Transforming Imposter Syndrome into Self-Trust Success with Dawn Ledet | EP296

What if your actions labelled as self-sabotage are actually choices waiting to be altered? Join us for a transformative conversation with Dawn Ledet, the self-trust coach, as she unpacks her journey from self-doubt to self-mastery. Dawn shares her innovative techniques from the Self-Trust Lab and the Self-Trust Executive, offering listeners a fresh perspective on overcoming imposter syndrome and reprogramming negative self-talk. This episode promises to shift your mindset on self-trust, highlighting how tuning into your inner voice can be the cornerstone of personal and professional success.

Ever wondered why you procrastinate? Fear of failure—or even success—might be the hidden culprit. Dawn and I dissect the traditional notion of self-sabotage, challenging you to see it as a gateway to growth, not a roadblock. Through insightful dialogues, we explore the importance of self-talk, explaining how changing the narrative from judgmental to curious can unlock a new realm of creativity and wisdom. Learn practical strategies to foster a supportive internal dialogue, helping you transform generational scripts and deep-seated beliefs into empowering affirmations.

Picture a life less cluttered by digital noise. That's what a "consumption fast" can offer, as Dawn explains through her personal three-year journey. We delve into the benefits of stepping back from constant media consumption to discover a deeper connection with ourselves. Embrace the transformative power of digital detox, and learn how to maintain a healthy relationship with technology without sacrificing the newfound sense of tranquillity.

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Chapters

• 0:00 Self-Trust and Business Success
• 10:58 Unlabeling Self-Sabotage and Empowering Choices
• 17:54 Changing Inner Dialogue for Self-Improvement
• 30:42 Inner Wisdom and Consumption Fast
• 34:19 Digital Detox and Self-Trust Boost

Transcript

Donna Eade: 0:57

You're listening to the Mindset in Action podcast, the place to be to grow and streamline your business. I'm your host, donna Eade. Let's jump into the show. Welcome back to the podcast, everybody. I am so excited to have you here today and even more excited to bring you a guest. So we have been a little low on guests coming into the new year, all of my own fault. In the back end there, we started the new year with a lovely guest, cam. If you want to go back and listen to her episode. She was the accountant, but today I have got Dawn with me. Hello, dawn, welcome to the show.

Dawn Ledet: 1:42

I am so excited to be here. Thank you for having me. I'm grateful to be here with you and your audience.

Donna Eade: 1:49

Introduce yourself to my audience. Tell them a little bit about who you are, what it is that you do and a little something about your life.

Dawn Ledet: 2:06

Oh sure, okay. Well, I am Dawn Lede. I am known as the self-trust coach and I help small business owners and entrepreneurs and business leaders master the one thing that impacts everything and that is self-trust. And, like many people, we come to our expertise by often not being very good at that expertise. At some point in our life and for me, it was this big aha moment, and I love to share how very proud I was of myself during this realization, because it was very funny I literally sold my car.

Dawn Ledet: 2:38

I was an executive in the hospitality industry for two decades and I had this brilliant idea in my mind to sell my car, to force myself to walk to and from work two miles because I live in a city, and that meant that I would need to get to work at a normal time, not too early, and leave work at a normal time, not too late, and I would be moving my body. I'm like this is so brilliant. Yeah, all of this done, I'm going to work normal hours, I'm not going to bring work home and I'm going to be moving my body more, getting more exercise. Well, one of those proud walks, I was like thinking how smart I was.

Dawn Ledet: 3:21

It dawned on me, and when I say dawn on me, I really mean it slaps me in the head like a ton of bricks that to mind throughout my whole life of decisions and indecisions and actions and inactions that I had taken and not taking, and they all brought to light one thing that I was seriously lacking in self-trust and I couldn't unsee that and it just sent me on a path of really one.

Dawn Ledet: 4:07

It was a lot of noticing, which was quite painful in the beginning, but then starting to see how it applied, because I was still very successful and I'm not someone that someone would regularly look at and say that you have a confidence issue or you have low self-esteem, and so we can often equate a lack of self-trust with those things like being truly negative to ourselves and really like being shy or inward. And I didn't identify with any of that. And when I started seeing how self-trust is even more noticeable, whether we have it or not, in the achievement of big goals, and how we could fix that and how I did the work on myself, I knew I had to get that out there and help other people yeah, that's so good, so good.

