66: Mental Fitness 101 - Building Resilience and Finding Your Purpose with Jeni Raitsin

Rosie (00:43)

Welcome back to the Pursuit of Freedom podcast. This is actually the second time I've recorded this intro because we got about five minutes in before realizing that silly me hadn't hit the record button. But here we go. I've got my shit together. Joining me today is the amazing Jenny Riotson. She lives in Tel Aviv.

where she has been a mental fitness coach for the past six years. But prior to this, she was actually an architect for a decade. I can't wait to unpack Jenny's story, learn more about what mental fitness is, because I actually have no idea how it changed her life and how it can change my life and hopefully your life too. So Jenny, thank you so much for joining us today.

Jeni Raitsin (01:22)

Well, thank you for having me.

Rosie (01:25)

Of course, let's go back to when you were an architect because I'm intrigued how you went from there to where you are today. So what was life like for you as an architect and how even did you end up doing that role?

Jeni Raitsin (01:42)

Wow, it's a long story, but I think for the majority of my life up until my thirties, life was very normal, regular. know, went to university, got my degree, did the internship, got a good job in the center of the city, living my best life, was with my high school boyfriend. Like everything was the way you should be living life or the way I...

Rosie (01:54)

Mmm.

Mmmmm

Jeni Raitsin (02:07)

I should be living life very according to the norm very inside the box and I think that up until a certain point I didn't realize That there was life outside like that you can even do something different I grew up in the same place Tel Aviv is a big city But still like everybody living kind of like the same life you're going through the same path

Rosie (02:22)

Yeah.

Jeni Raitsin (02:32)

You get a degree, you get a good job, you get married, 2.5 kids, get a mortgage, die. Like this is what my parents also taught me that was a good life. This like, this is what I thought I should be striving for. And I think like I achieved it and life was looking really, really good on the outside. Like I felt like I had it all. and it was a very successful architect. I just won an award, got promoted to be a team leader. Like I thought.

Rosie (02:32)

Hmm.

Yeah!

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Jeni Raitsin (03:02)

Everything was fine, but there was like this nagging feeling slash little voice in the back of my mind that was just like, okay, I got all the things that I was working really hard for, but I'm really not happy. Like what is wrong with me? Like what has happened? remember just having multiple conversations with different people saying like, wait, is this it?

Rosie (03:07)

Yeah.

Jeni Raitsin (03:28)

Like, is this how it's supposed to feel? Like, am I supposed to feel something like different? Should I be happy with what I have? And I think it was a really, really confusing time. And the breaking point was actually a breakup with my former partner after literally a breaking point. And then I was just, think I wasn't, I don't even know what was going on through my mind, but I said like, okay, I have.

Rosie (03:28)

Mmm!

Literally a breaking point.

Jeni Raitsin (03:56)

all this free time, let's put it more time into work. Like, let me be like the best. I just got promoted. Let me prove myself. I'm going to be like, I moved to an apartment in the center of the city. Let me be like an independent woman. I'm going to be like the best in my career. And I think for almost a year, like this is what I did. In hindsight, I was just filling up my time and was really, really busy.

Rosie (04:01)

Mmmmm

Yeah.

Jeni Raitsin (04:26)

just so I won't have to deal with a lot of emotions that I didn't want to deal with. So I was working hours and hours in the office, but after that I was just like, again, on the outside living my best life. was doing like working out every day and going out and like learning Italian and photography and taking classes and like was busy literally like 24 seven. And after about a year of this, I realized that like, okay, first of all, I'm

Rosie (04:26)

Mmm.

Wow.

Jeni Raitsin (04:55)

very much burned out, like burned out, I can't even. And randomly or not randomly, maybe from the universe, I said, okay, like I need a vacation, a long vacation. I just want to go away for a while. In that couple of months, I already started going through therapy and I started reading a lot of books on like personal development, about productivity. I'm like, okay, how can I manage my time better so I can

have time for all the things that I'm doing and not like burn out. And also a lot of books about like positive psychology because I still believe that like something was wrong with me that I have all these achievements and things and I'm not happy about it. So I'm like, okay, how can I be happy? my very rational brain thinks that I can solve every problem. in a book where like, I just can learn everything. And I just said, okay, I need a vacation. I need a break. I wanna get.

Rosie (05:26)

Yeah.

Mmm.

Of course, yeah.

Jeni Raitsin (05:54)

this ad popped up on my screen and work one day and said, like, join a digital nomad community in exotic locations around the world. And I'm like, OK, click. And then it was very serendipitous, random. I don't know how to say it, but it was an advertising for a company that did digital nomad workations.

It was a bunch of 30 plus year olds working remotely in different location one month at a time. And just remind you, that was the end of 2017. Pre-COVID, pre-remote work, it wasn't a thing, especially not in architecture where you literally have to be, like it's a very physical profession. And I said to my boss at the time, like, I want to go for two months and I'm going to take my work with me. Like, don't worry. And she's like,

Rosie (06:22)

Okay.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, yeah.

Jeni Raitsin (06:52)

What? No, like that's not a thing and I'm like, okay, so I'm gonna quit like I literally cannot handle like I can't she's like No, don't quit like you're in the middle of a big project. We can't have you quit. It's fine Do your thing and I went to Brazil remotely % of the time To meet a lot of people from different locations around the world entrepreneurs

Rosie (06:53)

you

Wow.

