Episode 267 with Mark Myers: Revolutionize Your Business with Self-Awareness

On this episode of the Ready Yet?! Podcast, my guest is Mark Myers, a Career Management Coach and Network Development Consultant with a passion for collaboration and development of people and business growth. Join us as we dive deep into topics like self-vulnerability, embracing all our feelings, and navigating fears. Mark shares his journey of discovering self-awareness through personal hardship and his insights into how being true to oneself can lead to more authentic, fulfilling relationships. We also touch on the importance of maintaining curiosity and kindness in our personal growth processes.

GUEST RESOURCES

Mark Myer is a seasoned speaker and coach who helps individuals connect with themselves and others to achieve their goals. Through Evolve Connection Partners, he leverages his executive networking skills to assist clients in personal and professional growth. He's a recognized Dale Carnegie trainer and has received awards for his leadership in Financial Executive International.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/jmarkmyers 

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Transcript

Episode 267 with Mark Myers: Revolutionize Your Business with Self-Awareness

Transcribed by Descript 

Erin Marcus: All right. Welcome. Welcome to this episode of the ready at podcast with my guest today, Mr. Mark Myers. And I am, I can't wait to get into this conversation with you because you said something that one, I absolutely agree with. And two, I think is going to be very interesting for people to hear. And you said one of the sexiest things you can be is self aware.

Erin Marcus: Tell me. Self 

Mark Myers: awareness is sexy. Yes. Absolutely. 

Erin Marcus: Tell me more. Why did you decide that? I'm only five feet tall, so the whole blonde, thin, model thing, sexy, isn't going to work for me. I got to go with something else. 

Mark Myers: I learned several years ago about vulnerability and I can talk about vulnerability, but also learn about self vulnerability.

Mark Myers: And self vulnerability is taking that step that a little bit further and being aware of what my feelings are and not always trying to convey them to someone else, because sometimes I'm blind to my own feeling. And so when I learned to be self vulnerable and not resist recognizing those feelings, I feel more at ease with who I am, my purpose in life, my interaction with people.

Mark Myers: You know what? And dadgummit, that self awareness is just hot, 

Erin Marcus: it's just hot, right? I, it's so true because, and I've had this myself I've done a lot of work just coincidentally in the last, even more so in the last six months, of feeling the feelings and just being okay with them instead of repressing them.

Erin Marcus: And I think there was so much in the self help world on think positive and it went too far, right? Where it almost made challenging feelings a no. Yeah. It doesn't really work. 

Mark Myers: And I'm, I'm I practice vulnerability all the time. I'm in front of students. I'm in front of individuals and in front of adults and in front of men, in front of women, in front of anybody real young and real old, and I've known to shed tears in those moments and guess what?

Mark Myers: I'm not embarrassed. I don't apologize. I'm just go. That's something that I'm feeling right now. And I'm comfortable sharing that. And if that bothers you, I'm sorry, but I recognize my feelings. My feelings matter to me, even if they don't matter to anyone else. And so I choose to recognize them and go with the flow of them.

Mark Myers: I'm a dancer. So like dancing across the dance floor, I go with the flow of the music. And if I have a feeling, they proceed as negative. I just embrace it and I go there it went. Oh, there, oh, there it went. Now I turn the page and go into the next thing. 

Erin Marcus: I think that's the key because I found that with myself.

Erin Marcus: The more I try to not feel it, right? What is it? What we resist persists. The more you try to not feel it and fight against it, the harder it's gonna take hold. 

Mark Myers: I've been through grief. I've been through a lot of different things in my life. And so I, I've just learned to accept it.

Mark Myers: And I used to have tremendous fear and I feared being rejected. Oh, and then I finally figured out that it was just fear of being vulnerable. Just the act of doing something. And I developed a connection with myself back years ago, and people just think that I'm being ridiculous when I say this.

Mark Myers: But I have no fear. Let's put it this way. No fear is a relative term. It's not an absolute term. And when I say I have no fear, I've learned to embrace it something to help me improve and grow. And to recognize is that self awareness thing, okay? I like myself because I'm comfortable with who I've become and who I am.