Donna Eade: 4:57

So how do you work with people now?

Dawn Ledet: 5:02

so I have two ways that people work with me. I have the self trust lab, which is a proven framework. We call it the three E success method. That teaches you the thrills three skills it takes to achieve anything, how to fuel those three skills with self-trust. And there's an like it takes you through setting the goal. It's new ways of doing things that we've all done, but fueled by self-trust, in a way that supports us instead of having ourselves drag ourselves across the finish line. And coaching comes along with that, which is the most important piece, if you ask me. And then I also have the self-trust executive, which is a more high level, detailed, bespoke way of working together that is closer knit, more hands on.

Donna Eade: 5:53

Brilliant, amazing. So what we're going to talk to about today is more along the lines of self-sabotage, self-talk and how that all relates into self-trust. So you're definitely the expert to talk to about this, and what I was thinking while you were talking there is how that actually self-trust is a key component, I would think, in how we help ourselves overcome the dreaded imposter syndrome, slash phenomenon, whichever word you're going to use. But this is something that is huge with my audience. It's something that we've talked about a lot with my guests.

Donna Eade: 6:32

Um, when I've talked about, um, their biggest mindset block imposter syndrome comes up again and again and again, and I think a lot of that is that lack of self-trust. And I want to sort of pull that back also to something that you were saying before we hopped on to record this episode, where we were talking about you having a complete break from consuming anything so that you could be with yourself, and I think imposter syndrome comes a lot from the external voices and how we kind of handle that versus our inner trust. What are your thoughts about?

Dawn Ledet: 7:11

that 100%. I mean, I have a challenge with labels, the same as with self-sabotage, the same as with calling it imposter syndrome. But because when we place that on ourselves, sometimes we just lay it there and we're like, okay, that's it, that's our truth. There's no growth from there. But I also know that I call it the lobby we live in. The lobby noise in our mind and that's our external voices that we hear from friends and family and experts and critics outside of us. And then there's it's paired with our own doubts and insecurities and fears and that's that loud, like really picture yourself in a loud, busy lobby and you can't help but like overhear it, but it's kind of jumble and it's just like feeding. Yeah, well, through the lobby there's this door and on the other side of it are all your answers, it's your inner wisdom, it's your intuition and we have to spend time with it. So that's where my consumption fast came from was to clear out because often we get into that lobby and we're like no thanks, and we just leave, we go out the other door or we try and drown it out with music, movies, shows. You know something else more, outside voices actually, which just can compound it. But it does give us a little bit of an escape and there's nothing wrong with those things.

Dawn Ledet: 8:44

But that's our general is. We either live in the lobby and that's like when we're really in anxiety and fueling our insecurities and doubts and fears and questioning and comparing, or we like duck and leave. But the invitation is to go through. It is to invite silence and give yourself, like you can literally visualize walking into the door, if you will, and starting to make that a practice, whether it's for 30 seconds in the beginning when you do it or minutes at a time, but starting to make friends with that and not judging yourself for how it goes, not making it a problem if you're like this is hard or I'm afraid of what I'm gonna find. That's generally what I hear, but the only thing to fear that you're gonna find is in the lobby, because what's through is your truth and your truth is never gonna tell you terrible things yeah, yeah, oh, that's so good, that's so good.

Donna Eade: 9:44

Oh, there's a lot to unpack there.

Donna Eade: 9:46

But I want us to bring it back to the business side of things, because a lot of the well, pretty much my entire audience are business owners, and I think when we are looking at our self-trust in our businesses, it can be quite difficult for us, especially if it's something that we've not done before and given the time of year we're at we're sort of towards the end of February now and we've already had almost two months of the year, which is crazy to think about.