Hmm.

Yeah.

Jeni Raitsin (07:18)

people that were literally living their best life. was working in front, like I had like a beach workspace office. I was working half of the time and the other time I was just living, like truly got to live life and breathe. And I was really, really happy, I think for the first time in a while. And I think it just cracked the understanding of like, you do get to, like,

Rosie (07:41)

you

Jeni Raitsin (07:46)

There are other options for you. You don't have to figure out how to be content with what you have. If what you have doesn't make you happy. And this was kind of like the beginning. And I came back from Brazil. It took a couple of months, but I quit my job, went to Mexico at the time, decided that I'm going to be an entrepreneur. had this idea for social enterprise that was again, still related to what I was doing.

Rosie (07:48)

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Jeni Raitsin (08:16)

realm of urban planning, which was my experience then. So I'm like, okay, I still got all these skills. Let me kind of try to be an entrepreneur. I met so many entrepreneurs, they changing the world. They want to do better. Like I want to be the same. Let me do that. thing that I didn't mention that when I went to Brazil, a friend kind of told me, because it was months of me reading all these books.

Rosie (08:18)

Okay.

Mm-hmm.

Jeni Raitsin (08:40)

and constantly like talking about it, you know, when you get to personal development, you feel like you're this a new, a new realm and you just won't shut up about it. And you talk to everybody just about what you learned. So this was me in the last month in the office and my friends are like, Hey, you, know so much and now you're going on this adventure. It's so unique. Write a blog about it, like share it with people. Like people want to know. And I'm like, what blog? Like, again, it was.

Rosie (08:45)

yeah. yeah.

Yup.

Mmm.

Jeni Raitsin (09:10)

Way before Instagram was really Instagram, it was still an app with like pictures and like sharing personal lives. It wasn't what it is I'm like, blog, I don't know how to write, like who's going to read it? I don't know how to set up anything. But when it got to Brazil and I saw all these people, I'm like, maybe I am going to write a blog. And then I started what is now Leisure Hacker.

Rosie (09:18)

Mmmmm

Mm-hmm.

Mmm.

Jeni Raitsin (09:39)

It was a blog about how to happiness into our life. was around time management, all the techniques I learned. It was about positive psychology and happiness and how to hack leisure into the life we already have. I feel like it was what I needed to read back in the day when I was in the office and just struggling.

Rosie (09:57)

Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.

Yeah. Whoa.

You mentioned it a couple of times. You thought something was wrong with you.

And I know I have felt that way before and a lot of other people have felt that way. Why do you think we assume something is wrong with us?

Jeni Raitsin (10:24)

I think there's, it's just we're so conditioned by society to believe that there's one way to live life. And if you don't fit this mole, so it's very primal by the way. It's how our brain, today I know this, this is how our brain wired because your brain won't tell you like something wrong with everybody else because then it threatens your survival as a human being.

Rosie (10:29)

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Mmm.

Jeni Raitsin (10:52)

So

if you're like, the mall is okay and everybody again seems to be happy, social media, everybody's posting, everybody is living their best life and you're like, you're off, so something must be wrong with you. And I think now more and more we hear, and this is why it's so important to share these stories and say like, hey, nothing is wrong with you. There's so many people that are feeling this way, but when nobody speaks about it,

Rosie (11:20)

Mm-hmm.

Jeni Raitsin (11:21)

you just think like, everybody else is okay. probably I'm the problem.

Rosie (11:26)

you think there's shame tied with that? Because you said we don't talk to other people about it. I'm nodding because that was me. I just internalised it all. So why are we so afraid to share how we're feeling with others?

Jeni Raitsin (11:40)

Nobody wants to be, I think I'm speaking for myself. think like you don't want to be the odd man out. Now I don't care. Like I'm living a very, very different life from a lot of people. And again, I found the people that are living the life that are similar to mine, but the desire for safety, for belonging, for love is the most primal thing we have and sharing something that will

Rosie (11:46)

Mmmmm

Jeni Raitsin (12:08)

odd us out is threatening that and nobody wants to do that. And I think that's why there's a lot of shame around, again, just being different, thinking differently, wanting different things. And I think part of my life's mission is also saying like, no, like you get to choose and that's kind of dismantled this shame around wanting another life. And I think now I'm already, we didn't get to this part of the story, but

Rosie (12:26)

Mmm.

Jeni Raitsin (12:35)

Like I feel like I'm already in the next cycle of my own evolution that after like and achieving and achieving, I'm like, okay, that's not my definition of success anymore. Like I get to define what success means to me. And I say if I'm enough or not enough by my own standard, not by society standards and not what my, what my friends are thinking or what Instagram is thinking or what other people are thinking because today I understand that

Rosie (12:46)

Yeah. Yes.

Mm-hmm.

Jeni Raitsin (13:04)

No matter what this definition and how close you are, once you don't defy success on your own terms, you will never be happy. Like never. I don't think it's possible.

Rosie (13:17)

So how do we figure out what our version of success is? This sounds like a game changer. So how do we do it? How did you do it?

Jeni Raitsin (13:27)

I think I just started asking myself this question. It's so simple, but it's not easy. It's just asking yourself small questions of what makes me happy. And not even happy. Happiness is a tricky word, but I like to differentiate. Does this feel good? And when I say good, it can be a range of positive emotions.

