a hunt.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:And here's the difference between a lion and a human. No lion, after they fail at a hunt, goes, gosh, I'm a terrible lion. I can't believe I suck so bad. Like, I just. I. You give up now? I just am a terrible hunter. They take a nap.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:That's what they do. And humans create our own stress by going just, like, spinning in the cycle of all of these negative thoughts. So, like, it's not just the stressor. It's all of the thoughts that we have about the stressor and what that means about who we are and how we show up. And so we actually compound our own stress. So how do we begin to deal with this? Step one is recognizing that your stress response, again, it's a feature, not a bug. But it's really built for the ancestral environment. It's built for, like three minutes of Screaming terror through the savannah, getting chased by a lion, tiger or bear.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Oh, my. Right. So the first step is simply to say, oh, this isn't a tiger. And what I mean by that is in the next three minutes, just whatever is stressing you out, if you will not be dead in the next three minutes, it's not a life and death situation, right? So all of the energy that your body is getting, that heart rate increasing, you're sweating, your adrenal glands are firing up. That is your body preparing you to perform. But it doesn't mean that you have to run away from something that is life threatening. So if it's not a tiger, we get to then repurpose the energy. That's step one.
Marli Williams [:Step one. You know, I think it's so important. It's like, what are the stories that we're making it mean? And I think that moment of pause and reflecting of like, yeah, will this thing actually physically hurt me, harm me? You know, one of the things is we're treating everything in our life with like so much, like this huge sense of urgency. One of the things that I say sometimes is it is not a kidney in a cooler. I am not about to do open heart surgery or a kidney transplant on somebody. And the funny thing is, my partner is a nurse and like, sometimes it legit is a kidney in a cooler.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:You know what? And again, your body is serving you for that moment. So, like, your partner, like, those three minutes are critical. And so her body is like, let's go, let's go, let's go, let's go. She's getting the job done for us. When we get an email and we're like, oh my gosh, this has to be done tomorrow, okay, that is a different story, right? And it's really important in these moments too. I think it can be really shaming for me to be like, oh my gosh, just like, calm down, it's just an email, right? And we do that to one another, we do that to ourselves.
Marli Williams [:Calm down, calm down.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Just calm down. Okay, Before I even get into that, let's just talk about the fact that instead of trying in that moment to like, justify that it's not a tiger, allow yourself some time with the tiger. Right? Those three minutes of screaming terror, we're not logical in that. We're not going to be able to come. We're not even going to be able to say it's not a tiger, probably for the first three minutes because we're like, right, so that's fine. Give yourself permission, set a timer. I literally will set a timer. When I have that response, I'm like, oh, my gosh.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:And allow myself for three minutes to freak out, because it gets my body into the space where I can then, okay, I'm still alive. Guess it wasn't an actual tiger. And I call this inviting the tiger in for tea, right? You're just like, come on. Come on, tiger. Let's go. Let's see what you got. Come on, put them up.
Marli Williams [:I think, like, that acknowledgement of it versus the pushing it down, or like, the kind of sometimes we want to bypass it or override it, or like, oh, it's not a big deal. Versus, like, wow. Like, in this moment, this feels like this female does feel like a big deal. Or you feel your nervous system getting activated and your palms are sweating and, like, all of these things are happening. But if you can actually be with. Can move through, then you can go on to the next step of the journey.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:We call that naming it to tame it. Right?
Marli Williams [:You name it, name it to tame it.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Love that. Right? And it works especially well with tigers, right? Like, you tame the tiger. Hey.
Marli Williams [:Tame the tiger. I love it.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:So now we know, okay, this isn't life and death. Great. And by the way, like, sometimes it is, like, in your partner's case, great. Your body's already doing the thing it's supposed to do. Roll with it. 99% of the time, it's not going to be. So then we get to take all that energy that our body is giving us, and we get to transfer it. This is my favorite stage.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:I love the transfer stage. Because you're already at this heightened state. And this is inevitably when you believe, because either you've been told or you tell yourself, you're supposed to calm down. And I call. Bowl on that. Like, first of all, it's mean. It's just flat out mean.
Marli Williams [:Stop being so mean to yourself.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Calm down.