Donna Eade: 10:18

But a lot of us set goals in January and if we were to be honest with ourselves and sit there and look back at them now, some of us will be going oh, I'm already behind off the mark, missed the mark completely or, even worse, I've completely forgotten what my goals were, that I set at the beginning of January. And we start telling ourselves all these things like I'm sabotaging myself, like I've literally why didn't I just do x, y and z? And you have got a bit of a a different view on self-sabotage, being blamed for missing goals. So let's talk about that. Um, self-sabotage and goals, yeah.

Dawn Ledet: 10:58

I shun a lot of labels. So it's I. There are millions. There are amazing people I shouldn't say millions. There are several really amazing gifted experts out there that talk about self sabotage and what they say is right.

Dawn Ledet: 11:15

But what happens with those of us that aren't experts in self-sabotage? We take that label, we put it on ourselves and we use it as a reason why we don't do things. Oh, I, just I self-sabotage and there's no growth in that. There's no way to move forward, because now we've just decided I'm someone who self-sabotages. So what I'd like to invite people to do is to recognize that the truth is, you made a choice and this is not an invitation for judgment. It's an invitation to connect.

Dawn Ledet: 11:46

Actually, we're not trying to create more disconnect. We're actually trying to lean in and say the reason why I'm not further along on my goal is because I chose not to do X, y, z. Now I can look at. If I'm not going to judge that, I can say let me look at why, and does why even matter? Or do I just want to start right now and choose differently?

Dawn Ledet: 12:08

Because our greatest power is our power to choose, and what a privilege I mean. This is why you don't need to judge that you haven't worked on it yet or that you've lost track on it or that you've even forgotten about it, is because what a privilege it is that we can choose to make goals and then we can choose to pursue them or not. We don't have to, yeah. And so, owning that privilege and knowing like I just didn't choose to do these steps, now I'm going to decide. Do I want to choose differently? Did I choose not to because I just didn't set myself up for success? Let me see what that would look like now. That's the difference in the gift of not labeling it as just self-sabotage and owning it as a choice that we can change.

Donna Eade: 12:59

Yeah, I love that. I love that it's. It's really interesting when you say it like that. It's almost like when we give ourselves a label. We're just giving ourselves an excuse and actually we need to just strip back to the whys. And you said, why might not matter, and I think a lot of times what can be behind the why is a fear, whether it's fear of failure or fear of success that it's often a fear that just makes all of the back end of our website is much more interesting to do. I'll just get on with that, or, you know, you just start procrastinating with different things because it prevents us from from doing what is scaring us, and I think that's that's that can be part of it.

Donna Eade: 13:41

But another part that we can talk about is the language that we use, because I think oftentimes people sort of get on that self-hate train, like as if we haven't got enough going on in that lobby with everybody else's criticisms board. We take it to heart, we take it personally and then we start filtering that into our own self-talk and all of a sudden we're and you know the analogy has been used a lot with people who are trying to lose weight is how do you talk to yourself in a mirror? Start talking to yourself like you would your best friend, because would you ever turn around to your best friend and say, oh my god, you look absolutely hideous in that and you can't possibly go out wearing that dress and things like that? So self-talk is really, really powerful and it feels like it's an impossible thing to change, like it is ground in from very young. A lot of times I literally watched you'll love this.

Donna Eade: 14:41

It was an episode of Say yes to the Dress and there was a mother in there who turned around. Her daughter was used to be a sort of a model, so used to have a model physique. She is now what I would say is a regular, regular looking girl size, and her mum turned around and said she needs a wedding dress with sleeves because we need to hide her chunky arms. Now the woman, the bride she was actually fiercely self-confident and she was just like I'm just in a different phase of my life right now and I'm going to enjoy it. You know, it doesn't matter what I weigh, which I was.

Donna Eade: 15:19

It was so refreshing and I was just so happy for her that she felt that way. But then it cut to a clip of her mum turning around and say, well, my mum's still goes on to me about my weight and I'm like, oh so it's a self-cycle thing that you're just continuing with your own daughter. Do you not hear the words that are coming out your mouth? So it can be generational, this self-talk that we like. It's just pounded in. So is there a way we can change it?

