Bending Reality to Achieve True Happiness (Without Burnout!) with Victoria Song

This episode is sponsored by BELAY. Visit belaysolutions.com/million for your free download of their CEO’s new ebook: Rise Up and Lead Well. Accomplish More. Juggle Less. Modernized Staffing Solutions From BELAY.

Victoria Song is a leadership advisor to visionary founders, billionaire CEOs, and celebrities. A Forbes 30 Under 30 investor and Yale and Harvard alumna, Victoria has helped her clients achieve multi-billion dollar exits, write patents in 24 hours, and more. She is the author of the new book, Bending Reality, designed to help readers tap into their hidden potential, so they make the impossible probable by accessing extraordinary (seemingly supernatural) abilities they didn’t even know they had.

“When you start to learn how to live from the inside out, you’ll start to motivate yourself based on this more renewable, sustainable, expansive fuel of your truth and what matters to you.” – Victoria Song

Episode Highlights:

• The difference between contraction and expansion (And how to transition from contraction to expansion)
• Acknowledging your feelings and emotions (How to tap your emotional intelligence)
• How body sensation affects your decision-making and success
• How to get through with burnout and find sustainability in business
• How the world’s most successful achieve more without burnout

Website:

VictoriaSong.me

Book:

Bending Reality (Coming out on August 24th)

Connect with Victoria:

Instagram
LinkedIn

Transcript: Download

Video Transcription provided by GMR Transcription Services.

Jaime:	Welcome to Eventual Millionaire! I am Jaime Masters, and today on the show – now, I interview some really absolutely amazing people, but when I got Victoria Song’s bio, my mind was blown. She’s a Forbes 30 under 30, she’s both been an alumni of Harvard and Yale, her clients have had multi-billion dollar exits, and her new book is coming out on August 24th called Bending Reality. Thanks so much for coming on the show today!

Victoria:	Thanks for having me, Jaime! I’m so excited to be here!

Jaime:	I’m pretty sure every single human that’s listening to this right now wants to know how to bend reality, so why the title of the book, and tell me a little bit more?

Victoria:	Yeah, so Bend Reality had to make the impossible probable. I do believe that when we cultivate the right physical, emotional, and intellectual stage, we can actually do what appears to be bending reality. So, bending time, collapsing time, being able to access downloads, synchronicities, all the things that we hear about that seem almost Whoa-sounding. I do actually believe there is a science, there’s evidence, and there is proof with my clients here. Mostly engineers, who are not spiritual, who are mostly atheist, agnostic, nihilist, and they too have been able to bend reality.

Jaime:	I so appreciate this. I used to be an engineer also, and I was very in that camp until I started interviewing a whole bunch of people and going, “Oh, maybe there’s more.” And there’s science that now thankfully is catching up a little bit better that shows that. But it still feels kind of difficult to figure out what piece goes where, right? Because there’s no rulebook, or anything like that. So, hopefully your book will go into more detail. Can you tell me a little bit more where we start in regards to all this?

Victoria:	Yeah, so I wanted this book to feel super accessible to people who are like yourself, coming from an engineering background who are more left-brain and analytical. And so, all the words I use are super grounded in this reality. So, one of the first meta frameworks that I share is the difference between contraction and expansion. And so, I can ask you right now to think of a time this past week when something happened that you didn’t like, that maybe brought up some stress or anxiety. Can you imagine one of those events this past week?

Jaime:	I have children, so I have many.

Victoria:	Yeah, and so as you can imagine, this is that state of contraction where it’s doesn’t feel good. There’s an unpleasant feeling. It changes our breath work, it changes our tightening of our chest. Sometimes we feel it in our belly. So, this is a state that many entrepreneurs live in. And many people in general. Especially during the pandemic when there’s uncertainty in the unknown. So, most of us because we value safety, get very scared when there’s anything that feels like, “Oh no, we don’t know what’s gonna happen.” That loss of control, the loss of knowing creates contraction. 

And when we’re in that state of contraction, we tend to have this fight / flight response which narrows our perception of what’s possible. We don’t realize we’re getting very black and white with possibility. We only see yes, no, right, wrong, good, bad, and that’s all we have access to. And so, this is the first state that I really go into teaching like, “Okay, well what causes contraction, what are the thoughts, what are the emotions, what are the events in our life that can cause that, and where does it come from? What’s the programming, what’s the coding?” You’re an engineer. How are we programmed actually to be in contraction from our own family life? 