Rosie (13:35)

Mmmmm

Jeni Raitsin (13:57)

It can be joy, can be sadness, it can be satisfaction, but something that just feels good and differentiate with things that don't feel good. It can be stressful, can be overwhelming, it can be shameful, it can be upsetting, whatever it is. And again, and I think a lot of people just, even when we're talking about work and leisure, don't...

Rosie (13:59)

Hmm

Jeni Raitsin (14:26)

go by these terms anymore. So for example, like everybody's like, going on vacation with your friends, that's a good thing. That will make me happy. no, that's, again, on the outside, this can look good and work can look bad, but it just depends on how things feel for you. And this is how I operate now. Like, is this person making me feel good?

Rosie (14:29)

Hmm.

you

Jeni Raitsin (14:53)

After I'm meeting them, do I feel like full? I feel like good about myself, about the situation? Do I feel comfortable? I feel expansive? Or I don't. Does this make me like cringe or contract or like tightness anyway? And this is how I differentiate what is, what's going to make me happy. What's good for me. Again, there's no absolute thing. Cause you can say like, again,

Rosie (15:00)

Mm-hmm.

Jeni Raitsin (15:20)

I'm taking the weirdest example that's popping in my mind, like going on vacation. I don't know. Maybe you're not a person that likes to go on vacation. You shouldn't feel shame about it. Do you want to spend your day on your couch, eating snacks in your underwear? Amazing! That's what makes you feel good? Good for you! Do this! You're a success! Like, I'm fine with that. Just understand what makes you happy or again, happy, we're using like this broad term and go with it.

Rosie (15:23)

you

you

I love it.

Mm-mm-mm.

So.

How do we get the courage and the self-awareness to realise what makes us happy, what brings us joy, how certain things make us feel? Because I know it can be quite scary and intimidating. We're not raised in a way, generally, to question everything.

Jeni Raitsin (16:16)

That's true.

Rosie (16:16)

How do we get there? It seems like a really big jump and is probably scary for a lot of people. So where do we start with that? Is there an easy win?

Jeni Raitsin (16:27)

Start small. That's always my answer for everything. You don't have to change anything. You don't have to change anything about your current life. Like you said, the first piece is self-awareness. Just start asking small questions. Don't start with like, is this relationship making me happy or not? No, that's a big question. But you can ask, what do I like to do in the morning? What makes me happy?

Rosie (16:29)

Mm-hmm.

Okay.

That is a big question.

Mmm.

Jeni Raitsin (16:55)

What kind of workout do I like? Maybe I've been running for the past couple of years, but do I like actually like running or do I like yoga? do I, what, just in small things, what food makes me happy? And again, you don't even have to change your workout or change your food. Just ask yourself. I think the way to create change that isn't overwhelming and isn't scary is through curiosity. We don't want to

Rosie (17:04)

Mmm.

Mmm.

Jeni Raitsin (17:24)

push

ourselves into change again and the brain and we're gonna get to mental fitness in a second the brain has two parts two parts like operating system one is with this negative side all the negative emotions and thought live in this side and this side is when we push ourselves to do to create a change or push ourselves to to do something all the hustle culture or all the toxic positivity every everything lives

Rosie (17:51)

Mm-hmm.

Jeni Raitsin (17:52)

If we want to create a true change that is aligned with ourselves, it's got to be through curiosity. We're going to pull ourselves into creating change. And curiosity is just, you know, like, like children, they're walking around the beach and they're so curious, like, this is a rock. What's this rock? What's underneath this thing? What does this do? Right. They have like this very innocent curiosity. There's no shame there.

Rosie (18:09)

Mmm.

Jeni Raitsin (18:18)

And also it doesn't have to lead anywhere. Sometimes they're just asking questions. not going to do anything at all. They're just curious. And this is, I think, the best way to start creating a change. Just be curious. I don't know, does this food make me happy? I feel good after eating start questioning, and this is the next step, start questioning everything, but in a small way. The TV shows you watch on Netflix.

Rosie (18:22)

Yessss

Jeni Raitsin (18:46)

The music you listen, the podcast you listen, the people you follow on Instagram. If you see somebody and sometimes we follow people and it's just like, it's a cringe and you're like, this person. Ask yourself like, why am I following? Just unfollow this person. It starts with small things. And I really believe in the fact that small changes build up to create a big change. So we don't have to quit our job. Yes, I did all these things, but you don't have to quit your job.

Rosie (18:56)

Mmm.

Yeah.

Hahaha!

Jeni Raitsin (19:15)

to change profession, you don't have to do anything drastic. A lot of the time, and this is like my entire company is called Leisure Hacker. It's just how to hack small things into our life because a lot of the time this is what contributes to our overall happiness day to day.

Rosie (19:26)

you

I love that you said being curious doesn't have to lead anywhere. It's not an end destination. And I think that's a big mindset shift for us. There's always, we're taught there has to be this end goal. In school, you set your goals, you achieve your goal. That's the way it is. That doesn't have to be a specific outcome. I think that's a big one.

And the other thing that stood out to me what you were just saying is those small, consistent changes. A lot of us underestimate the power of that. It reminds me of what's the book called? Atomic Habits by James Clear. He preaches that. He's not the one who sort of coined that, but it's so, so true. I know for me, sometimes I roll my eyes like, really? That's not going to make a difference. Like, can't be bothered. Whatever.