Marli Williams [:Just relax, Susan. Just relax.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:You would never say that to your best friend. Why would you say that to yourself? Right? It's just terrible.
Marli Williams [:I always say if we talk to other people the way that we talk to ourselves, we wouldn't have no friends.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Oh, 100%.
Marli Williams [:We are terrible to ourselves.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:So mean. We're so mean.
Marli Williams [:Calm down. Why are you making such a big deal? Just chill out. Yeah, that doesn't work.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:It doesn't actually work. Like, you can't. Physiologically, you can't create or destroy energy, right? Like, you can't destroy it. So if you're heightened, that's great. That's an opportunity. I always say athletes are breaking world records at Olympics, at peak events when their pressure of the stress is really, really high and they're not getting rid of it, they're using it, and we have the same ability. So rather than say, oh, gosh, I'm so stressed. I'm so anxious.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:I'm so nervous. What else could that mean? And the way we begin to challenge what else that could mean is twofold. One, we have to get curious with it. We have to ask ourselves, what else might this signal in my body be? Because curiosity and fear cannot coexist, right? There's literally no brain mechanism that allows for those two things to exist together, which is pretty cool. So if we start getting curious, we're starting to kick ourselves out of fear. And then we can adopt another high arousal state. I suggest excitement, Although anger is a good one, too. We just have to talk a little bit more about anger and how you use it.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Right? I'll just say it now. Look, if you choose anger, that's great. Anger can be incredibly productive. Like, you can be more creative, come up with more innovative solutions. There's all kinds of really good research on anger. The trick with anger is to not point it at people, but at problems, right? So, like, I can get really angry. I can be in that height and say. And I can say, oh, I'm getting curious.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:You know what this is? This is anger. Then point it at the medical diagnosis. Point it at the problem that your company is struggling with, but don't point it at the sales team. Don't point it at Susan. You know, this is the challenge. And where people get into trouble with anger is that. So if you want to use anger, great. Just use it appropriately.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Excitement is one of my favorites because to me, you can't get wrong with excitement. Like, oh, I'm excited about this. Now, listen, you and I both know we're going to be lying to ourselves about that, right? Like, you're actually really scared. You're actually not really excited. You're nervous. You are stressed. You are uncertain. But the very act of saying out loud, declaring, rebecca, you're excited, shifts the energy, not just for me, but also the people that I interact with.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:So one of my favorite studies, again, is we took graduate students and had them put pencils in their mouth like this, and it kind of forces a smile. And it turns out that we don't smile because we're happy. We are happy because we're smiling. So when we position our bodies as if we're excited, we Throw our shoulders back. We put a big smile on. We're like, here we go. We're actually creating hormones of excitement and happiness and joy. And this is important.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Your anxiety doesn't go away. It's there. It's still going to be there. Right. Like, anybody that tells you they can get rid of your stress. Nope. But you're starting to feel actual excitement alongside it. And now these two things are commingling, and now you're interacting with other people, and they see a little bit of the excitement, and they respond to you as if you're excited.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:And suddenly you begin to feel more excited. Because humans are incredibly emotionally contagious. So, again, my favorite step, for so many reasons, because all of this energy just starts to shift.
Marli Williams [:Yeah. It's so powerful. Like, again, in those moments of, like, what am I making this mean? And how do I shift the meaning? Like, that is what makes us human. And that level of like, I think, like, that moment of that pause of like, oh, the story I'm telling myself. Or like, or over and over. I'm nervous. I'm nervous. I'm nervous.
Marli Williams [:Versus shifting that energy to. Yeah, like this. I'm excited. And this feels. One of my favorite words is fun, comfortable. That's a good one, right?
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:I might steal that. Yeah.
Marli Williams [:It's like, is this fun? Is this uncomfortable? But what if it's fun, comfortable? And in those moments, that is when we are growing, expanding, evolving, learning. Like, it's like when we're in our comfort zone, if we were experiencing no stress, right? Like, and just sat on our couch and never left our house and just did, you know, only hung out with a few select. That is like, the most boring existence ever. So it's like, actually stressful moments are the. Again, I can create a new meaning around. This idea of stress is like, oh, that's when I have meaning and purpose. Going up to someone new, asking for someone's number, asking them on a date, it's like, to me, what are we missing out on? Because we're not all, like, trusting our capacity to meet that moment. And I think when we do that, in that transfer stage, we are expanding our capacity to say, like, I'm okay, I got this.