From our own upbringing from the culture society system’s programming? And then, the second state then is, “Okay, well I don’t wanna live in contraction.” And so, then the state that I talk about is expansion. So, if you reflect on this past week, what was a moment where you felt really lit up, happy, joyful, grateful? Can you think of one?

Jaime:	Oh, definitely. Laying on the grass with just my head on the ground.

Victoria:	Yes. Perfect, yes. Being in nature, sometimes being in beauty. And in that state, how much access to creativity or inspiration do you have access to then?

Jaime:	So much more. Yeah, I do.

Victoria:	Yeah, and so this is a state that I really train the nervous systems of my clients to start to make their default state. So, how do we program this in so that even though you’re conditioned to being in contraction, over time, we unravel and calm the nervous system so that you attune to these feeling states of, “Oh, everything’s possible. I trust. Everything’s great. I’m okay. I’m safe.” All these things that when we’re in the state, it’s easy to tap into what our mission statement, our purpose, the impact you’re here to make, how we’re living our values, we feel more connected to our vision. What we want to happen, versus running away from something we don’t want to happen. 

So, in the book, I really lay through this meta-framework that I believe is what a lot of people are teaching. Not in these words, but I believe it’s the meta-framework behind peak performance, self-development, therapy, meditation, all these flow states, or even in the zone that athletes call it. I think there are these states of expansion that we can learn to really ground and stabilize.

Jaime:	I so appreciate you saying this, because when we look at most entrepreneurs, and I work with a lot of them, they live in a constant state of stress. And contraction. And they’re like, “UGH,” right? And in that state, it’s even harder to solve problems. And so, they don’t understand that they’re doing it to themselves. So, –

Victoria:	Mm-hmm.

Jaime:	– it’s a completely different shift though. How do you get clients of yours to go from that innate – and it’s not innate, but programming, feels innate, –

Victoria:	Yeah.

Jaime:	– to something completely different? ‘Cause I say meditation sometimes to clients, and they’re like, “I can’t do that. I just can’t.”

Victoria:	Yeah. Can’t sit still. Yeah, absolutely. So, one of the first things that I know is not fun, and nobody wants to do this, is people are very uncomfortable feeling their emotions. So, the reason why we avoid states of contraction is because as soon as we feel anxious, we wanna get ourselves out of it. We want to stop. And we learn this at a young age, where maybe we cried when we were babies, but then as we got older, our parents would be like, “Okay, stop. No. Don’t do that.” Or they bribe us, like, “Okay, fine. We’ll give you ice cream. Just stop crying.” 

And so, we learn at kind of a young age like, “Oh, okay, don’t feel my feelings. Especially unpleasant ones. It’s not safe. I’m just not gonna feel good in my system, so don’t go there.” But then, what happens is as you know, anytime you step outside your comfort zone, you feel unsafe, you feel the stress and anxiety, and this fear comes up. 

Maybe there’s guilt, maybe there’s shame, maybe there’s, “I need to prove something. I need to prove that I matter in the world.” And all of these feelings are very uncomfortable for people to feel, so they’d rather look the other way, or pretend it’s not there. And a lot of people even think that being intellectual means not feeling anything, and just not letting your emotions get in the way. 

But what people don’t realize is whether or not you acknowledge them, our feelings are absolutely driving the show. And so, one of the first things I teach my clients is this sense of emotional intelligence. So, how can we be with our emotions, how do we learn to ride the stress and anxiety, how do we learn to be with and stay expansive, even in that place of uncertainty? How do we stay calm and relaxed even when we’re feeling something we don’t wanna feel? ‘Cause I think that is ultimately where the power lies, or the untapped powers, or ability to sit in the discomfort of that unknown, and of that unfamiliarity, and of the stress and anxiety that most people are trying to avoid. 

So, yes, there’s a lot of power that comes from, “Okay, just actually sit and allow yourself for a moment to admit to yourself that you’re scared to feel the sadness, to feel whatever it is that’s coming up.”

Jaime:	Yeah, okay. So, so many questions in regards to this. ‘Cause I used to cut myself off at the neck and be like, “Well, I’m smart, and I don’t feel negative feelings.” That was my engineer brain back then. I was like, “Oh, I only feel good things.” That doesn’t work by the way, people. That was really really painful in the long run. But feeling my feelings was even hard. I’d sit there and go, “I got nothing.”

Victoria:	Yeah.

Jaime:	It was hard to tap into. What happens if somebody sort of doesn’t feel like they can even understand what scared feels like?