Dawn Ledet: 15:47

absolutely, we can 100% change it. Now to your point. There are we and I talk about this in my book, master your Inner Dialogue. There are origins for our inner dialogue. So there's the origin, which can come from one, just just our if you're familiar with the motivational triad just our brains wiring. There's a part of us that's wired to seek comfort, avoid pain and conserve energy. So there's that piece. Some of our inner dialogue comes from that makeup, that wiring. Some of our inner dialogue comes from rules that we either adopted, were created in a way to create safety for ourselves. Sometimes they're very interesting as we get older, but as kids maybe we had to create shrinking because that protected us in some way. So there's many ways that our origin, different types of origins whether we create it, adopt it or it's part of that motivational triad affect our inner dialogue. That leads to the lens we are generally operating from. And if we want to simplify lens, there's lots of different ways to look at our lens and what it looks like.

Dawn Ledet: 17:01

But if we boil it down to the simplest, it's like a lens of belief in ourselves or a lens of disbelief in ourselves, to the tone that you hear your inner dialogue in. And the tone is where I really love to start. We can explore because, just like the why, it's not that the why doesn't matter, it's just sometimes we can get caught up digging into why and miss out on moving forward and just creating connection. We can do both. But so I just like to let you know that when you ask why, sometimes the answer is just as simple as because I chose to or because I didn't know better, or because that's the best I had at the time, and it's perfectly fine to answer it that way. But the tone of our inner dialogue is fascinating.

Dawn Ledet: 17:55

I want to tell all of you, whatever you hear your tone and if you hear you screwed that up or why is this so hard for me, and you're hearing that in this tone of like judgment, daggers of criticism or victim mentality, I have great news for you your inner dialogue actually doesn't have a tone. We assign one, we all do, but what that means is we can take it off or change it. So I just encourage you sometimes to hear that you know why is this so hard for me. If I don't hear that as a judgment and I hear like why is this so hard for me? From curiosity. I'm like, oh, let's look at this. How can I make this easier for myself? Or do I just want to hire it out? It just there's answers to it.

Dawn Ledet: 18:48

So when we hear something through the tone of judgment and criticism, it literally shuts down our wisdom. We just miss out. It's like the door closes to the inner room and we can't access. All the times that we were able to do hard things and how we know how to get through and how it's not a problem to delegate so that we can focus on things that we already know how to do or or that we want to grow in or that match our genius. So that's a really good place to start is changing that tone, and sometimes I have clients who will just turn it into a robot so that you can really hear it objectively, or some people give it an accent because that's just fun. So starting to play with that tone can really make a difference in how you engage with your inner dialogue.

Donna Eade: 19:38

Yeah, what would you say to people who don't hear it? Because you know, there's a thing it's a medical issue that there are people out there that cannot picture things in their heads. And I think there is also people out there that don't necessarily hear the voices, and not because they're not there, but because they're not tuned into them. So instead of hearing the voices, they're observing the action. So, for example, somebody who finds it, you know, absolutely nerve wracking to go into a networking event and on their own they might hide to the corners of the room, look down at their phone like not being engaged. So there's no self-talk there for them. They just walk into the room and that's how they behave.

Donna Eade: 20:28

But behind that is I'm scared of interacting with, I'm scared of rejection. I, you know there's some sort of inner talk there that has told them that they're not going to perform well in this environment and their actions are showing it. But they're not necessarily. It's almost like it's just automated. So they're not necessarily hearing. Oh god, you can't do this. They just go in and they behave the way they've always behaved. So somebody's not actually hearing their inner talk. What would you say to them? Like if, if, if, they're a way of them tuning into it.

Dawn Ledet: 20:59

Start the conversation truly it's start the conversation if you're not hearing it, because that's what it is. It's happening subconsciously, or or it's there and you've drowned it out for so long that you just aren't attuned to it. So we have to, um, start engaging in the conversation. So maybe you start it like hey, hon, why are we scared? Like why are we here to be in the corner? And so maybe you start it like hey, hon, why are we scared? Like why are we here to be in the corner? And if not, let's look at how can I support myself through this? Because, going back to like what you were saying with the goals, and so part of it is owning our choices not to.