Marli Williams [:I can handle this moment. I'm in the arena. I'm in the arena of being human. I'm playing in the playground. It feels uncomfortable. But it's like every time I do something, you know, I say, I talk a lot about confidence, right? Like, where does confidence come from? It's like, it comes from doing scary Shit off the line.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:That's right. Yeah. And then did you die?
Marli Williams [:And it's like, it doesn't just exist in ether. It's like every time you do that thing, you're like, whoa, that was outside my comfort zone and I didn't die. I can build that self trust.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Oh, my gosh. Have we Talked about type 1, type 2, and type 3 fun? No, because you're fun. Comfortable is like, oh, this is bringing up things. Okay, so type 1 fun is the kind of fun that most people would describe. Also nice. We have Matchy Matchy water bottle.
Marli Williams [:Matchy Matchy emotional support water bottle.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Type 1 fun is the kind of fun that most people think about. Like, it's just fun. Like you hang out with your friends, you play a board game. Like, it's fun. Type 2 fun is like the fun. Comfortable. This is uncomfortable. I don't really love it while I'm doing it, but.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:But as soon as I'm done, like, I just ran a 5k, I didn't love it. But at the end I'm like, cool, when's the next one? Right? That's fun. Comfortable. And then there was type three fun, which is not fun during, it's not fun after, but it makes for a hell of a story, right? Most people, given their druthers, will stay in type one fun because here's where you control the outcome. And when we're in especially in stressed out states, in states of uncertainty, we like to have control. And if I'm in type 2 fun or if I'm in that fun comfortable thing, I don't know if I'm gonna finish. I don't know if I'm going to complete this 5k because it's outside of my normal zone of comfort and so I can't control it. I'm probably not gonna do it.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:And that's when people end up in this, like, space of learned helplessness and inaction. And they end up missing out on the very things that are going to bring meaning and purpose to their lives.
Marli Williams [:Yeah, it's like, where are you phoning it in?
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Yeah. Where you play sick?
Marli Williams [:Where are you playing sick? Where are you playing sick? It's like, where are you letting yourself off the hook by not putting yourself in the arena of life of like, putting yourself in those uncomfortable moments or situations? Whether you choose them or they're happening, they find you. They find you because they will, because you're human.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Here we are. Life lives.
Marli Williams [:Life lifes.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Okay?
Marli Williams [:So we transfer the energy matted Tiger.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:We've Transferred the energy. Step three. And we've already kind of been talking about step three. The step three is the trajectory. So we've got all of this like butterflies now in alignment. Where are we going to point them? How do we use all of this? There's a couple things with step three that I really like to mention. One, pointing it outwards to serve is probably the best way you can mitigate stress. So this comes from a study from 2023 looking at 90 different workplace interventions.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:90 of them. And I am talking everything from like the apps to one on one coaching to massage. I was really hoping massage would be one of the things that mitigate stress. Turns out none of them work with the exception of one, and that's service to others. So this is one of the things that like, ah, gives me chills every time because it makes so much biological sense. You know, we've all heard of cortisol, which is your main stress hormone. The other main stress hormone is oxytocin. And that's a hormone of cuddling and community and togetherness.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:And when we go through discomfort together, we become this much closer to the people around us. And really, oxytocin is there supporting this stress response, saying, reach out, help someone, ask for help. Right. It's a hormone of courage to both ask for and receive and give and offer help in these stressful times. So that trajectory, pointing it outwards and then taking an action. Right again, we covered it a little bit already. But, like, it's easy to measure the cost of our actions and it keeps us settled back in that type one fun, just kind of like comfortable because we don't want to fail. We don't want to be rejected.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:We don't want those things that come with this discomfort. But we forget about measuring the cost of our inaction. And when we don't take action, especially in stress, the stress doesn't go away. It's not going anywhere. We have to move through it, which requires taking these small trajectories forward into, I call it running at the roar. Right? You got to run towards that tiger. That's so scary. But if you break it down to small enough steps, it's not like you have to climb Everest in a single leap, right? It's these tiny little movements toward the stress that are going to get you through it.
