Unconventional Life – Podcast, Blog, Live Events

Category: Wellness

Decoding the Wisdom of Your Soul With Astrology
Debra Silverman has had a private astrology practice for over 40 years. She has served celebrity clientele including Sting and Trevor Hall. She is also the author of the book The Missing Element: Inspiring Compassion for the Human Condition and a successful YouTuber who has garnered 7+ Million video views.

In Debra’s episode, you’ll learn:
- How astrology provides insight into your personality and why you are the way you are.
- A method to heal trauma and emotional pain.
- How to cultivate self-compassion.
Key lessons from Debra’s episode:

1. Your Personality is Largely Determined by Your Astrological Sign.

“Astrology explains the parts of ourselves we can’t explain,” Debra says. “It’s not just a predictive tool, it’s also a tool for understanding and cultivating compassion for our personalities.”

If you’ve ever wondered why you’re introverted, disorganized, or perfectionistic, astrology could provide you the answers you’re looking for. Debra says our personalities take basis in our astrological signs, which are determined by our place, date, and time of birth. It may provide you closure to know that many of your traits are a consequence of your sign and not some defect or something you need to change.

2. It Helps to Neutralize Your Point of View.

So often we get so involved in the story and drama of our lives. We tell ourselves we are a victim, that he or she is bad, or that it would be so terrible if a certain outcome unfolded. Allowing our minds to weave these kinds of stories can be exhausting and potentially destructive, particularly when those stories are negative.

Debra encourages us to strip away our stories. Here’s how:
- Bring a neutral lens to your experience. Simply notice what is happening around you. Detach yourself from judgment and expectation.
- Practice this “observer muscle” often, especially when you feel yourself getting dragged into the story.
Meditation can be a powerful practice to help you get out of the mind’s story and into a neutral perspective. Allow the inner mental chatter to fade out.

3. Movement is Key.

“Moving energy is the shortest, simplest way to never age and stay healthy,” Debra says. She’s a huge advocate for daily movement, not only for its physical benefits, but also for its mental and energetic benefits. If you often feel tense, or if your chest feels “heavy,” this can signal the presence of dense energy in your body. An effective way to help it clear your system is to move your body. Find a form of movement you actually enjoy and commit to it as a regular practice.
May 5, 2018
Risking it All to Gain Everything: Why Taking Risks for a Life You Love is Worth It
Cat Kom is the founder of Studio SWEAT, an online fitness streaming service and community of thousands of users from around the world. Studio SWEAT features cycling, bootcamp, yoga, pilates, HIIT and other kinds of high intensity workouts.

In Kat’s episode, you’ll learn:
- Why it’s essential you honor your intuition—even if it doesn’t make logical sense.
- How to create success as a woman in a male-dominated industry.
- How to stay grounded in the midst of fierce competition.
Key lessons from Cat’s episode:

1. It’s Never Too Late to Seize Your Dreams. Cat’s success in the fitness industry is inspiring not only in its own right, but because it followed a long career in the corporate IT world. Cat chose to work in the tech industry because it was a viable way to support herself and her newborn as a young mom in college. She climbed the corporate ladder and found traditional success—a high salary and a prestigious job title—yet she felt something was missing.

Her intuition was getting louder and louder, calling her to her passion of fitness. Though it didn’t make logical sense, Cat decided to take a leap of faith into the fitness industry. It was challenging at first, but through hard work and perseverance, Cat was able to make her joy passion her source of revenue.

If you’ve ever told yourself “I’m too old,” or “It’s too late for me to start a new career,” think again. Cat’s victory shows us anybody can start over in a new industry, no matter how old. It’s never too late to seize your dreams.

2. Don’t Let Your Gender Hold You Back. As a woman in the fitness world, Cat was outnumbered. The majority of the figures in the space were men by far, about 3:1. While this was certainly intimidating for Cat, she didn’t let it stop her. Instead, she developed thicker skin. “I became a bulldog. You need to stand your ground and not be intimidated when your ground needs to be stood.”

Are you a woman in a male-dominated industry, or a man in a female-dominated industry? While gender norms can be discouraging, they are only norms until somebody changes them. Be the change. Be a trailblazer. Stand your ground.