Dawn Ledet: 21:34

But then the other piece is how we manage discomfort and what we're sharing. In this analogy of someone going into a networking event, there's discomfort. Yes, behind that discomfort is often fear. Really, that's what it all boils down to is, most of the time is fear, fear of something, fear of failure, fear of embarrassment, fear of humiliation. So what we want to do is get in touch with that and create eight comforts that support us moving forward.

Dawn Ledet: 22:07

So I write about creating a comfort plan because our default comforts are the things that we end up judging ourselves for, like standing in the corner instead of engaging, turning on Netflix, scrolling through social media, you know, just giving up going to eat something or get something to drink. Comforts in themselves aren't wrong, but if they're pulling you away from what you want, then they are comforts that aren't very comfortable to your long-term success. They don't actually work for you and you end up judging yourself and going down a cycle. So engaging in that conversation and giving yourself comforts, honoring yes, this is uncomfortable. It's uncomfortable because it's new, or because I have a fear, or because I just don't know what to expect, and that's okay.

Donna Eade: 23:08

How can I take care of myself and do it anyway, yeah, which reminds me of that fantastic book Feel the Fear and Do it Anyway. I think it's a book that we all should read. So we've started this conversation with our inner dialogue that is berating us and putting us down and scaring the life out of us. I mean, some of us must have a fantastic inner dialogue that are actually really supportive of us and you know, if you're one of those people, come and introduce yourself to me sometime. I'd really like to have a conversation. But you say that we can change this inner dialogue. But you say that we can change this inner dialogue. So what are some tips that we can give the listeners on how they can start to change those scripts that they have, especially when they're such ingrained scripts that might be generational, that might have been there for a very long time, that we've just like convinced ourselves there's no opportunity, we're just useless at whatever it is. How can we start to actually change those scripts? What can we do it?

Dawn Ledet: 24:02

can be as simple as instead of even changing the script, it's just changing your relationship. You have with that, those scripts, and I love what you said about like some people don't recognize that. They're braiding. I didn't recognize it as that. It can often be much subtler. It can come in questions like the most like.

Dawn Ledet: 24:23

It seems like such an easy question what if I get it wrong? Like that's, like it's possible. Whenever I start on a new goal, it's like what if I get it wrong? But if I hear it without answering it, my brain is really good at going to find evidence. All of our brains love to prove us right. We love to answer questions and we love to prove ourselves right. So if we don't answer a, what if I get it wrong? With an actual answer, our brain goes and starts looking for all the ways we could get it wrong and then it starts bringing you other questions of doubt. It starts feeding that. So one practical tip is to answer the questions that present to us. So what if I get it wrong?

Dawn Ledet: 25:05

Could be as simple as we don't have to paint rainbows and daisies and make it like lie to ourselves. We want to be really honest. We're creating self-trust by creating a safe space within to be really honest, to roll through the challenges, to have our own back through the difficult. But we don't want to create more disconnect. We want to create more connections so that we have a unified front to those challenges and hard, because the challenges and hard come. We don't have to create them and we do so much better when we have a united front towards it. So we want to answer those questions very truthfully, like what if I get it wrong Could just be I could and I could get it right and I'm so ready to find out which. Yeah, like that is the way we can start to improve our self-talk in two ways answering the questions that present instead of letting our default brain go and answer them, and also paying attention to the tone. If you hear it with criticism, something, any statement could be really subtle.

Dawn Ledet: 26:10

sometimes it's like passive, aggressive or passiveness mine's definitely passive, aggressive right I, and so just answer those questions and also pay attention to the tone. If it comes across as critical or passive, aggressive, repeat it to yourself or even write it down and look at it just for the words. This actually works with other people too. I always tell people if you have teenagers, it's really nice to just erase the tone. People, too. I always tell people, if you have teenagers, it's really nice to just erase the tone. It's it's a practice, but when you just hear the words, you react in a way that supports you, and that's what it's all about. When you start believing that that tone is representative of either a truth, like we're buying into the judgment that I could get it wrong and that's a problem, instead of I could get it wrong, sometimes I get things wrong yeah not a problem yeah, oh, brilliant, so good, so good.