Victoria:	That’s such a great question, ‘cause most of my clients are in the same boat. They’re really disconnected from their bodies. It’s almost like the more intellectual you are, the more high-achieving you are, the less connected you are to anything below your neck. And so, this is where most of my clients are when they find me. And I would say that less important than naming the story, and the why, and trying to think about the emotion, it’s really as simple as when I asked you, “Okay, what does contraction feel like to your body? Okay, it’s tightening the chest, or noticing your breathing change.” And at the beginning, you might actually go blank. I’m like, “What’s going on in your body,” and you’re like, “I think…”

Jaime:	Seriously, yeah.

Victoria:	And as we do the work to relax and calm the nervous system, whether that looks like moving energy through your breath, movement, or sounds – and sounds like you might meditate, sounds like you have your ways of moving energy through your system – we do start to loosen the nervous system, which I believe allows us to feel more. So, most of us who feel numb, it’s because our nervous systems are quite tight and wound up. And it’s doing that to protect yourselves, ‘cause it’s like, “Okay, I don’t wanna feel too much of anything.” The more neutral we feel, the better. And as you were saying, you can’t actually just feel good emotions and avoid bad emotions, ‘cause it’s just energy. 

So, you’re cutting yourself off from all of it. And so, one of the first things I do when I work with anyone is just to give them the tools to start to unravel their nervous system. So, breathwork, for instance, is a great way to do that. And then, we go really slow. We really meet the nervous system where it’s at. So, sometimes, a wall goes up, you feel numb immediately at the question. For other people, it is just really basic like, “Okay, I just notice my breathing is getting a little shallow. Okay, great.” And so, we just bring it into the sensational awareness of it. 

I know in therapy, and in a lot of other places, we tend to think the value is in talking about it, and trying to understand the root cause of it, and the why, and tracing it back to your family. And I do think that there is some value there, but it can give you a false sense of, “I’m feeling my emotion.” Though what you’re doing is you’re actually thinking about the emotion and your story, and that person caused it, and then it’s this person’s fault. And it’s like, “Nope. None of that is actually processing the emotion, and until we process the emotion, it’s frozen in the body.” 

So, that’s a key reason why we do this work, is we want to loosen up, and release all those stuck energy patterns, so that we really have that freedom to access the quantum field of possibility. All possibilities that ever was, could, or will exist are all there. But when we’re in contraction, we only see, “I can do this or that. It’s either this kind of success or this kind of failure.” Or, “I can either hire this person or fire this person.” And it’s so binary, and we don’t even realize that we cut ourself off from so many possibilities.

Jaime:	I remember someone being like, “Oh, lean more into your intuition,” after many interviews. It was like, “Okay, great.” And then I was like, “I can’t feel that,” right? And so, I would immediately say, “I don’t know.” And I remember somebody going, “What if you did know.” And so, I’d sit with that for a long period of time. And knowingly. Don’t get me wrong. I have ADD, so my brain goes everywhere, right? And it’s work though, to sit with your emotions. Even though they don’t technically last very long. Can you tell me how – this is me wanting to know a timeline, which I know you can’t give me.

Victoria:	Yeah.

Jaime:	But how long can it take for somebody to start really embodying their feelings, and sort of going through them, acknowledging them, and moving through them like we’re, “Supposed to,” even though most of us don’t?

Victoria:	Absolutely. So, I really believe that however long your body can be with at a time, it’s like every time you let yourself go there, you give your body that repetition and muscle memory of like, “Oh, I’m safe. I can go here.” And then, so I do believe that it’s almost like an onion, where you peel off the first layer, then you go deeper the next time, and you keep getting to go deeper. So, I wouldn’t say that it’s sort of a one-and-done, like if you know you did it for 30 minutes, then you’re officially done for life. It is really like, okay, trusting that once you allow yourself to fully go there, you’ll feel as much as you can. So, whatever 100% of its entirety feels like in that moment, that’s what you do.

And then, if you do allow yourself to do that, you have access to new insights. I’ll ask you, after you do feel an emotion, even if it’s one minute or two minutes, do you notice new shifts in awareness and insights and information, and… how do you feel?

Jaime:	Yeah, I’m becoming a lot more sensitive to all of the things now, comparatively to before. Do you know what I mean? One thing is to cut it off, another thing is to be like, “Oh, I feel like I can potentially even have three or four different emotional feelings in my body at once.” Which is also like, “Oh wow, that’s a whole…” It just feels complex.

