 Today I'm with Roshan Daryanani and we're going to talk about how we can shift our perspective so that we can always maintain optimism and Proactivity in our in our life and our work Roshan, it's great to have you here Yeah, it's lovely to be here. Thank you for having me. Yeah, so let me first kind of share your background with people and then we'll get into this topic of You know personal leadership so First I want to just say the way that Roshan and I met was interesting And it's an example of collaboration. I always talk about collaboration so Roshan had Had found me on some podcast interview that I did We can't remember exactly who it was but she's heard me on a podcast somewhere and then Maybe she followed my blog or something afterwards and then eventually She sent she mailed me a physical letter of thanks and I rarely Get physical letters. I mean literally like two or three in a year Don't get me up. I get emails all the time. So letters is really rare So obviously that kind of stood out for me and I reached out to her and thank her for that and then you know we exchanged emails every now and then and Here we are, you know on an interview so Roshan, let me just share that you are a tutor and a writer She by the way, Roshan just wrote a wonderful little book Called the answers are everywhere. Is that right? That's right. Yes. Yeah, the answer and it's one of the most creative books I've bought in a long time. It is it is you should y'all should check it out We'll give you a link in the notes of the video. So she's a tutor and writer She trained as a teacher and she tutors children of all ages in maths and biology Here in the United States to call it math and over there. You guys call it maths And do you tutor people? Online as well or just in person. I have tutored online as well, but mostly it's in person Okay, but so you can accept. Oh, I do. Yeah, I have done it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah So I'm just continuing with the bio here Roshan enjoys writing about self-improvement and connecting with other people in an increasingly disconnected world her other creative pursuits Which include graphic design and filmmaking also feed into her writing, which is why her book is so creative looking Roshan recently published a book called the answers everywhere It's a collection of resources that answer some of life's big questions such as how to befriend your feelings and how to keep learning So thanks so much for being here Roshan and You I want to just start with how you you say there's there are five words that can change our Level of contentment. So let's start with that. What are those five words? Yeah, so the five words are there is another way And basically there is always another way. That's right. Sorry. There's always another way So, yeah, so I can tell you a bit about how I Develop the idea. Yeah, that's great. Sure. So I have Over the last few years been reading a lot of self-development books as no doubt all those who follow you have been doing as well And I kept coming across this idea again and again, which is that it's your perspective on the situations that matters and not the situations themselves and No doubts You know, we've all heard this But I realized that I wanted some concrete steps to actually apply that to difficult situations So your work for example George has really helped me Realize that there's a different way to be a freelancer or an entrepreneur a way that's more heart-to-heart centered and And at the same time smart, but that doesn't involve sort of constantly thinking about scale and hustling and all that So I'm really grateful for that So Thinking about this you sort of concrete steps that would help me to to view situations differently into That can help us all to shift our perspective on really difficult things and I came up with these four steps and helpfully The first letters of the steps spell out the word lead Which I think is is very relevant because that's what leaders do They have a unique vision on situations and they're just able to see things In a different more constructive light than the rest of us do So that's how I remind myself to keep doing this when I'm in that challenging situation Yeah, and I just before you go on I want to mention that you had written a series of little Public journal entries Some time ago. I'm trying to remember exactly what it was I think it was a series where you were like challenging yourself every day to do something scary. Is that right? That's correct to do something uncomfortable every day for a hundred days Yeah, that was amazing because I didn't catch all of it, but I did catch some parts of it and I was I was just really Inspired by that that you chose to do something uncomfortable What were a few of you remember what a few of those things were? Yeah, they were all little things as well And so it wasn't like huge huge things one of the ones that was really difficult for me was to just do a survey like Survey strangers in front of a mall that one was quite hard But I realized that you know the things we think are really hard. We can actually do them another one was going to a Sort of morning rave. I'd never done that before and it was a super raid But it was it was interesting and it was something I'd never done before so that was interesting Yeah, and I of course I remember one more one more was