Mark Myers: And so when I just realized that, that fear is just, is a passing thought. Fear has both positive and negative things, and the more I'm aware of it, fear keeps me from jumping off a cliff, it keeps me from running my car into a brick, oh, let's see what happens no, my fear is healthy, and when I'm sad, it helps me remember things that are important to me.

Mark Myers: Brings me the awareness that I keep talking about, and that awareness key for me. I'm now single. I'm a widow kind of stuff. It's like going with the flow and my objective in life is to have meaningful conversations. 

Mark Myers: Do 

Erin Marcus: you know when this awareness or when you grabbed onto this idea, because I imagine.

Erin Marcus: You didn't or did you grow up with it? Just generationally? I know Gen X, I'm Gen X. We did not grow up with this. 

Mark Myers: Yeah, I'm a boomer if you didn't already. 

Erin Marcus: Without saying, Hey, you're a little, you got a few years on me and I can't do it. Like where did you? Our sideburns 

Mark Myers: are similar.

Erin Marcus: Where did you, or do you remember a pivotal thing that happened where you're like, wait a minute, there's something else here. 

Mark Myers: Oh, my goodness. You just opened up a can of worms. I can tell you the actual moment when this triggered. Yeah. I mentioned that I was a widower. My wife was disabled, was bedridden for many years.

Mark Myers: And about three, I'm thinking roughly around three years ago. I remember where I was, I can't remember the exact date. About three years ago, I had to take, get her to an emergency room, local hospital, late in the evening. And they needed to keep her overnight. And for years I had just a kind of a side.

Mark Myers: Tangent to that for years. I thought if she were to pass, I won't be okay. I'll be okay. That night I came home, it's 2 a. m. The house was empty. The house was disarray because I had emergency people coming and picking my wife, I have two cats. I had, you had two cats at the time and they were about as attentive as a stick on a tree.

Mark Myers: And I walked into my house. I looked around and I went. I'm not okay. Yeah. I have severe fear of loneliness. What I thought was I was going to be okay. Hey, young guy, I could keep going on and on, 60 plus, sorry. But, so I thought, okay, I'm okay.

Mark Myers: And then it dawned on me and I'd literally Aaron almost had what I call the closest that I've ever experienced is a nervous breakdown. I went into all this stuff. And then I just stopped and just looked at what was going on. Not only was I all of a sudden aware now that I had a fear of loneliness, which I was in total denial.

Mark Myers: Okay. 

Erin Marcus: And it's not even like it's, I forget the difference. It wasn't like you were suppressing it. Like you didn't even feel it. 

Mark Myers: I didn't even, I didn't even acknowledge. 

Erin Marcus: Yeah. It wasn't even on the radar. If 

Mark Myers: I felt it, I wasn't aware of it. That's the way of distinction I make. And so I became aware of that.

Mark Myers: Oh my goodness, I'm not okay. And this is something I need to think about. I need to process. And so that's when the phrase self vulnerability came to me. Because I had been suppressing or whatever. Ignoring. Ignoring. Probably more like 

Erin Marcus: ignoring. And 

Mark Myers: in total denial of the fact that I'm not going to be okay.

Mark Myers: Or I might not be okay. And so I kept thinking, self vulnerability, is that even a thing? And I've Googled it, there's phrases out there about that. And, and I don't plan to write the book on that. Although, probably could. But anyway and that's when that happened, Erin. I became so much more keenly aware that my feelings cannot be ignored.

Mark Myers: If I ignore my feelings, I'm setting myself up for a deep drop of something, in some way. And guess what? I can't be authentic. I'm super, super confident and passionate about being off with people. Yeah. And so if I'm not vulnerable with myself, How can I be authentic? How can I be who I want to be?

Mark Myers: And so I've learned over time that I'm actually attracted to people over these last few years. I'm more attracted to people who can actually share their feelings and actually are aware of their feelings. If I come back to that word, if they are aware, then all of a sudden I'm talking to a person who is being real with me right now.