I want to get over myself. Actually, it does make a difference. And I feel great. Even if it's just the smallest, tiniest little change, I'm going to have a new routine in the morning or whatever it is. I think it is very powerful. But before I get totally sidetracked on that.

I'm sort of assuming a lot of this, right, is about mental fitness, but can you give us like a broad, not too complicated definition and then let's dive into the nitty gritty. So what is mental fitness?

Jeni Raitsin (21:01)

Okay, so just like we have physical fitness, we have mental fitness. imagine you can be, by the way, mental fitness and mental health is not the same thing. Just like physical fitness and physical health is not the same thing. Because you can be completely healthy. There is nothing quote unquote wrong with you. You're not sick in something, but you can still be not fit. And if you're not physically fit,

Rosie (21:07)

Mm-hmm.

Mmm.

Mm-hmm.

you

Jeni Raitsin (21:30)

and you're trying to climb a big mountain, you will feel physical stress. You will get to that, if you can make it to the top, by the way, you will get there very sweaty and hyperventilating, right? You're not physically fit. The same thing with mental fitness. You can be completely mental, mentally healthy again, like, and you're not mentally fit. And if you're not mentally fit and you're trying to climb a mountain, in our case,

Rosie (21:38)

Right.

Mmm.

Jeni Raitsin (22:00)

reach a certain goal, you will feel mental stress when doing it. So you're either not going to reach your goal and get to the top. And if you will, you will get there sweaty and hyperventilating, which is what we all call stress, anxiety, overwhelm and burnout. That's the symptoms of trying to climb a mountain and not be mentally fit. And a more scientific kind of definition, mental fitness is the

Rosie (22:16)

Mmmmm. Mmmmm.

Jeni Raitsin (22:30)

amount and strength of our negative thoughts versus our positive thoughts. And it goes from one, it's an actual score, we call it PQ. So like we have IQ and EQ, we also have a PQ score, which is a Positive Intelligence Quotient score. It measures our mental fitness from one to 100. So if our mental fitness is 34, means

Rosie (22:37)

you

Jeni Raitsin (22:57)

that there's 60, what did I say? 34, 66 % of the time, we operate, we think negative thoughts versus positive thoughts. We operate from the negative part of our brain versus our positive. And just imagine, like, I can be super smart, super talented, have all this knowledge, work really hard in my business or in my work, whatever it is.

Rosie (23:01)

Yeah

Jeni Raitsin (23:22)

But all of these things are just our potential at every given moment. What determines if they realize that potential is our mental fitness, because I can be in this presentation and then there's this again voice in the back of my mind that's telling me like, Hey, who do you think you are? Like, shut up. Don't speak up. People are going to laugh at you, whatever it is. And if I'm not mentally fit.

Rosie (23:40)

Yeah.

Jeni Raitsin (23:47)

and strong enough, I will listen to this voice and I'm not gonna speak up. So I'm not gonna get the project, I'm not gonna get the money I deserve, I'm not gonna ask this cute boy in a bar for his phone number because I'm gonna be afraid. Fear will lead the way. But if I am mentally fit enough or mentally strong, I have more positive thoughts than negative ones. And then these voices, they never go away, but they're muted in our mind. And we can follow our positive voice of

Rosie (24:03)

Hmm.

Jeni Raitsin (24:16)

Again, curiosity of action, focus, productivity, ambition, motivation, it all lives in this part of our brain. So what we do in mental fitness, we help people train these muscles of our brain to operate more times out of the positive part of their brain and from their positive thoughts versus the negative ones, if that makes sense.

Rosie (24:38)

Hmm. And that was going to be my next question. Is mental fitness something we're born with or can we learn it? And it sounds like we can learn it.

Jeni Raitsin (24:48)

Just like physical fitness. some people are more prone to be physically fit. They have good genetics. It's easier for them to work out. It's going to be easier for them to get in a really good shape. But just like physical fitness, mental fitness, again, some people have a lower kind of starting point. They're more round around. They have like muffin tops, you know.

Rosie (25:13)

Hahaha!

Jeni Raitsin (25:13)

So it's going

to take them more training to get to that fit score they want. But it's possible for everybody. Even I've worked with people that have very, very low scores and we got them in a very, short amount, which is why I like the practice. Get them amazing, amazing results in a very, short amount of time with the right training, with the right muscles and with the right exercises.

Rosie (25:20)

Right. Yeah.

Mmm.

Hmm. How do we?

figure out how mentally fit we are. Cause I wouldn't know where to start and not just assume, yeah, I, I suck. You know, that negative self-talk, which is probably a sign of some, you know, negative mental fitness there. But how do we, how do we like do a litmus test? Where, where am I starting from?

Jeni Raitsin (26:03)

First of all, there's a free assessment you can actually take. There's a test. You can write PQ score assessment and it will take you to the positive intelligence. By the way, everything that I'm talking about is based in science. It is not something I invented. I want to give credit to positive intelligence, which is the company that I learned from and I work with and they created all of it. It's rooted in the latest breakthroughs in neuroscience and positive.

Rosie (26:06)

Well, there we go.

beautiful.

Mm-mm.