where you were like taking a cold shower. Oh, yeah Yeah, that's that's a great one. Yeah, I actually inspired me to start looking into them Like and then I have occasionally be taking cold shower Yeah, there's there's a lot of science saying that they're really helpful. Yeah. Yeah, so Anyway, I just wanted to mention that because I feel like you are You are really you're continually challenging yourself and kind of this is where the framework has come out of it So lead le ad let's go and share that with folks Sure. Yeah, so In lead that L stands for link Link up with people that you know and people that you kind of know as well So I think there's this myth in self-developments that we have to do everything by ourselves and you know it's important to be independent and That's not helpful to us in the sense that it makes us feel we have to We shouldn't be asking people for help and I think that limits people a lot I think actually leaders ask people for help all the time and kind of figure out who's the best person for the job and so Think about you know in your own community in your network Maybe when it comes to friends of your friends who could help you with a situation who has more experience in it And reach out to them, you know get to the habit of speaking to them and asking them questions That's actually the trait of a great and humble leader. I think so. That's the L And actually, you know what with each of these you had a you had an example you wanted to share Absolutely, should I go through the example? Sure. Yeah. Yeah. So for me The way that I have applied these steps is when it comes is in the realm of sort of work and money Over the last few years, I've noticed that I'm getting into a scarcity mindset around these two things and I really wanted to shift that So when it comes to linking up with other people Sometimes the person you link up with is the author of a book or some, you know Just someone who helps you see things in a different light. So I came across this article. That's called Thankfully life is full of problems and and it's on a great illustrated blog called more to that Which is lovely little articles on on various different topics and and that article helped me see that actually I don't have to think about money and work as this heavy burden I can start to see it as Something in my life that I can learn through and I can I can actually start to enjoy the process of learning to manage my money And George your work on George for productivity ties and really nicely with this as well So you can learn to enjoy the person a process that you previously thought would be sort of really difficult and so In terms of the actual person I linked up with after reading this article my dad Help me to get in touch with one of his friends who taught me all about investing in index funds Now this is something I previously had very little knowledge knowledge on and so Learning about these index funds let help me realize well what we talked about money in school is really limited And there's so many ways to go about it And I also realized that people really want to help in general. So it's actually Like really kind of you to give them the opportunity to help. So that's a different way of looking at it as well Yeah, and I'm glad you mentioned index funds because I'm a big fan of it. That's where most of my money is And then there's of course these days well Vanguard is the most popular one But these days there's these robo advisors like I use wealth simple. That's one. That's my probably my favorite one Which allows you to easily invest in? Index funds that are filtered for social responsibility Like it's just a matter of few clicks and it's like so easy and yeah, so I'm glad you mentioned it I just want to give that a plug. Yeah Yeah for sure. Yeah, yeah So that's that's the link part of it and The second part is to externalize and and what this refers to is Try to detach yourself slightly from the problem and think if Someone specific who you really care about came to you with this problem. What would you advise them? And it sounds really simple. It's kind of hard to do. So what I try to do is I try to notice What's the advice that I keep giving people in my everyday life? What they're asking me about their own issues and So I mean this from my example is is true for money and for many other things I found that the advice I was giving people was you know be kind to yourself and Celebrate the small wins. I think celebrate the small wins is a huge one And so I had to turn this on myself and think well What little steps have I already taken towards managing money? You know in what ways have I stopped comparing myself to others because that's a huge one for me And am I celebrating my own sort of unique journey through this? So that's externalized sort of try and look at the problem from a different perspective think about what advice You're giving to people because more often than not that's the advice we ourselves need to follow the advice that we're giving other people and Then the next step is to act and take a little tiny action that moves you in the direction that you want to go For me, it's all sorts of small things and I Really enjoy listening to instrumental music when I write or create and that helps me There's an app called focus that will I don't know if you've heard of this George. I have not but