Mark Myers: And I don't have to sit back and go, are they really? Are this who I'm really talking to? Who are they? 

Erin Marcus: And it's not just, a hundred percent agree with that, and it's not just now you get to talk to someone who they really are, having these authentic conversations, but I find they're more interesting conversations.

Erin Marcus: They're less about the random crap that's going on everywhere that has nothing to do with anything, and it's all contrived, and it is absolutely irrelevant. I don't know if it's age, you can call it wisdom, whatever it is. I don't care about that anymore. 

Mark Myers: I'm not dating. I'm not wanting to have an interaction with Wikipedia.

Mark Myers: If I wanted fake stuff or if I wanted, I know there's facts. We need to be talking bad about that. Instagram or whatever. Yeah. Yeah. Whatever it is, all the social media and all the different things. If I wanted to have a relationship with that, small talk could be okay, but otherwise small talk is.

Mark Myers: It's boring. It's just boring. I get it. It's the way we interact when we start conversations, but 

Erin Marcus: yeah, we're not saying here, run around telling your deepest, darkest to every stranger on the street. That's not exactly what we're talking about here. 

Mark Myers: But we can talk about times when I felt, cause my experiences are my experiences. And guess what? I'm the expert. On my experiences, you, I think about my experiences, you make it relate to my experiences, but I'm the expert of my experiences. So I can talk about what I'm feeling and what I'm experiencing and how things help affect me.

Mark Myers: Then I'm just being authentic again. I don't want to create, especially if someone I meet first, I'm going to go into the this is what happened, blah, blah, blah. 

Erin Marcus: We're not talking doom and gloom. 

Mark Myers: Exactly. 

Erin Marcus: It's not there's no. Even with everything you've been through in the last six months, three years you don't have a negative energy about you.

Mark Myers: My, I have just as much positive feelings as I have what is perceived as negative feelings. But notice I said perceived as negative feelings. Feelings are not wrong in themselves. Feelings are just real. You know what? My feelings are based, are frequently based on facts, but my facts might not be right, but my feelings in that moment.

Mark Myers: Are absolutely the facts might not be 

Erin Marcus: well. Okay. So I have a question for you because this is something that I feel strongly about and I'm curious your take on it. I absolutely 100 percent agree with what you're talking about. I think it's massively important and I think too many people use it as an excuse to treat other people poorly or right like you got to have bumpers in your gutters.

Erin Marcus: Your feelings. While legitimate for you, and important for you, doesn't mean other people have to prioritize your feeling. We all get to do this.

Mark Myers: Yes. 

Erin Marcus: You see a bit too much out there of, what is that phrase? I'm, it's just my truth. Yeah, but your truth doesn't mean it's my problem. I 

Mark Myers: remember going through a shopping, I went to the grocery store or what it was, but many, perhaps decades ago, there was a situation where the cashier, let's just call it a grocery store, was just super, super sweet and kind and blah, blah, blah, blah.

Mark Myers: And I gave some sort of compliment to that effect. And this person just said, that's just my nature. And I want to be like that person when I grow up. I just want to be able to share. Now you said you had a question. What is 

Erin Marcus: your take on people or what would you recommend for people in the Who use, whether it's self vulnerability or what they call self awareness, to try to inflict their view on others.

Mark Myers: That's where communication style comes into play. I don't have to agree with something that I totally disagree with, okay? But there is a way to disagree. Without being mean, obnoxious, discounting, dismissing, dismissive of other people. So if someone were to share their opinion about something, and I didn't just necessarily agree with that internally, I didn't agree with it, I wouldn't say, oh, you're wrong.

Mark Myers: No. I would say, tell me more about that. Tell me more where you're coming from on that. And usually I can turn that whole conversation around to my experience around. This has been this, and this is how I what I experienced with this. And this is the way this particular situation.