Jeni Raitsin (26:31)

positive psychology and behavioral psychology, like it's all there, go to the website, take the assessment and you'll see your score. Don't get freaked by the score. It's usually when people take it and they're truthful about themselves, the score isn't the highest and that's okay, but we wanna know where we're starting from. But if we don't wanna take the score, this is for my more left brain people that are watching, they're listening. But if you just feel like...

Rosie (26:33)

Mm.

Okay.

Jeni Raitsin (26:59)

You have all this potential and you kind of know what you want, but it feels like there is an invisible wall between you and your goal. And like you're working really hard and you feel like something is holding you back and you don't really know what it is. This is how I felt for a very long time. like, I'm super smart, I'm motivated, I'm a hard worker, but still something is blocking me from reaching my goals. Like it really felt like this invisible wall. I'm like,

Rosie (27:19)

Mmm.

Jeni Raitsin (27:29)

keep banging my head over it, you don't know what it is, it's probably because your mental fitness score is low.

Rosie (27:31)

Yeah.

Hmm, that resonates. So, okay, we've all probably got some improvement to do, right, in our mental fitness. So what can we do? Are you able to share with us maybe something simple we could do to start improving our mental fitness?

Jeni Raitsin (27:56)

So, 100%. First of all, we already talked about it, starting with self-awareness. Because it's about, we can't change something we're not aware of. But here's my kind of like adjustment on self-awareness. A lot of us, especially if we're in this like personal development space, we're already done a few things, we went to therapy or coaching, we read a few books, we're like, can self-diagnose ourself, having...

Rosie (28:02)

Mmm.

Yeah.

Jeni Raitsin (28:25)

sort of some sort of problem, but that's not the kind of awareness that I want us to start practicing because it's one thing for I'm a productivity coach. A lot of my work is around productivity. So it's one thing when you say, I'm a procrastinator. So easy to say, I'm a more, I have a VHD or I struggle to focus. That's one level of self self-awareness, which is really, really gentle.

Rosie (28:32)

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Jeni Raitsin (28:53)

What I want us to start practicing and everybody does is listening, start catching the procrastination as it happens. So it's not just a general, I'm a procrastinator. I know I'm going to read a book about it. When you're sitting on your computer and your brain is just like, I don't want to do this task. Let's get a snack or let's go get another coffee or let's grab our phone. So this second, when there's an

Rosie (29:15)

Mm-hmm.

Jeni Raitsin (29:19)

Neuron transmitting to another neuron. Hey, get the phone pick up the phone. This is when you need to catch it now It sounds super complicated. It just takes practice It just takes practice of starting becoming more aware of when you're let's say procrastinating in real life Or whatever is holding you back by the way, there's certain patterns we work with in mental fitness that we can diagnose and help people become more self-aware, but start paying attention to

Rosie (29:24)

Mm-hmm.

Jeni Raitsin (29:48)

when it happens to the moment. When are you talking to yourself negatively? Like when is this little voice in the back of your mind saying something to you that like you're not good enough, you're not good, like don't do this. Every time you feel a negative emotion it means that there is a negative thought behind it and if we're able to start being more aware of it when it happens it's going to be easier for us to change that.

Rosie (29:57)

Mm.

Okay, so we're becoming more self-aware, which takes practice. noticing these negative thoughts or emotions, behaviors. So what's the next step?

Jeni Raitsin (30:19)

Yes.

The next step is question them. Like if you catch that little voice telling you like, you're not good enough to send this proposal or pitch this something or do this presentation at work or go on this date or whatever we're trying to get. Question it like, is this actually true? Is this thought benefiting me? Do I want to think this way? Because our thoughts are choices. And when we learn how to catch the negative ones,

We get to choose, do we want to think this way? Now I know it sounds very, very like, okay, it's easy to say, hard to do, but it's literally, it's a muscle in our brain that we can start practicing. And now I'm going to say something that most people are not going to like. In order to do that, we have to slow down. If we are rushing through our day and we're just like working, working, working, going in this, talking to people.

Rosie (31:19)

Hmm

Jeni Raitsin (31:25)

and we don't slow down, it's going to be really, really hard for us to catch thoughts or change them. Because our thoughts, we have 60,000 of them during the day. We're not going to be able catch 10 % of them, but we're not going to be able to catch any of them if we're just on autopilot. We need to step out of the autopilot and in order to do that, we have to slow down and be more intentional.

Rosie (31:37)

Hoof.

Mm-hmm.

Jeni Raitsin (31:54)

and stop to ask questions. We can't run and ask ourselves and be curious at the same time. It just doesn't work. Right? It's just the same mechanism we have again with fight or flight. When we're seeing a bear in the woods, we can't run and make a sandwich in the same way. It doesn't work this way. Or we can't like come up with an idea. Now the bear isn't a bear is a deadline from our boss that is stressing us out.

It's triggering the same fight or flight response. We don't feel it as much as running from a bear, but our nervous system does. Our nervous system translates a lot of minor things like deadlines or bills to pay, or our partner saying like, we have to talk. We're like, my God, something is happening. This fight or flight is triggering. And then we can't be curious at this moment. We can't digest in this moment. We can't.

Rosie (32:48)

Mm-hmm.

Jeni Raitsin (32:51)

Think clearly in this moment. can't change anything in this moment because we're in survival mode. And you will be astonished by the number of times during the day when we're in this fight or flight response when we don't even feel it. You can be sitting in your computer and on the surface, you might not feel this anxiety or stress or panic attack, but it's going on in the back of our mind.