Marli Williams [:It's so good. And one of my favorite quotes says the imperfect action is always better than perfect inaction. And for those recovering perfectionists out there, you know, I think that we want to do the right thing or the perfect thing. And, like, just one tiny step to shift out of that, like the inertia or that fear response where it's like, I don't want to mess up. I don't want to do the wrong thing, so I'm just not going to do anything. And we think that somehow that's going to keep us from the stress.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Magically safe. Magically safe.
Marli Williams [:Magically safe. And, you know, our brains are hardwired to keep us safe. Sometimes I think, you know, if someone's just lived their life at like a five or a six, it's decent, pretty good, not bad, you know, it's not below a five, you know, whatever. I'm above the line. You don't even know what a 9 or a 10 would feel like. And so that trajectory, it's like, sometimes I talk a lot about, like, goal setting and motivation. Like, where are you going? And having a vision for, you know, your life or who you want to be or how you want to show up. So compelling that instead of feeling like we're pushing ourselves and this, like, kind of hustle and that we are being pulled, we have this trajectory of, like, this is who I want to be as a speaker, as a leader, as a parent, as a partner.
Marli Williams [:Like, and so can I remind myself who I am and who I want to be and where I'm going and can I take those actions in service of that? And I love this vision of being pulled versus I'm supposed to. I have to.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:I should, I gotta. I gotta. You know, the "shoulding". Yeah, the should.
Marli Williams [:You know, people should. Should not all over themselves, you know, and how important that is and the being of service to other people.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Right.
Marli Williams [:And so often, like, that stress is, like, for speakers too. People that are out there. Like, our ego wants to look good and get it right, and so our stress freaks out. But when we shift it from, like, show up and serve is one of my mantras.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Be in service of.
Marli Williams [:Yeah, be in service. And so it's like reminding. It's like we're so sometimes focused on looking good and getting it right. And that can create just, like, so much stress versus. I want the trajectory here is that this changes people's lives. This makes a difference. This plants the seed, you know?
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Yeah. This reminds me of adaptive peaks. So evolutionary biology, all of these questions get asked about why our design is so poor. Like, if you're of a certain age, we have bad backs and knees. It's like, why didn't that evolve out? Right? Like, we should be better than that, like, that's not a good design. Evolution do better. And there's a number of reasons for this, but one of them is an adaptive peak, which is basically, it was good enough. And when you're on an adaptive peak, like, think about this level of adaptive peak, whatever.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Like, I just have my hand at midpoint. And when you're there, like it's above two valleys, so it's fine. And evolution and most humans aren't going to go down the valley in order to reach the next higher peak. So you can see the better design, you can see the better life, you can see the better choice. But man, this is okay. This is fine. Right? Because you gotta go down the valley to climb the next peak and get to that next level. And it is so scary to leave the position of an adaptive peak to say, this is good enough.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Right?
Marli Williams [:It's good enough. So from that evolutionary perspective, do you have to go down to go up versus just going from like peak to peak?
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Yeah, wouldn't that be nice? Wouldn't that be nice?
Marli Williams [:But I'm so curious. From a like, evolutionary perspective, sure.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:So, like, we'll take the human back, for example. The human back evolved from chimpanzees and bonobos who were four legged. So there's this long elongation that is built for like, not bipedalism. So we've got this nice curvature to our spine. And in order for us to be bipedal, that would require an entire shift of the spine. Like you can't get there from here. You can't just like it would have to be an entirely different design. I always think about like Legos.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:You have to pull all the Legos apart to put it back together in a new way. Well, if we just add this piece and put that piece on now, it's right. It's a full undo, redo.
Marli Williams [:It sounds like that's what happened with you a little bit.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Ooh, go on, say more with your life. You blow it up.
Marli Williams [:Yeah, you kind of blew it up in a way. Started over. I don't know if that's what it felt like to you, but like a hundred percent. We're probably at some sort of adaptive peak. It was fine. Ish.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Maybe.
Marli Williams [:I'm guessing. It was fine.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:It was, it was fine. It was fine. Yeah.