Mark Myers: Affected me, and so it seems similar to what you were saying. Is that right? I'm off base on that. So there's ways to have conversations where. The, if someone is sharing their view. And what they think is their view, I just assume that they're aware of that. But I also assume that there are other options.

Mark Myers: Aaron, I'm confident with what I know, but I'm also humble with what I don't. Okay. And when I am confident, what I know, I go with it. And until I realize it's not accurate, then, I'm going to, I'm going to do that, but when I realize in my own head that there's a chance that I may not have that exactly right.

Mark Myers: My humility raises the roof and my awareness of possible differences and opinions, differences of perspective. I think everybody's perspective is there. I don't argue with people's perspective. And so maybe my perspective needs to be modified a little bit. And I just, I'm just humble about that. I said, tell me more about this.

Mark Myers: I'm not really thought about it now. And and what usually happens. If they were just making it up, it just can't have that conversation, they end up backtracking, they 

Erin Marcus: haven't thought about it. And I 

Mark Myers: exactly, 

Erin Marcus: I think that's one of the unfortunate things is people are claiming self awareness and what they're using it as a reason for a lack of common courtesy.

Erin Marcus: And we're talking about self awareness that actually increases common courtesy, right? Your awareness of yourself allows you to be more aware of others authenticity. 

Mark Myers: And a lot of folks are afraid, I think, I feel, I was afraid of being that self aware. And then to share that awareness with other people, I don't want them to always see the loser.

Mark Myers: I want them to see, oh, somebody that I really want to know. And I think people, I think there are some people, I don't want to generalize this, but I think there are many individuals that are afraid to identify what they're really feeling because they either don't like how others will perceive that. Sure.

Mark Myers: Or they're afraid of. That I don't really have a good basis for that view. I don't want to get in that argument about it because I can't defend myself. 

Erin Marcus: It doesn't fit in with the persona that they're trying to present to the world. I know. And one of my favorite quotes, and I can't get it right because I'm turning into my mother and I can't remember quotes anymore, but the truth, that success is tied to how much truth you could hear about yourself without running away.

Mark Myers: Like that. 

Erin Marcus: And I think, and it's old it's, this is not a newer quote, this is an old quote I think it was the era of Think and Grow Rich and Honeywell and all that stuff, but we don't want to face things about ourselves that we might not be proud of. 

Mark Myers: When I'm working with 20, 20, 20 to 25 year olds, and a lot of that age bracket are very insecure.

Mark Myers: Not always. Some are amazing young professionals who are going to be wonderful. The only reason that keeps them a little held back is their confidence and their self confidence. self view of their self worth. And so that, that become, that becomes a barrier for them to be themselves because they don't trust that who they are is noteworthy, and so I feel and I think there's two year olds that are that way. There, Over this all over the spectrum, it's not an age specific issue is anybody and everybody. And I've worked with 16 year olds to 75 year olds in my coaching practice. And so it's all about person's perception and a person's perception is their reality.

Mark Myers: As I mentioned a moment ago, and guess what? Their reality is going to keep them from being them. So we have to be willing to adjust and be open. And perhaps humble. If we really think we know ourselves humble about what am I going to learn about myself today? What am I, what's the what's the new thing that I've totally missed my entire life.

Erin Marcus: Yeah. 

Mark Myers: Or what's the new thing that's all is contrary to what other people have told me, people grow up being told this or that. 

Erin Marcus: And I think to me, I always, because this is what resonated with me when I do this type of work for myself, I'm always asking myself, how brave can I be?

Erin Marcus: How brave can I be to face the truth of, whatever it is. And when I work with clients, I say it's not more work like moving from what I call a business operator where they're doing everything in a business to a business owner or if you're trying an entrepreneurial journey or whatever it is that you're going for it's seldom more work that you need to do what it is you need to do the scarier work it's not more work it's scarier work because it's internal 

Mark Myers: you know you Erin, related to what you just said, this is the way I approach the scarier work, is I treat every experience as an experiment.

Mark Myers: When I approach something scary, especially as an experiment, then my expectations of what could happen are irrelevant. 