Victoria:	Yes.

Jaime:	Which is interesting.

Victoria:	I love that you said that, because one of the things I encourage people to say is a part of me feels sad. A part of me feels excited. A part of me feels worried. A part of me feels grateful. To start to allow yourself to know, “Oh, there’s all these different parts.”

Jaime:	Yeah.

Victoria:	It’s not one-dimensional. And I think sometimes, we tend to say, “I’m angry,” or, “I’m upset,” or, “I’m sad.” And it’s like, “Oh no, now you feel identified with your emotion, which makes it even harder to feel anything.” And so, just acknowledging like, “Okay, a part of me feels this way, a part of me feels that way.” And letting yourself process and release it. So, to answer your question, something really simple that people can do is just to drop into their body, even close their eyes, and take a couple of deep breaths, and they can just feel in, and say, “Okay, what do I notice? Is there any tightness anywhere in my body?” 

And as they breathe, can they breathe deeply into their belly? Noticing that horizontal breath versus the vertical breath. ‘Cause when we breathe, it tends to go into fight or flight. So, it’s like, “Can I expand my belly?” And a lot of people don’t soften their belly. And that’s kind of a key piece of feeling, is like, “Oh, can I actually breathe and soften my belly?” And then from there, you say, “Okay, I’m noticing it’s hard to breathe into my belly.” Okay, great. Go there. Imagine there’s a dial and you’re turning it up to a 10 and feel that. And then, you’re like, “Okay. Ooh, going into it, I’ve never tried to intensify the discomfort.” 

And then, they actually learn to turn up the discomfort, and they’re like, “Wow, okay. Interesting. I’m going into the store. I can feel my chest is getting tighter, ‘cause I’m like, ‘Can I do this?’ Am I gonna be okay?’” And then the mind is like, “What do I do? I don’t wanna feel this. What do I do about it?” And it’s like, “No, can I just stay with it? Can I drop back into my body, so I notice the thoughts going on? Can I come back into the sensation, the physical moment? This moment, what do I feel?” And then, almost following it like a white rabbit, like, “Okay, now I’m noticing it from my belly to my chest. Okay, now it’s tightness in my throat. Ooh, there’s achiness in my back.” 

Just allowing yourself to follow it throughout your system. So, there are tons of tools and techniques. ‘Cause as you mentioned, it’s not easy to do. And so, the book is filled with – at the end of every chapter, it’s like, “Here’s 30 different ways to process the emotion.”

Jaime:	Wow, that’s awesome! I can’t wait for the book. ‘Cause I mean, it’s funny, the reason why I said I was laying on the grass is ‘cause I’ve been meditating for almost 14 years. And I noticed when I would sit in mediation for at least 10 minutes, I could feel my digestion actually working again. ‘Cause when I’m cut off, –

Victoria:	Yeah.

Jaime:	– I was so tense. And so, I’d go, and I’d literally just go lay on the ground outside for 10 or 15 minutes, and go, “Oh, my digestive’s working again.” Which is something that –

Victoria:	Yeah.

Jaime:	– I had no idea wasn’t working to begin with very well beforehand.

Victoria:	Totally. Yeah, the rest and digest, it sounds like you activated from just that calm parasympathetic breathing.

Jaime:	Well, I’ve lived a lot of my life in the fight or flight mode. And like you said, a lot of people that I interview have, and a lot of clients have.

Victoria:	Until you learn you have been, yeah.

Jaime:	Yeah. Well, and I think that’s what’s so interesting though. And I want you if you can, paint a picture of why we care about body sensation. How is that going to affect our decision-making and our success? Because usually, if we can’t hook those two things together, most entrepreneurs will be like, “Screw my emotions,” right?

Victoria:	Yeah, totally. So, I would say that when my clients find me, they often think there’s some secret tactical thing they haven’t learned, or some strategy for success, or some blueprint. And then, once we start working, they realize that the things that are hard for them are like, “Well, having difficult conversations is hard, failing is hard, making mistakes is hard, giving and receiving feedback is hard, managing and inspiring their teams is hard.” And then, you learn behind all of these skillsets is your emotional intelligence. Like, “How are you with discomfort? Can you sit through that, and are you okay with someone else having discomfort in front of you?” 