And then it's really, really hard to again, create a positive change, think positive thoughts, build our mental fitness. We have to slow down and calm down, calm down our mind, calm down our nervous system in order to be able to even create this change.

Rosie (33:36)

So it's sounding like, please correct me if I've misinterpreted this, that slowing down will help us avoid, at least some of the time, going into that fight or flight response. Have I got that right?

Jeni Raitsin (33:51)

In a way, yes, because a second before we, this fight or flight is triggered, if we're more calm, we can actually kind of, again, choose another thought that won't trigger this response. Or, and by the way, and it goes back to the beginning of the episode that you didn't record it, it shows a great mental fitness that you didn't go into like, my God, shit, I didn't record the episode. What am I going to do? Like, just said like,

Rosie (34:18)

Yeah.

Jeni Raitsin (34:21)

cool, no worries. Press record and we just started over. And it shows me like we both have great mental fitness because a lot of it is not just getting, avoiding the stress response because sometimes it's impossible. Stress is just everywhere. Like I'm living in the most stressful country. Like we're all living different levels of stress. Social media is stressful. news is stressful. Everything that's going on in the world is stressful right now.

Rosie (34:35)

Mmm... Mmm... It is.

Yeah.

Jeni Raitsin (34:50)

So I think that trying to avoid stress is kind of mission impossible, but what I want us to start working on is resilience, which for me means I can get triggered. This fight or flight switch can be turned on, but then I bounce back really quickly and continue with my day. That's true mental fitness in my book, because again, how can we have like some, things are just stressful.

Rosie (34:55)

Mmm.

you

Jeni Raitsin (35:17)

And if we're trying, I'm going to this, I'm going to avoid the news, I'm going to avoid some people, I'm going to avoid people, I'm going to avoid my parents, my boss, everybody. I'm just going to sit at home and be a hermit and not feel any stress. Good luck. But if we're living in real life and we have bills to pay and people to take care of and jobs, it is stressful. This is life. But when we build mental fitness,

Rosie (35:21)

Yeah, good luck, right?

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Jeni Raitsin (35:44)

We feel the stress, but we're resilient. We can really, really bounce back and continue and switch on to that productive, focused, calm way of thinking.

Rosie (35:55)

Mmm.

So does resilience, this is probably a bit of a complicated answer to this question, but I'm gonna ask anyway. Does resilience come from practice? Because like you said, we can't avoid stress, that is out of our control, but we can control our self-awareness and making the small changes and slowing down. So is the key to resilience just practicing these things? What else is there to it?

Jeni Raitsin (36:25)

100 % and I'm going back to my analogy with physical fitness and small changes by the way Imagine you're going to the gym. You're not gonna pick up a hundred kilos, right? You're gonna start small you're gonna pick up in the gym small weights build up muscle so that when you Move apartment next time you can pick up a really really heavy box

And it's not going to bother you because you practice those muscles in the gym. In mental fitness, we have a mental gym. We create practices for specific mental muscles. We build this muscle so that when we have a stressful deadline, a big bill to pay, whatever it is, we're not as bothered because we have strong mental muscles to carry the load of the stress.

We're not trying to avoid stress, we're just building more fitness to carry the stress and the load of it with more ease.

Rosie (37:25)

Mmm, that resonates. And it makes me think, because I live full time in my van and I converted it myself. I'm not a builder or a carpenter. I had no idea what I was doing. So many things went wrong. Jenny, so many things. I started and thought, this is going to be done in six months. It took me four years. That's how out of sync I was with what it would involve.

And initially I would get very frustrated and angry when something would go wrong. And I'm not going to say that I stopped getting frustrated and angry, but my tolerance and my resilience for when things went wrong is so much better now than it was four years ago. And most recently I've had some really big mechanical issues with the van. It's like, this is my home and I couldn't drive anywhere, do anything for months.

old me probably would have had a bit of a breakdown. Like it would have sent me in a downward spiral. And yeah, I wasn't feeling great for a while, but you know, after a couple of days I'm like, well, this is out of my control. What is in my control? Well, I can start seeing who can repair it. I can start saving some money and it's cost me a lot of money to fix, $10,000. But I'm not going to let that freak me out. And it's like, okay.

Let's just roll with it. And now my van is working and I'm doing my podcast. And I think that resilience has very much been improved from my experience building this van. It's really taught me problem solving and just, it's not the end of the world. Most things have a solution. There are extreme cases where there isn't, but most things there's a solution. There's a way forward. Maybe it's not.

Jeni Raitsin (39:04)

Yeah.

Rosie (39:16)

the solution we wanted, but it's there if we look for it. So that, that resonates, but I want to, you mentioned earlier, you're a productivity coach, but you also said, guys, you need to slow down. So Jenny, I'm, I'm confused. How can you be productive and slow? What is going on?

Jeni Raitsin (39:31)

Yes.

I think this is the biggest misconception of the productivity world that you need to go, go, go in order to get results. And this is completely, I don't believe it. I think we need to slow down to speed up because if we're going full speed ahead and neutral or we don't know where we're going, we're not going to get there. We're just going to burn ourselves out. And I've been there.

Rosie (39:43)

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Jeni Raitsin (40:03)

So how I teach my method that I developed is mindful productivity, which is exactly how to get results without burning yourself out that is stress-free productivity. And yes, it can happen. It can go together.