Mark Myers: In an experiment, you pour something, in a lab or something, you pour something in a tube and you see what happens. If I'm trying to prove something, that's a different thing.

Mark Myers: But if I'm just trying to discover, And learn, I treat it as an experiment. I do social experiments almost every day of my life, it's just, okay. I have an interaction with someone in the elevator, someone gets on the elevator and they're a third my age, but yet they have a dog, I just work with that dog.

Mark Myers: And I have a amazing conversation. But if I were to try to do something else in that situation, then. Then what am I'm expecting something instead. I see how this dog reacts to me. Oh my goodness. This dog is wonderful. The dog is licking my hand. Oh my goodness. And the dog owner is just looking at me like, 

Erin Marcus: got three heads.

Erin Marcus: It's pretty 

Mark Myers: friendly. Then I'll interact with the person, but that's just, that's an example of a social experiment and experiment of, and that's how, when I said no fear earlier, Yeah, that's how I that's how I avoid that the real 

Erin Marcus: well, it's 

Mark Myers: part of 

Erin Marcus: it's staying curious. 

Mark Myers: Oh, perfect. It's 

Erin Marcus: just great.

Erin Marcus: It's stay curious when going back to our conversation about when people disagree with you and have differing views. If I can start with my energy being that isn't that interesting. And then go from there instead of the wall coming up instantly and the defending my position before they finished their sentence.

Erin Marcus: If I can stay curious. Then anything can happen. 

Mark Myers: I have one of my email signatures is I'm loving the life of growth and learning. And growth and learning is a, is another way of saying being open to the possibilities. And and when I'm approaching something, I just go, okay, what am I going to learn?

Mark Myers: If I learn something from it, I might grow. I might grow, might not, or it may be just affirmed of something that I already believe. But guess what? I gained something from that. It may be. Hey, I learned that's not, it's not, I'm not, I'm totally not interested. I have no connection to that. 

Erin Marcus: Here's something I'll add to that.

Erin Marcus: That is new for me because this was not my default. In addition to always asking, what am I learning here? I've also asked myself on a daily basis. How can I be kinder to myself in that learning process? And kinder to myself was not a thing for a very long 

Mark Myers: time, 

Erin Marcus: right? That wasn't a thing, right?

Erin Marcus: What is it? I'm Jenn Act. We grew up on hose water and neglect, right? So it's my new favorite quote that I saw, but not only 

Mark Myers: And frequently we go to the faucet and just do this, right? 

Erin Marcus: Yeah. What's a cup? There's a cup. It was a cup. But Yeah, not just stay curious and what am I learning, but I have found if I can also stay aware and intentionally ask, how can I be kinder to myself in this process?

Erin Marcus: It automatically makes me kinder to others in the process. 

Mark Myers: We don't love ourselves. How can we love others? 

Erin Marcus: 100%. 

Mark Myers: And this whole thing of what can I get from this? I've heard, I've had, I've been in situations self help type things where people say, are you a giver or a taker?

Mark Myers: And I've had to really look at that. Back in the day, I was a taker to the bank, take it, however I can get it. 

Erin Marcus: That's how you were, that's how our generations were raised. That's how that worked. 

Mark Myers: And now I enjoy who I am when I have that giver mindset.

Mark Myers: And if I don't enjoy who I am, how can others? The only way others would enjoy me is if I'm faking it, okay, if I'm doing something to just manipulate, 

Erin Marcus: right? Yeah, 

Mark Myers: but if I'm, I don't want to ever have to fake being something that I'm not. And when I meet someone and I can tell they're uncomfortable.

Mark Myers: Or just either because of new conversation or stranger or whatever. I try to help them be as comfortable with who they are. I ask them questions, I don't have to keep talking. I can talk all day long. Remember I'm loud, but I could keep talking all day long. But I, what I'm sensing is the person is not may or may not be real comfortable with themselves.