I will check it out So it just plays Instrumental music has all these different channels that you can choose from but it's very sort of it minimizes the distraction And that you don't have to keep choosing the song or anything. It just plays music for you In the background, I find it really helpful and it's sort of music that I think has been proven to help you focus Made a difference to me. We'll be checking it out. Yeah, very soon for sure And the other thing that I do I mean sometimes the things that help move you forward are sort of unexpected and can be really simple as I said so In order to motivate myself to write an article what I do is I actually look for a photograph or design a Graphic beforehand because I find that that part really relaxes me and I really enjoy it So if I have the graphic or the photograph all ready to go then I have more reason instead of more of a source of motivation to just get on with the article because the graphic is done and So that's act, you know find a tiny little step whether it's five minutes of work or whatever you can do to just move yourself forward And the last step is decide I think that's the most important one for me So as no doubt, we all know there are many situations in life that are Where it's quite difficult to shift your perspective because you've been thinking about Something in a in the same way for many years. This is where coaches are helpful or you know people who can Look at the situation objectively. I think it really comes down to you deciding to you saying Well, this is hard, but I'm gonna commit to it for however long I need to And keep reminding myself of why I want to manage the situation differently your view it differently and just sort of keep coming back to it because mistakes and You know, you're falling back into your old tendencies. That's all gonna be part of the process But if you decide and you commit to it, then you can keep sort of moving in the direction that you wanted to go in So I think deciding is a huge part of of the process That's great. So link Externalize act decide and I will have the write-up Roshan was kind enough to write this up and I'll put it in the notes of the video as well. So So this is like a framework that you use to you know, when you encounter a life challenge So maybe you could share with us how how this might be applied in it in another setting Let's say let's say somebody was well dealing with Marketing their business and they were having a hard time figuring out what to do So let's let's just play a game and apply this lead idea to to do that. So so link Would be to well Where can you go for advice, right for support that kind of thing? and externalize would be If if a friend came to you to say well, I'm confused about marketing What might you say to them that right? Yeah, that's correct. Yeah, just a couple of things I would add to that absolutely and with the link I would say try to think outside the box a little and go to people who You wouldn't normally think of as marketing experts say for example Marketing is a great one that you brought up because break example that you brought up because everyone to some extent uses marketing in their job So teachers have to sort of market Their lessons to their students. So I'm just as an example. I would say if you're Thinking about marketing your work and you're a little bit tired of the marketing advice that you're seeing maybe go to a teacher Or a salesperson or someone who has a slight different job and think about how do they? How do they address their target audience? Example yeah with the externalize that's kind of a hard one, but I do keep coming back to and What's the advice that you're giving other people or what I guess with the marketing example? It would be in what ways have you been successful? So maybe when have you been able to persuade someone to change their mind or to think differently? What tactics did you apply in a situation where you were successful in sort of someone something? Yeah, and I would say sometimes we We're more effective giving other people advice and we forget Just just like we'll say how can that advice apply to my business? That's right. And so no, I think it's really right like like You know when you go to a Facebook group for example That's related to business and you see other people posting questions to you It's like oh, I have an idea about that I have an opinion and then you might just even look at your own comments and go wait Okay, absolutely. Let me try it and then act let's let's say so act let's talk about that How would how would that person then apply act to their marketing? What does that mean? Yeah? I think the acting comes down to There's two ways to go about it so one is to if you find yourself really stuck and you know, you're having difficulty moving forward with whatever the marketing Process to the business. I would say focus on making it a little easier for yourself and you know, so What could make the what could make it a little more pleasant to you if you really don't like marketing and It's super simple things like music or or you know, planning a little treat for yourself when you've accomplished your next task So that's one way to go about it. But if you know what you need to do and what's actually stopping you is Sort of the fear. That's when I would come back to that doing uncomfortable