3. Don’t Let the Competition Change You. When you’re up against fierce competition, the pressure is real. It can be hard not to compare your brand to theirs, or not to check in on what they’re doing and try to one-up them. But it’s important to your sense of well-being and the integrity of your brand not to.

Cat says, “Believe in the value of your service. Stay on your course and continue to provide an amazing service at a fair price point. If you just try to constantly react to everything around you you start to make decisions based just on money. You have to think about it from the customer’s standpoint—continuing to serve them well. The money will follow if you do that.”
April 17, 2018
How to Work More Productively and Have More Free Time
Liam Martin is the co-founder of Time Doctor, a productivity software with the largest second-by-second work database in the world. Time Doctor has been proven to increase worker productivity by an average 22% and is a fast-growing tool that’s being increasingly used by major companies.

In this episode, Liam shares his key research findings on worker productivity. If you’re somebody who could benefit from effective time management strategies, or you’re simply curious about the science and psychology behind distraction, this is an episode you won’t want to miss.

In Liam’s episode, you’ll learn:
- The productivity cost of having notifications like Facebook turned on (it’s much higher than you think!)
- Strategies to optimize productivity… a.k.a. work fewer hours.
- The “distraction economy” – why billions have been invested into distracting you and how to defend yourself from potential threats to your productivity.
Key lessons from Liam’s episode:

1. Optimal Productivity Requires a Distraction-Free Work Zone. For a moment, I want you to visualize your typical work zone in your mind’s eye. Where do you work? Do you work in the presence of others—perhaps at a library, or at your local trendy coffee shop? Do you listen to music while you work? Is your phone easily accessible? Are notifications turned on? Do you often hop between multiple tabs?

Chances are, you said yes to a few of the questions above. And it’s no wonder. The average millennial work environment is distraction-laden, with a typical worker getting only 3 hours worth of work done of the 8 they work. The other 5 hours are filled with Facebook memes, chatty rendezvous at the water cooler, and mindless web surfing.

Time Doctor’s research shows that the most productive work occurs inside a distraction-free work zone. This means making yourself 100% unavailable to outside distractions and notifications while you work.

“Get yourself into a flow state and create a sacred space,” Liam says.

For optimal productivity, consider adopting these principles:
- Work in a secluded, private room.
- Disable notifications on your computer and mobile device(s).
- Only have open tabs that are relevant to your current task.
- Declutter your computer desktop.
- Dedicate yourself to only one task at a time, and suppress the impulse to do anything unrelated to that task for an allotted time period.
- Install useful browser plug-ins, like:
  - Tab Limiter (limits the amount of tabs you can have open at a single time).
  - News Feed Eradicator (makes your Facebook newsfeed invisible).
  - Intently (replaces ads with content you choose).
2. Distractions Come at a High Cost. According to Time Doctor’s research, the cost of opening a single notification—for example, clicking on an incoming message from your friend via Facebook Messenger—is a whopping 16 minutes.

Yes, 16 minutes! (Not one minute, like we tell ourselves it will take 😉 ).

How many times do you click on incoming notifications in a single hour (emails, texts, reminders, etc.)? How about in a typical day? The point is, it all really starts to add up.

3. You Can Beat Distractions With Mindfulness. Time Doctor’s software is designed to minimize the amount of times you get baited by incoming distractions. It’s based on the simple philosophy of mindfulness—when you bring awareness to an unconscious process, you gain the power to make a conscious choice about it.

Here’s how it works… Time Doctor assigns you one task at one time. That way, you can execute with laser-sharp focus. As soon as a distraction (like a notification) comes along, if you attempt to pursue the distraction (by opening a new tab or a new app), Time Doctor will flash an alert on your screen.

“You’re now leaving productivity town and are headed to distractionville,” Liam jokes.

What might have been an unconscious habit, you’re now forced to consciously evaluate.

Imagine a friend who gently holds a mirror up to your behavior, reminding you of your goals and asking you to consider if the choice you’re considering making is in alignment with those goals.

Of course, you’re in the driver’s seat. You can always choose to pursue the distraction anyways, but the difference is, you’re now making an informed choice, fully aware.

Bringing mindfulness around your work zone has been proven to powerfully increase productivity. Time Doctor’s research shows the average worker gets 22% more done in a day using its software.