Marli Williams [:Then it's like, am I willing if.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:I want to get here? Marli's being very, very sweet because she knows my whole story and she's trying to determine how much she should share. And I, I appreciate that, but what I'll say is, look, I quit my job, sold my house and divorced my husband in a month. And like, that is a true grenade. Like, that's a blow up. And the truth is, like, my husband was fine, he was nice, we were fine. My job was great. Like, I liked it for the most part. It was easy.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:I could have retired from it 50 years from now. Everything was fine. But if I wanted to get to a really love of my life level of passion, if I wanted to get to a real true calling, not just a job, I can't just, you know, say, okay, well, this has been fun. Bye. I'm going to just move to the next person or move to the next space. No, you've got to go through the devastation of the loss. You've got to reorganize. Everything's got to implode on itself and really rediscover and put together new pieces.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Because if you don't, what you think you want might not be the same thing once you get through all the mess.
Marli Williams [:Yeah, it's so true. And I think, you know, it's one thing when, like, life lifes you and then you kind of have to navigate that and deal with it, but I think, like, the courage to choose life, that is like, I mean, and one of the things that I said, I've said before is you don't have to wait for your life to suck, to want to change it. I had a steady, stable job at a university in a college town. I was like, living my Bellingham dream. But I was a little bored. I was like, this is it. There's this whisper. I think that we all have whisper, intuition, knowing something like, I meant for more.
Marli Williams [:There's something more out there. Or like, I, I want a better life, or an epic, amazing relationship, or, you know, and people just stay in things because of that. Our brains are so hardwired for that. Comfort, safety, security. And again, we've lived our life at a five or six, eh? Pretty good.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Yeah. And I gotta say, yeah, this is. I want to let people off the hook a little bit too, because when it was first described, we talked about learned helplessness, right? And the idea is, well, this is what I know. And so I'm just going to stay in it. It's. It's fine. We can describe. Actually, I'm gonna take a minute.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:I'm gonna describe this study because it's pretty powerful. So the original study was done on dogs and two different groups. And the first group, they electrified the floor, so the dogs were being shocked and they had a little panel that they could press with their noses and the shocks would shut off. So quickly, these dogs learned, okay, I have agency over my life. And they press the panel and they shut off the shocks. And the second group of dogs, same situation, except for when they press the panel, nothing happened. So the shocks continued. So these guys learned, nothing changes.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Doesn't matter what I do. Both groups of these dogs are then put into a third experiment. And in this experiment, the floor is once again electrified. There's a small barrier over which the dogs just have to leap. And when they take that little leap on the other side, it's safe, and there's no shocks. So the first group who had had agency before immediately goes and jumps over and they're like, cool, this is great over here. The dogs that had no agency, the dogs that had done things and it hadn't changed, just laid down and accepted the shocks. So this begs the question, like, where are you accepting shocks in your life? In, like, this is just how it is.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:I have no control. And again, I say this because I want to let you off the hook in that. We call it learned helplessness, but it's not learned. This is the default setting of our brains. So this is like default helplessness. It is what your brain does when it decides that it has no agency, no control over a situation. It just says, forget it. This is just how it is, and gives up.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Y'. All. Let me remind you, you are human. You have so much agency. You have so much more control than you know over the stories that you tell and the situations you find yourself in and. And the environments you find yourself in. And yes, there are always gonna be things that are outside of our control, but you have the power to take back some agency and take some little, small, tiny, itty bitty action into that stressor that shows you that you have some hope and some power in those moments. Soapbox done.
Marli Williams [:I think to understand, like, that is something that is part of being human. And part of being human is also having this ability to change our story, to change our narrative, to reclaim that sense of agency over our life. And it's like every decision that we've ever made up until this point has gotten us to where we are right now in this moment. And I've said this so many times, like, what got me here won't get me there. What are the new choices, actions, attitudes, behaviors, mindsets? Who are the people that are going to support me? Sometimes there are people in your life that want to keep you small, right? And so it's like, who's gonna be on this journey with me to help me get to that next peak? And who's gonna be with me in the valley when, like, things are hard or things crumble? Whether I choose that, whether life lifes me and I'm going through it. Whether you're at a peak, an adaptive peak, you're like, it's fine, but I can see this other peak over there. Or you're in the valley and you're like, there is no way to the top of this freaking mountain. It's like, wherever you are on that journey, I think this invitation, like, where can we reclaim our sense of self, our sense of agency in this last piece of your trajectory? Like, where do you want to go? As a coach, I've gotten on so many conversations with people, and, like, one of the first questions I ask people is, what do you want?