And on the contrary, when our mind, again, we're going through this stress response of our brain, when we're stressed, when we're in this hustle mentality, go, go, go, we just want to achieve more things, we're in this fight or flight mode. What our brain does, we create this tunnel vision. Stress narrows down our brain into seeing only more problems, only one way.

Rosie (40:47)

Mmmmm

Jeni Raitsin (40:49)

slow down, when we calm down our nervous system, when we relax, we open our brain to see more solutions, more possibilities, more way out. And we can achieve more things in less time. That's true productivity for me. Productivity is not just teaching people how to do more and get more done. Like, I don't want to do more. I don't want to do more. Like, I've done years of wanting to do more.

Rosie (41:12)

Mmm.

Jeni Raitsin (41:17)

I don't want to do more. I just want to achieve more. And I don't need to more for that. I need to do less, but better.

Rosie (41:21)

Ooh.

Ooh, tell me a bit more. You don't want to do more. You want to achieve more. I have never heard that. Tell me the difference.

Jeni Raitsin (41:33)

Do

you want to work more? Who wants to work more? Like it's so let's step outside of the metrics and the hustle mentality, especially if you're working for yourself. I don't want to be working more hours. That's the opposite of my goal. I just want to, again, with my business, my goals is to earn a certain amount of money and I want to create an impact on a certain amount of people. And again, going back to our own definition of success.

Rosie (41:40)

Uh-huh.

Yeah, no thanks.

Jeni Raitsin (42:00)

I know what success means to me. I know this number of money that I want to make and I know the number of people that I feel like, wow, this is a great impact for me. For one person, it can be a thousand dollars per month. For another person, it can be a hundred thousand dollars per month. And there's nothing wrong with either of these numbers or anything in between as long as you say, this is good enough for me. And then we have our goals. And by the way, it doesn't mean like setting or

Rosie (42:24)

Mmm.

Jeni Raitsin (42:29)

bar around enough and I call it enoughness doesn't mean we don't want to do more or be better, but it just means that we're again not operating from this mechanism of shame, guilt, hustle. We know when it's enough and when we're relaxed, I promise you that we can get way better results because we're not just running around like a headless chicken and just doing more things and just like crossing off to do list.

Rosie (42:44)

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Mmm.

Jeni Raitsin (42:58)

We're very,

when we're in mindful productivity, teach, I teach focus, clarity, calmness, like you said, problem solving, decision making. When we know what we need to do, we know how to prioritize it. We know how to focus and get the things done. We don't need to do more. We just need to do better.

Rosie (43:19)

Mmm.

This is sounding very much part of purpose.

What do you think? Does purpose or having a purpose in life, does that have anything to do with this mental fitness?

Jeni Raitsin (43:33)

think so. think that purpose is a big term. I spent years searching for my purpose. There's air quotes. But I want to say that my perspective, I think we're all here and this is kind of me getting a little more spiritual. I think that we're all here to live out some kind of purpose. But I don't want people like me spending years just

Rosie (43:37)

Yeah.

I get it.

Hmm.

Jeni Raitsin (44:01)

finding it because I feel like again that finding it is just like I have to find my purpose like this was years again pushing from that part of our brain pushing needing have to it's not the way to our purpose I believe that our purpose and our happiness goes together like there's no way that your purpose isn't gonna make you happy

Rosie (44:07)

Yeah!

you

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Jeni Raitsin (44:26)

It just doesn't work

this way. So I feel like if more people were on the pursuit of their happiness, they will find their purpose on the way, on this path. So instead of just sitting at home and finding your purpose and doing like multiple itchy guys and tests on the internet and personality tests and reading books about your purpose,

Rosie (44:36)

Mmmmm... Mmmmm...

Jeni Raitsin (44:50)

Okay, these are fine and again, I'm not laughing. This was me for years, literally sitting at home trying to find my purpose. But then I realized that purpose is also in the smallest thing. Purpose can be multiple things. It can be motherhood, it can be volunteering, it can be just being kind to people can be your purpose in life. So you don't have to find it. It doesn't have to be this big thing.

Rosie (45:03)

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Jeni Raitsin (45:16)

Follow

the path of your happiness and what makes you happy. You can make your purpose out of

Rosie (45:23)

love that so much. And I was laughing as you were talking about obsessing over finding your purpose because I did exactly the same and it really stressed me out. It wasn't helping me at all. I very much listened to Simon Sinek and he talks about start with why, which is essentially purpose. And I'll preface this. I like Simon Sinek. He's a great guy. He's got a lot of good stuff to say. However,

He says you have one why, it doesn't change, that is it. And I spent years trying to figure out what's my purpose, why don't I know my purpose, what is it? my God, my God. But I think our purpose can change. I think it is a journey. And I love how you suggested that if we follow our happiness, we're going to find our purpose along the way. That's a beautiful way of putting it. I don't think our purpose is a set destination.

Jeni Raitsin (46:18)

No, think life is not a set destination. Life is a journey. I also like, and again, this is my personal perspective and personal development. You don't have to take it, but I don't think that personal development is about change or becoming somebody else or finding something on the outside. It's just a journey back home because we are already our most perfect best selves.