What does 22% of your work day translate into? For the average 9 to 5er, that’s nearly two hours of your workday freed up.
April 12, 2018
How To Bring A Traveler’s Mindset To Everything You Do

Millennials in the work force are traveling more than any generation before. Each year, they average five business trips, compared to just two for those aged 35 and up.

By 2020, millennials are projected to account for 50% of all business travel and 20% of all leisure travel.

Besides just being fun, the travel trend sweeping Gen Y may actually be making them more productive. Neuroscientists claim that traveling increases the neuroplasticity of the brain, supporting creativity and innovation.

“Foreign experiences increase both cognitive flexibility and depth and integrativeness of thought, the ability to make deep connections between disparate forms,” says Adam Galinsky, a professor at Columbia University.

That’s why one young person is capitalizing on the benefits of travel to enhance the quality of her life and business year-round, and empowering others to do the same.

Meet Ginger Kern, founder of The Traveler’s Mindset, a community hub helping thousands of travelers have transformational experiences abroad. She’s also a TEDx speaker, a leadership coach, and an avid traveler who tallied an impressive 25 countries by age 25.

This week on the Unconventional Life podcast, Ginger shares how you can integrate the supercharged mindset of a traveler into your everyday life.

Kern’s passion for travel stems from her love of adventure books as child. Growing up in quiet Milwaukee, WI, she recalls noticing a stark contrast between her life and the life of the stories’ characters. “I noticed all these characters would have these amazing adventures but I was just sitting there,” Kern jokes.

The books invited Kern to a reality of adventure and possibility. In college, she chose to study French, German, and Italian to equip her for the ultimate adventures abroad.

The cornerstone of Kern’s philosophy is that travel vacation and daily life don’t have to be separate realities. “We go on vacation and escape,” she says. “Mentally we put up this barrier–like we can be a certain way when we’re out there exploring and having adventures, doing new things, being curious. But when we come back home, we get stagnant, go into our routines, and totally get stuck.”

The disconnect Kern observed between travel and everyday mindset sparked her inspiration for The Traveler’s Mindset, which serves as a bridge between the two. “The concept is openness, curiosity, and a sense of adventure no matter where you are in the world, even when you’re at home,” says Kern.

When you practice the Traveler’s Mindset, you allow the benefits of travel to assimilate into your day-to-day life. Cognitive enhancements like higher creativity, better problem-solving, and increased depth of thought, become integrated seamlessly.

If you’re having difficulty with finding the resources to travel, including time or financing, Kern’s site offers free advice to help make travel a reality for you, no matter what your situation. For example, if you’re locked into a location-dependent job, you might not have considered the possibility that you can actually ask your boss for an opportunity to travel or receive a raise. Focus on the value-add in creating a solution that would benefit you both–flexibility may be more available to you than you think.

Below, Kern shares how you can capture the Traveler’s Mindset to approach your entire life with a greater sense of curiosity and zeal.

1. Identify what inhibits you from feeling excitement and adventure. Notice what exactly in your life switches the off button of your excitement. “Maybe it’s how your boss treats you, or how you interact with your spouse or partner,” Kern says. “Do they always bring up that one thing that stops you from feeling alive?”

2. Become 100% responsible for your response to it. Don’t blame the thing that you believe is taking away your excitement, because that will only leave your powerless. Instead, take accountability for your response to it. If you notice yourself feeling upset by the same thing across multiple situations, it is because the common denominator is you.

3. Repair your relationship to it and allow your excitement to flow. The thing that is robbing you of your excitement can only continue to do so as long as you let it. Rather than try to change it, change yourself. How can you respond more openly to it, instead of closing to it? How can you find a way for your excitement to flow even when it is present? When you heal your relationship to what is bothering you in your life, you make it so nothing has the power to take away your joy.

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March 2, 2018
7 Steps Peak Performers Can Take To Achieve ‘Flow State’

As millennials, we face a tremendous amount of pressure to perform daily.

Just scroll through your social media feed and you will see article after article being shared of a millennial solving a world problem, accelerating his or her career, or launching a successful company.