Donna Eade: 27:06

I think it's an absolutely fascinating topic because I think it's one that really affects everybody in their everyday lives and it's a big thing. But I think it's something we don't give enough time to, and in our businesses especially. You know, I've always said that's why I have this mindset. Part of this podcast is because you could have all of the right funnels in place, all of the right systems, all of the right connections, but if your inner self is saying you're going to fail, but if your inner self is saying you're going to fail, you're never going to make it, who do you think you are? And all of that kind of stuff, it doesn't matter, it's never going to work. Because you're telling yourself it's not going to work all the time.

Dawn Ledet: 27:57

It becomes this battle and some of us do get there Like, anyway, it's just so painful and it takes longer and it's so exhausting. That's what burnout looks like. It's like we're dragging ourself and pushing ourself and punishing ourselves across the finish line, when it could be this. I keep saying united front, but that's the way I really look at it. That's why I sort of don't like the self-sabotage talk is because it paints us as different pieces that are against us, and so I often like to invite you to have a lens of all of me is for me, because when all of me is for me, even with if my thoughts offer me, my brain offers me like that was stupid, I'm gonna be like yeah, girl, it was, and this is what I've learned from it.

Donna Eade: 28:45

It's totally fine yeah, yeah, brilliant, brilliant, oh. This was actually one of the words I had sentences that I had on my vision board last year was everything that is for me will find me. Um, so I loved, I love that a little bit, okay. So, moving on from that, we're going to dive into, we're going to talk about you a little bit now, dawn. Um. So I always like to ask my guests this question because, like I said, mindset is a big part of this podcast and I think it only serves others when we can share our own journeys and show people that you're not the only one going through this or dealing with these things, like we've all got our baggage to bear. Um, so, dawn, what's been the biggest mindset block that you've had to deal with in your business so far and what did you do to overcome it, or what are you doing to overcome it?

Dawn Ledet: 29:42

yes, well, the biggest thing was really quieting some of those external voices. There's amazing experts out there and they're all brilliant, but then they can contradict, they can compliment in a way, but it can become confusing, and I had to quiet that and also decide that my voice was worth listening to, and that took some time. That was why I did that consumption fast, because I needed to reconnect and I was seeing parts of me as against me and it just felt like a constant battle and I'd done it for 20 years successfully, and so that was tough to tease out and to create this united front in a way that's not only honored, that I am worth listening to myself and I can help others as well. But the biggest, I would say, statement I don't know if anyone else will will recognize this one, but the one that would come up for me that was very sneaky because I thought it was just kind of funny. I would say, like what's wrong with me? Like what's wrong with me Anytime I would do something.

Dawn Ledet: 31:04

That was just a little bit of a mistake Like what's wrong with me, and it didn't feel terrible for me to say it. Nice, but I recognized after a lot still, having done this work. It was still coming up and I started then noticing like, okay, I'm asking this question and I'm not answering it, and my brain's going to go. Look for things to tell me, to show me. Here you go, here's what's wrong with you. Remember when you didn't do this 20 years ago?

Dawn Ledet: 31:32

and remember yesterday when this happened, and, hey, you know what that means about your future, because that's what it does yeah and so I started by answering it with everything and nothing, because that also made me laugh, but the truth is that's still not the right thing. I do not encourage your audience to answer it with nothing, because the true answer is nothing. Nothing is wrong with any of us. We have a perfectly working human brain that likes to prove us right, and so what we want to do is give it things to prove right that support us in our growth and moving forward, and so it's a true answer to that question. If anyone listening has, it is nothing, and you can always answer it with that. And now that is my answer.

Donna Eade: 32:20

That's beautiful and I just love the fact that it was like completely goes back to what you were saying in the beginning about tone. It's like your brain doesn't recognize tone. So it's like you were joking, like what's wrong with me? In fact, I did it today. I was with a colleague on um, uh, on teams, and I was saying something to her and I was like, yeah, I've just been working on that um, um, and I had it right in front of me and I couldn't think of the words. And she was like, oh yeah, I know it.