things and so Challenge yourself to take that one uncomfortable step Whether it's starting a Facebook page that was for me or you know Figuring a video or something make a video absolutely that one thing Yes, just find one thing that's that you find uncomfortable if you can achieve that one thing Then you sort of earn the confidence and the ability to tell yourself Well, I managed that thing which I thought would be really hard. So I can do the next step Yeah, right. Yeah, I'll have to say, you know, so much of marketing still is not I have to you know, it's it's not easy for me either and You know, sometimes people say well George and you're doing this for so long. It's well. No, like every time I write I'm still challenged by it. I'm still not feeling inspired by it every time I make a video By the time my press go live or record I'm just gonna say, oh, I'm just gonna I know kind of what I want to say But I'm not comfortable yet until a few minutes into the video. So no, it is it is a very important step So D decide how do we apply that to this process now? Sure, I'll get that. That's so interesting to hear you say that like having done that for so many years I'm still finding it hard. That's that's great that you said that and Decide. Yeah, well, this is is sort of having the commitment and for this I'll borrow an idea from Alexander Franzen who I know that you yes, he also enjoy it and so she talked about on a little post-it note or Just writing down three reasons why you're doing the work that you're doing So when you're doing your work as an entrepreneur or you're marketing your business go back to why did you start that business? What are you trying to do with it and three simple but it plates? For why you're doing that and whenever you fault her you can always come back to those and say well This is why I made the decision to start this project and this is why I want to move it forward. I love it It's simple, but it's powerful. It's great for us to remember these things. So Roshan if people want to connect with you see your further work I'm gonna be putting the link to the Facebook your new Facebook business page up there It's Facebook comm slash tiny love letters. I love that That's I kind of your brand now because you're your tiny love letters that on Instagram as well So tell us a little bit about that. What was the kind of genesis of this? Sure, so I'm tiny love letters. I'll be sharing. I already have started sharing essays that I write on medium and they're all about Little lessons that I'm learning on my everyday life often lessons that I learn in teaching but also just my personal life and also the the next project I'll be moving on to is sort of connected to the essays is I'll be using some of the essays and gathering them together in a book and About so music of this book uses maths analogies because I'm a math tutor And I'll be using math concepts like equations and vectors to explain some of these lessons that I'm learning in everyday life So I'm quite excited about that That's so cool. Have you heard of a book called emotional equations? Might be interesting. It's by Chip Conley I think is like his name he wrote a book years ago that I really liked called peak It's about applying Abraham the Maslow hierarchy into companies But he wrote in such an inspiring and easy to understand way that I was like Oh, that's a brilliant concept for how to how to run a company and now he and then later he wrote a book on like applying Math equations to emotions and how we work through emotions. So anyway But yes, and I look forward to seeing your your next book and you're the book that you just published is called the answers are everywhere and I'm proud to have been mentioned in the book so and the answers everywhere so cool because you basically kind of look at various large life questions from you know from Sort of purpose to to even money and and work and all that stuff And then you link to a bunch of resources on on each topic that you found really helpful blog articles Podcast episodes, you know things like videos. So it's a really kind of a your your collection of best resources so I really like that and I'll be linking to that as well and Anything else you want to say as we complete this interview? No, that's right them just to talk about that book very briefly and it was So these are resources that I was gathering over the past few years and I felt I wanted to have them one in one place So that when I really needed some help on a particular topic I could go straight to it and find those resources when I need them and Again aside from that, I would just like to say thank you, you know, your work has really inspired me and And I have to say it really stands out in the sea of other marketing advice. I've heard And I'm really inspired by it. So thank you. Thank you. Thank you I'm so grateful to be able to do this. So thank you Rochon for what you do and the I mean, hopefully you all can see why I wanted to interview her. I felt like she was such a Rochon. You're such a you know, you're you're willing to really dive into life and challenges and Know that you have all the resources within you and the answers are everywhere. So so thank you, thank you so much for your work and I If anyone has any questions or comments put it below and I'll make sure Rochon sees it So thanks for Sean. Thank you. Thank you