We live in an era where if you are not a successful artist, entrepreneur, or startup CEO by the time you’re 30 then it can feel like you are falling behind. According to one study, “67% of millennials said they felt “extreme” pressure to succeed, compared to 40% of Gen Xers and 23% of Boomers.”

If you feel like time is running out and you still haven’t done enough yet, take a deep breath. Despite what you may have heard, success doesn’t actually have to be hard.

Meet Justin Faerman and Jackie Knechtel, two millennials hacking the algorithm for peak performance through their program Flow Mastery, which guides you to shed limiting beliefs and approach life from a lens of infinite possibility. The secret ingredient they claim is called flow state, in which you experience “exponential growth and success effortlessly.”

Faerman and Knechtel have been invited to speak about flow state internationally including many notable venues like the United Nations and the Women’s Economic Forum. This week on Unconventional Life, Faerman and Knechtel reveal how you can use flow to skyrocket your performance with only a fraction of the effort.

According to Faerman and Knechtel, flow is achieved through an intensive process of clearing out limiting beliefs, fears, doubts, emotional wounds, and self-sabotaging patterns. It requires a willingness to let go of seeing life the way you have been taught, and to embrace the possibility that the restrictions you are living by do not actually exist but rather are a construct of the mind.

“It’s these big massive mindset shifts–taking people out of fear-based thinking and out of these ideas that have been ingrained into us and learning to think through a different lens,” says Knechtel.

Through their research of flow states, the two have developed a groundbreaking methodology to achieve sustained states of peak performance, without the hustle and grind commonly believed to be a requisite. “We’ve taken everything we know and created a system out of it. We’ve done a ton of research and mapped out what it means to live in flow–the different shifts you have to make, beliefs you have to have, ways you have to see the world. Once you do it, things start happening effortlessly,” Faerman says.

Prior to working in flow, Knechtel ran a high-profile autism treatment practice where she was contracted to work all over the world, and even offered $10 million to open her own clinic. Faerman managed a multi-million dollar green tech division, and launched one of the world’s top conscious media platforms.

Though they were already playing at a high level, they knew that more was possible, and were determined to uncover their full potential.

Faerman and Knechtel’s hundreds of clients who have successfully made flow a part of their lives report powerful breakthroughs, including earning higher revenues, working less hours, and feeling aligned with their life purpose, all of which occur with minimal effort. Below, Knechtel and Faerman share seven steps you can take to master the flow state and experience peak performance in your own life.

1. Shift your focus from mind to intuition. While your mind might doubt that something in your life is possible, your intuition isn’t limited by reason and can see past your immediate radar of possibilities. Cease identifying with your mind’s limited perspective and embrace the fact that possibilities exist that you can’t see.

2. Prioritize your life based on what brings you joy. Spend most of your time doing what you love most. You may need to let go of the belief that if you do this, you will sacrifice your security. You can actually have both, if you choose to believe that joy and abundance go hand in hand.

3. Be intentional with your language. “Language is generative and powerful. You speak things into existence that end up happening,” Knechtel says. Eliminate words like “I want” and “I hope” from your vocabulary, and be confident about your ability to produce the outcomes you want.

4. Be able to recognize your Yes and your No. Be willing to walk away from things that aren’t fully aligned for you. If it’s not a resounding yes, don’t agree to it–this is an indicator that there is actually a better fit out there for you. Let go of the scarcity-mindset that an opportunity that isn’t fully aligned is the best you will get and you will create space for even better opportunities.

5. Become aware of your limiting beliefs. Become aware of the dialogue going on in your head and challenge your thoughts. When you’re thinking something negative, ask yourself, “Why am I having this thought?” When you ask that question, you discover the limiting belief that sponsored that thought and are equipped with the awareness to begin to eradicate it.

6. Take responsibility for everything in your life. Instead of attributing what is happening in your life to circumstances out of your control, take responsibility for it all. Be objective and accept where you are. When you take responsibility for everything, both good and bad, you restore power to yourself to create a different scenario that reflects what you truly want.

7. Practice makes perfect. Clearing out your limiting beliefs takes time and persistence. “It might feel challenging because you’re shifting the way you see the world and working away beliefs you’ve held onto for so long,” Knechtel says. “Every time you see it working you learn to let go a little more.”

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March 2, 2018