Donna Eade: 32:46

I was like what on earth's wrong with me, like you know, and it was joking, but exactly what you said didn't answer the question. The brain goes and just finds the answers for you. So it doesn't matter whether you're joking or not, and it's like the brain's so intelligent but then so stupid at the same time. You know, it's like the brain can't tell the difference between reality and non-reality. So if you tell it one thing, it's going to believe it. So it's it's like it's crazy how that works. But I, I love that. That was so beautiful that it came back to tone. Um, tell us a little bit more about this consumption fast. What did that look like for you?

Dawn Ledet: 33:22

well, I am embarrassed to say that this consumption fast was supposed to be for three months and it lasted three years, but it was. It a really so much beauty came out of it and I'll share why I wanted to do it was to. It was around the time that I recognized truly this is obviously over three years ago now where I recognized that I needed to access my own inner wisdom. I wanted to tune in and get through the lobby and I needed. I wasn't even really in the lobby, I was outside, listening to all the experts and all the voices and all the friends and the family, and they're amazing. Nothing against any of them, but I wanted to.

Dawn Ledet: 34:10

It was my goal, as someone who was becoming an expert in self-trust, to access my own inner wisdom and to see what that meant and what it looked like. So the consumption bass for me was not listening to podcasts, not reading books, um, not watching tv, listening to only certain types of music and not all the time, because I would have I don't know if people identify with this, but I would have a TV on in every room just to have the noise going on, a podcast, probably in my ears, an audible book beside the bed Like it was a constant barrage of consumption, and so I went to true silence, and it made a world of difference.

Donna Eade: 35:00

Wow, that is. And I mean we are now in a world of just consumption, consumption, consumption. And when I think back to you know, when I was a child we had four TV channels here in the UK and that was it. And so it was reading or one of those four channels or the radio, and that was all we had. And now it's almost like well, partly because of our phones, I suppose, is you can now read books on your phone, you can listen to books on your phone, you can watch TV on your phone, you can listen to music on your phone, so you can do everything from this one device that is literally glued to everybody's hand 24-7, 24-7, 365., so therefore it's just always there.

Donna Eade: 35:50

And interesting that a school in birmingham has recently I think it was birmingham has recently given their students the opportunity to give up their phone while they're at school.

Donna Eade: 36:05

So they've created these like lockers for each classroom.

Donna Eade: 36:08

They're just sort of big boxes with foam inserts and the students come in first thing in the morning, they go to their classes locker, they put their phone into one of these foam inserts and they get locked away for the day, and then they come back at the end of the day and get them, and there was a documentary on another school, I think it was same sort of area where they actually just gave up their phones for an entire month, so didn't have to even have them at home, and the difference it made to the children was phenomenal. So I can well believe that what you did was an amazing experience, and I feel like we should all like we talk about doing digital detoxes and things like that, little things where we don't do X, y, z, but I think to go back to a, to a time where everything's not at our fingertips and we just slow down a little bit, can only do good for our brains. So I love that you did this and I love that three months turned into three that three months turned into three.

Dawn Ledet: 37:14

That's how amazing it was. There was a lot to listen to within my brain for one, but also just started connecting to because, like you said, it's so over consumption, we get so used to it. And so just being able to take walks without music or words in my ears and noticing the sounds of nature, and paying attention to other people giggle or you know it just you connect into yourself and to the universe, yeah, in a way, but you don't exactly absolutely.

Donna Eade: 37:50

So now that you have come back, were there things that you put in place before you started to consume again, sort of any rules that you put in place to not lead you back to the stuck to your phone 24, seven and or how has it been coming back into that world?

Dawn Ledet: 38:20

How has it been coming back into that world? How have you managed it and sort of looked after yourself to make sure that you're not losing that wonderful peaceful time? You had probably a year, maybe six months, but six months to a year more than it probably needed to be, because I developed a fear that there was a risk to that connection and that access to my inner wisdom by bringing in outside voices and outside noise. And at some point I recognized that that was the fear and I realized that what was happening is I had attributed that also in a way to connecting. Like I wasn't connecting with people that mattered to me that were online, because that would mean me spending more time online. So, like our brains love to do the all or nothing, I had sort of slipped into the all or nothing and I knew it was time to introduce the and back in.