Rosie (46:29)

Mmm.

you

Jeni Raitsin (46:47)

deep down inside. And sometimes it's very, very deep. And sometimes it's buried under layers of societal conditioning and our own bullshit and the stress of finding our why and all of these things. But also our purpose is inside of us. Like the answer is there. We don't have to go somewhere to find it. just need to, again, if we slow down and we quiet our mind,

Rosie (46:56)

Uh-huh.

Hmm.

Jeni Raitsin (47:15)

and we clear all these bullshit thoughts, it's going to be easier for us to see this purpose instead of finding this purpose.

Rosie (47:25)

yeah.

I love how you referred to it as, how did you say it? Finding our way back home. We, it's already inside us and I definitely, I believe that too. I think we have everything we need. We just have to, it's in there. We just got to peel back the layers, peel back all the, all the conditioning and the grooming and the whatever, all the expectations and rediscover who we are. I think.

Many of us hold beliefs or values that aren't actually our own. We've never stopped to question them.

Jeni Raitsin (48:04)

Which brings us back to the beginning of the conversation. How do you know if this thought is your own or does this feel good? Because again our truth always feels good. Our purpose always feels good. And again not just finding our happiness because happy it doesn't have to be like happy happy joy joy. Does it feel good? And when you know something feels good you know it's your truth.

Rosie (48:23)

Mm, mm, mm.

Jeni Raitsin (48:29)

And if you keep following this in the smallest things, you will get there. You will get closer to there. I don't believe there is a dare to get, but you will get closer and closer to this. Again, happiness, purpose. Why? And just your greatest joy, because you won't be led by external conditioning or thoughts, just your own.

Rosie (48:34)

Yes.

And I think it's similar to what you were saying about mental fitness, or I guess it is part of mental fitness. The more you practice listening to yourself and how it makes you feel, the easier it becomes and the more self-aware you become. So think I'm a lot better now at recognising the signs of, this doesn't feel right. This is just not aligned. This is not me. And then, yeah, I take a beat. I pause. I need to slow down like, where to from here?

Whereas when I push through that and go, no, I have to do it. You know, this is what's expected of me or people are going to judge me. Usually it doesn't turn out, but things go wrong and the consequences aren't great for me or anybody else actually.

Jeni Raitsin (49:32)

100%.

Rosie (49:33)

I've got a final question for you. I can't wait to hear your answer. Not putting pressure on you at all here. It's something I ask all my guests and I just love the diversity of the answers. So I'd love to know what does freedom mean to you?

Jeni Raitsin (49:39)

Not at all.

Good question. I think this is what we talked, think freedom to be who I am. And it can be a very successful keynote speaker on stage one day, and it can be me on the couch in my underwear binge watching Netflix for 24 hours without moving. Like...

Just the freedom to be, to do and be what makes me happy. For me, this is like true freedom. and as a productivity coach, will say freedom of time, because I think that freedom of time is what gives me the ability to slow down, to be myself. Because if I had to work more hours than I actually am, I won't have time for...

slowing down and like it allows me to create this life that I want for myself. So, both.

Rosie (50:47)

Mmm.

curious, is that something you've ever thought about before? What freedom is to you? Or did that just kind of, that just came out?

Jeni Raitsin (50:59)

I think a lot of my, if we're talking about a lot of my past life as an entrepreneur in the past year has been around the pursuit of freedom. And in the beginning it was being location independent and then being financially independent. then I think again, I have a strong obsession around time. And for me, it was always about having time freedom and having time to again, be

Rosie (51:11)

you

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Jeni Raitsin (51:28)

and do what I want and what makes me happy. So I think also leisure hacking, a lot of it is the pursuit of freedom in a way. I think this is why we also resonate and have a similar energy because I think it's really, really similar. But I love this question. Thank you for asking it.

Rosie (51:38)

Yeah.

Yeah.

course. you know, I'm totally digressing here, but one of my dreams I've realised, I don't know if dreams the word, but something I want to work towards is after hearing all these definitions of guests about freedom, I think I want to turn it into a book or something because it's just, and I don't know how I would do that. So if anyone's got any ideas, help. I think it would be fascinating because freedom.

I mean, it could sound a little bit unrealistic, but I think we all deserve that. And freedom, much like success, is different to everybody. And I very much resonated when you said that when you started your entrepreneurial journey, a lot of it was about the freedom and initially the time and the money freedom, and it turns into a lot more than that. But I think that's why a lot of solopreneurs, entrepreneurs, that's why we start this path. We want more freedom and more control.

and to live more aligned. And that's who the bulk of my listeners are. So you're talking to the right people. Yeah, yeah. If you had one hot take that you want listeners to go away with, like if they forget everything from this conversation, is there one thing you would like them to walk away with?

Jeni Raitsin (52:51)

amazing, my kind of people.

Slow down. Slow down, take a deep breath. In the start of your morning, before you do any task, before you get into the next fight or the next project, before you get stressed, slow down and take a breath and everything is going to be better from there, like I promised you.

Rosie (53:08)

Mmm.

Yes, slow down. I need that reminder too. Jenny, thank you so much. yeah, slow down to speed up. Isn't that a juxtaposition?

Jeni Raitsin (53:33)

Slow down just speed up.

Rosie (53:40)

love it. I have learned so much in this conversation. So thank you for being so generous with your time and wisdom. And I can't wait to hear what listeners think of this episode, because I think they're going to love it. So thank you again.

Jeni Raitsin (53:53)

Amazing. Thank you so much for having me.