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:It's so hard to answer, isn't it?
Marli Williams [:Tell me what you want. The first three words that someone would tell me is, I don't know.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:I don't know.
Marli Williams [:And it's like, so number one is, get clear on what it is that you want. And I think that getting. You know, so many of us have chased someone else's version of success.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Right?
Marli Williams [:And so that's the adaptive peak. I got the house, I got the kid, I got the dog, I got the.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Here we are. Why am I not happy? Why am I not happy? Doesn't make any sense.
Marli Williams [:So I think that. That it's like, what is my definition of success? What is my version of success? And what. What brings me joy and happiness and meaning and purpose and fulfillment? And, like, that's step one, and then step two is believing that what you want is possible. Wouldn't that be nice? That's good for you. Oh, you can have that because. Oh, well, Marli, I could never do what you do or have what you have. You know, it's like, do you believe that it's possible? And number three is, are you willing to take action?
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:And do you believe that you're worthy of having that? Like, that's the other thing, that worthiness. The worthiness is big.
Marli Williams [:Someone said one times, like, we accept the love we think we deserve. Oh, I was like, that one breaks me every time. It's like, whoa.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Yeah.
Marli Williams [:Absolutely speaking some truth over there. Like, oh, like. But it's like, it makes you look inside of, like, what have I been accepting?
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:What shocks have you been accepting? What shocks have you been accepting? And then, like, how are you complicit? In them.
Marli Williams [:It's not blaming, like other people or things outside of ourselves necessarily. It's like, what choices did I make? But from that place of like, what do I feel worthy of? And I think it's like, can I increase my capacity to receive more love, more abundance, more energy, more community, more fun, fulfillment, joy? It's like Brene Brown says that joy is the most vulnerable emotion. Sometimes people think it's fear or shame or guilt or all this stuff. And it's like. And she talks about this idea of foreboding joy where she's like, you know those moments in your life where, like, everything's going really well and then your next thought is, when something bad going to happen, because we would rather take away our own joy than someone else take it away. So we're like, I'm just gonna, like, selectively numb, not gonna let myself feel too good so that I don't feel terrible. So we're like living in this mediocre middle ground.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Yeah. And I'll say, like, the thing that I've wanted to say for a while, like, as you're talking about this, it keeps coming up. It keeps coming up is who you surround yourself with is so important because they're going to be the dogs on the other side going, why are you laying there? Come on. Like, come on, get up. Or they're going to be by your side. They're going to come back over into the shocks with you and say, this sucks. Let's go.
Marli Williams [:You know, I don't know if you know the research that I remember when I taught college students, there was studies around, like, the biggest determinator of your success as a college student is who you hang out with, who you surround yourself with.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Yeah.
Marli Williams [:And I think that that is true. Your biggest thing that's going to determine your success is who's around you.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:And that, that stands up for productivity, for health. Like, when you look at like the way you show up for yourself in health and wellness, the way you show up for yourself in work and what efforts you're willing to put in, there's tons of studies just sitting near a high producer, high performer, like, wears off on you, like, in significant ways. So have a look at who you're spending your time with, because guess what? That's a reflection of you.
Marli Williams [:It's so true. You know, it's one of the reasons I moved to Portland. I lived in Bellingham and I loved it, but it was like, it's a little sleepy, little sleepy vibes. And I'm like, I Want to be around people who move me, challenge me, motivate me, inspire me. And I didn't know anybody who was a coach and a speaker and an entrepreneur and, like, did all this stuff. And I'm like, all right, I want to be around that energy, and I'm really intentional with, like, who I hang out with, because that does shift and change how I feel about myself. The things that I do, you know, the actions that I take. Like, people that.
Marli Williams [:I just think it's such a game changer.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Absolutely. And as you said at the start, like, it's lonely at the top. So if you're a leader, if you're a manager, if you're, like, you're not hanging with your friends at work, so you gotta find somebody that can push you and keep you honest and hold you accountable to yourself so that you can show up as a leader and lead that team. Because, yeah, that's.