Dawn Ledet: 39:24

So when you ask about rules, I didn't set any. I just trusted that I was going to find the balance that worked for me and so far I have. And if I noticed that I am spending a little too much time, say I'll watch a show and it's like oh, I watched like three episodes of that show last night, I'd be like, okay, maybe I want to limit that to two, or maybe that's cool on a Saturday, but while I'm cleaning cause I often am multitasking, as many of us do I'm not actually paying attention. But so that is part of it is just recognizing and knowing, like as I, as I bring things in, seeing if, if I'm starting to do it a little bit more than I might want to, might just be what I need right now. It doesn't have to be all or nothing and it doesn't have to be either. Um, you know this, three hours is the limit. I don't want to set those kinds of boundaries.

Donna Eade: 40:23

I love that. Do you know what I love? I love that you've just brought it full circle, because this is just taking me back to your all or nothing with your car and walking to work. You know so, you, you, you at that time turned around and said why am I making it such a big thing that I've got to do to make myself do this? It doesn't need to be that way, and you've just proved that it doesn't need to be that way with this fast. You took the fast, you. You didn't consume anything, but you're able to balance it now that you've come back, and I think it is always good to kind of have those sort of hard stops. So having that break and saying like I'm doing nothing because I want to reset and then coming back to it is, is also a good thing. So I love that such brilliant conversation. Thank you so much, dawn. Yeah, really appreciate it.

Donna Eade: 41:11

I'm gonna go through our quickfire round and then I know that you've got a very special seven day challenge to talk about. So let's do my quickfire questions and then I'll let you talk about your challenge. So the first question is what is the podcast that you enjoy listening to the most? Now you're back to consuming a bit right, so we've four.

Dawn Ledet: 41:29

I used to listen to love your life. It's Jennifer Bailey. It's like a law of attraction podcast, but I just love her vibe and so I'm catching up on some of hers and that's been really fun.

Donna Eade: 41:41

Brilliant and the book that's made the biggest impact on your life so far.

Dawn Ledet: 41:47

Easily, probably with the exception of your own, absolutely. It's called the Game of Life and how to Play. Play it. It's this short book by a woman. She wrote it, I think, in the 1800s, but it's changed the way I saw so many things in life fantastic, okay, one to put on the reading list.

Donna Eade: 42:06

And then what's your go-to snack if you're in a hurry almonds or a spoon of peanut butter always. I love it when people say peanut butter, peanut butter is my favorite. And then what is your ultimate me time thing to do?

Dawn Ledet: 42:22

oh, I love to put on music and bake bread love bread.

Donna Eade: 42:29

That that sounds like an amazing Saturday afternoon thing to do.

Dawn Ledet: 42:34

It hits all the senses Beautiful smells. You're getting your hands in dough. You have this sound. It's great.

Donna Eade: 42:41

Brilliant Love that. Okay. Thank you so much for answering those questions. Now tell everybody about your seven-day challenge that they can get hold of.

Dawn Ledet: 42:50

Yes, if you just want to reconnect with your self-trust, know kind of that you have it, because many of us like to say we don't, I can't trust myself as a common phrase, I can't trust myself around this food, I can't trust myself to work out, I can't trust. And I want to tell you that you absolutely can. So come to my seven day self-trust boost series. It will take you moments, literally moments a day. It's just an email series, an email a day for seven days, to reconnect you to your self-trust and to start seeing how you can apply it to the three things it takes to achieve anything, and that's make decisions, follow through and have your own back. And you can find that at the self-trust coachcom.

Donna Eade: 43:36

Brilliant. I will have the link for you in the show notes, guys, along with how to connect with Dawn. Um, thank you so much again, dawn, for coming on today. It's been a fabulous conversation. Oh, it's been such an honor. Okay, guys, I want to make sure that you have your tickets for my in-person event on the 3rd of April. So if you haven't yet got them, go to donnaecom forward slash birthday event and grab your tickets. If there are any early bird tickets left, you will be able to grab those. So make sure you head over. I would love to see you in person and get to do all of this kind of thing in real life with you. So make sure you do that, and I will be back next week with a solo episode. So I'll see you then. Bye for now.