Mark Myers: Or with me or both. And so I, I found that when people talk about themselves, they talk about their own experiences their enthusiasm goes up. When their enthusiasm goes up, their confidence goes up and guess what? They're a heck of a lot more effective at that communication process. When we are confident, enthusiastic, and aware of where we stand with that information.

Mark Myers: So I'm getting on a soapbox there and you got me going with it. No, this was 

Erin Marcus: so perfect because I was just, no, I think that is so perfect because I don't think that's it. That's it in a nutshell. And that's what you help people do, right? It's the insights and awareness that can then lead to better outcomes from using communication as a tool.

Erin Marcus: Thank you. I think that's one of the things that I love about what you do. Communication, when I listen to you talk about it, it isn't the intention, it's the tool. It's the process. How to get, how to put this all together so that You can create the outcomes that you want. 

Mark Myers: And, I feed on this a lot, but I just feel like our attitudes and our mindset about things are they so quickly influence our behaviors and if I don't have an openness, Nice comp, nice balance of confidence and humility.

Mark Myers: Then my communication and the way I talk to people can come across so wrong. 

Erin Marcus: Put me under stress. I'll show you that ever all day long. 

Mark Myers: Yeah. I was going to say, yeah. So I just I always approach a lot of these things is. My baby behavior is influenced by my attitude. And if my attitude is not in a good place, my behaviors are going to stop, excuse the French and guess what?

Mark Myers: My ability to communicate, influence, perhaps even inspire goes down the drain 

Erin Marcus: right out the door. 

Mark Myers: And if I can't, if I can't get somewhere in that continuum, then I don't, I have no joy, and if I'm trying to teach people how to find fulfillment in their life, I got to find fulfillment in my own life.

Mark Myers: Part of my own my, the, the icing on the cake for me and the butter on the steak for me. 

Erin Marcus: butter on the steak. Where do you live that you put butter? 

Mark Myers: Okay. Okay. Yeah, I know. Chicago. 

Erin Marcus: We don't put butter on the . 

Mark Myers: Oh, my oh, you're missing out. Erin. Put a little pad of butter on a steak and let that butter just permeate.

Mark Myers: But what I'm getting at is it's the, oh my goodness. I don't know how to say it and be appropriate. It's that really, it's just pure joy when I can feel good about things and I have my, my, my attitude is in great place and I don't feel really crappy about, oh my goodness, that didn't go 

Erin Marcus: well.

Erin Marcus: It's the difference between light and heavy. 

Mark Myers: Yeah, exactly. That's a very straightforward question. And how do you 

Erin Marcus: want to move through this world? 

Mark Myers: Sometimes I want to move light. Sometimes I want heavy. But no matter what, I'm going to learn and grow and experience joy in my life. 

Erin Marcus: 100%. So if people want to continue this conversation with you, learn all about you, how you can help them.

Erin Marcus: What is the easiest way to find you these days? 

Mark Myers: I'm all over linked in all over Facebook. My full name or my name is Mark Myers. Most of you say Mark Myers and coach, you'll find me. I think one of my one of my, Profiles is probably may has the initial J. My first name is John. I don't mind getting out my just my personal email address right here on the fly.

Mark Myers: It's mark M. A. R. K. Dot Myers M. Y. E. R. S. At Comcast dot net. I am the reason I'm just handling that information out is I'm in the process of rebranding my coaching practice. So I'll have a new, I'll have a new business name. I got all this all worked out. 

Erin Marcus: Fancy stuff is coming. 

Mark Myers: Stand by for partners. Okay.

Mark Myers: It's all connection partners. It's not published yet, but the logo is ready. And but I'm easily connected on LinkedIn. I'm an open networker. I, I. I rarely just say who's that, 

Erin Marcus: right? And here's the thing. We'll make sure all those links are in the show notes so that you're just a click away from people.

Erin Marcus: So thank you for hanging out with me and sharing your insights today. This is fun. I love communication. It's my jam and the self awareness piece. So be sexy, be self aware. I love it. I love it. Thank you so much for this. 

Mark Myers: All right. I love being with you today.