Marli Williams [:And sometimes, you know, I have found myself in these situations where I've been, like, the leader of a community, and I built the community because I want community, but I'm not a part of that community because I'm leading the community.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:So I'm like, that's right. Yeah, this doesn't work.
Marli Williams [:Well, then I need to go find other leaders and community builders and speakers and facilities who understand what it's like, because it's like, you know, I created this, like, huge summer camp for women. And, like, they're all having the freaking time of their life. Meanwhile, back at the ranch, I'm running around like a crazy person trying to, like, organize all the shit for them to have the time of their life.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Marli. I did one retreat. One retreat. One retreat. I was like, oh, my gosh, this is gonna be so great. I'm gonna bring this community of women together. Like, it's gonna be epic. It was.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Everybody had a great time. I was miserable. I was.
Marli Williams [:Everybody had a great time but you.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Yeah, I was literally. I was up to 2am every night, like, and in my head going, are they having fun? Is this worth it? Am I providing value? Is this enough? Like, yeah. So stress physiologists here getting stressed out. This is part of it.
Marli Williams [:It happens. It happens to the best of us.
Marli Williams [:Wow. Well, we covered a lot. We did.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:We did. We did some things.
Marli Williams [:We rocked it out. It's not a tiger.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:It's not a tiger.
Marli Williams [:You got to transfer that energy, and then where are we going? What is our trajectory? So as we wrap things up, bring things to a close, what final words of wisdom do you want to leave people with today and then where can people find you? Read your book. You know, all the things.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Yeah, sure. I mean, I guess the final words of wisdom that I would offer anybody is if you're stressed out, good, that's a blessing. It means that you have a lot of meaning in your life. And rather than looking for cures and ways that this is showing how broken you are, look instead to the joy and the meaning behind that stress and utilize the stress to perform at your very best for yourself and for others. And if you want to find out more about how to do that, first of all, hire me. I love speaking. That's the jam. That is what I do the most of. So as a keynote speaker
Marli Williams [:And she is amazing. I've seen it in real life.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Gosh, thanks, Rockstar. So, you know, working with teams, managers, leaders, any shape, size, industry, it's so fun for me. And you can find me at rebeccaheiss.com and if you want to do more like work individually, you can find my brand new book "Springboard" in all the places that you buy books. And also you've heard it here first, we're releasing a course specifically targeted for these younger generations. So every single time I give a keynote, somebody asked me, what can you do for my son, daughter, person who is in their 20s or even teenagers that are like struggling with transition into college or just this high achievement anxiety Because Gen Z, y', all, I see you. We love you, we're worried about you. Yeah. So I have a brand new course coming out next week, so pretty excited.
Marli Williams [:That's exciting.
Dr. Rebecca Heiss [:Yeah, lots happening. So reach out to me.
Marli Williams [:And we will have all of the links for all of those things in the show notes. And I remember when I did get to see you speak, you ended with something that I loved, which we'll end with today, which is that we hope that you go out there and live very stressful lives. That is our wish, that is our hope for you. Because like you just said, that means you are in the arena. You're doing the thing, you're stepping outside your comfort zone. You're putting yourself out there in new and different ways. And I love your work because it is, it's redefining what stress is and what we make it mean in our own lives. It's not about avoiding it or running from it.
Marli Williams [:It's like run towards the tiger, go for it and do as many things that are fun, comfortable. That's what we hope for you out there. So thank you, Dr. Rebecca Heiss, for being here sharing your love, your heart, your wisdom, your magic, your medicine with us today, y'all.
Marli Williams [:If you love this like this, share it, rate it, review it, send it to a friend who might be stressed out. And until next time, y' all go out there and live some stressful lives. Love ya. See ya. Thank you for joining us on another inspiring episode of the Marli Williams Podcast. We hope you're leaving here with renewed energy and valuable insights to fuel your leadership, coaching and speaking endeavors. I'd love to invite you to subscribe, subscribe, rate and review this podcast to help us reach more aspiring leaders and speakers like you. We have more exciting episodes and remarkable guests lined up, so make sure to tune in next time.
Marli Williams [:Until then, keep leading with purpose, coaching with heart, and speaking with conviction. This is Marli Williams signing off. See you next week.