And these are all things that a lot of my engineering clients are like, “I don’t wanna deal with that,” or, “Why can’t we just be robots and just get the job done?” That ultimately this is just reality. This is just the human experience. Feelings are the human experience. And when it comes to – you know how like an econ, and there’s all these sort of disciplines where it’s like, “If you lived in a perfect model where the world lived rationally, and everyone was this way, then sure this is your output.” But the truth of it is that we don’t live in these simplistic, closed systems. We actually have all of these wild cards, and the mind wants to create black and white reality, right? 

The mind wants to think it knows everything, it has a certainty. But the truth is there’s so much to life that is uncertain, especially if you chose an entrepreneurship as your career. And so, being able to ride out the waves of stress and anxiety that come with that much uncertainty, in my opinion, makes or breaks successful entrepreneurs, and ones who fail. Yeah, so the ones that I see can stay in a seat of expansion. So, I’ll give you some concrete examples. 

When a client comes to me with a desire to prove something, maybe somebody told them they can never be a CEO, or maybe someone tried to move up the ranks in their existing company, but then hit a glass ceiling, and didn’t know why they weren’t promoted. So then, they go off on their own, and they wanna prove that they’re gonna be so successful, everyone’s gonna know their name. And that is unfortunately a lot of the driving motivation that I find for people, right? They wanna prove they matter, they wanna prove they have something to contribute. To me, this is a very toxic fuel that is very rooted in contraction, right? It’s rooted in fear, it’s rooted in the scarcity, this lack of competition. 

And I was this way when I first got out of my school. You go to Yale and Harvard, you’re constantly trying to climb the ladder, you wanna prove that you’re smart, that you can be successful enough. And then, I find that even when I was an investor, these were the kind of entrepreneurs that not only would proving something be toxic to them, but it would be a really toxic environment. A culture. How they treat their employees. What they value. All of that kind of bleeds out. It’s a very toxic fuel. That is also what I believe leads to burnout. So, the people who are constantly burning out, I think it’s because they’ve been pushing themselves through this more contractive motivation. 

And so, then, what would be a more expansive motivation? So, one of the things that I really help my clients connect to is beyond their emotions, once they can be with whatever arises, we go, “Okay, well what actually matters to you? Can we connect to your sense of mission? Why does this company matter? Why does what you do matter?” And when they can connect to a mission, that can pull them through most of their problems, or any limiting beliefs. The other thing we connect to both at a personal level and a company level is their values, right? How do we operationalize your values, and make sure that everything becomes a statement of who you are, what matters to you? 

Not like ethics, but truly what’s important to you? What lights you up? And this is why I think life coaches, and business coaches, and everyone coach talks about these things. And then, the other thing that I believe really gets us into our zone of genius is the thing that feels like play for us. So, when we’re doing a podcast here, this is fun for you. We don’t have to be motivated to do what is fun for us.

Jaime:	Mm-hmm.

Victoria:	And so, that’s the other thing, is finding that sweet spot, whether or not you’re good at it. If you don’t like it, don’t do it. If you don’t love the thing you’re really good at, just delegate it. And that’s a core thing that I think a lot of entrepreneurs struggle with. And so, that’s another core piece of it. And then, really, as we talk about loving what you do, I know we hear this all the time that it feels trite, but really, loving what you do the way an athlete loves the game, or an engineer loves problem-solving, that’s going to get you motivated by more sustainable, renewable fuel, instead of the ones that lead to burnout.

Jaime:	Okay, I wanna break all this down. ‘Cause you went exactly where I was going. ‘Cause burnout is a huge deal. And I know that having something that sort of recharges, like you said, really makes it sustainable. And unfortunately, entrepreneurship is unsustainable for many many people. And I just also wanna highlight that your clients aren’t tiny business on main street. You have the CEO of Honey, who sold to PayPal. You know what I mean? You have clients that are learning this stuff also at the cutting edge of what everything is right now. And so, I’m sure they have burnout sort of going through. 

So, can you give me some examples of how some people can turn burnout – ‘cause what I see even with my clients is when they’re starting to the edge of burnout, they’re like, “Oh, I know I can’t do this anymore.” And yet, they’re so contracted, using your word, is that they can’t see what the other side looks like without doing the same thing that they’ve always done forever. You know what I’m talking about?

Victoria:	Mm-hmm. Absolutely. Yeah, I think one of the problems is that if you don’t bring in sort of an objective eye to look at what you’re doing, you do tend to repeat, and the things that you’re repeating tend to create more contraction, right? So, let me become a bootcamp coach, and just sort of punish myself, and yell at myself, and judge myself, and tell myself I’m not good enough.

Jaime:	Yes. That’s so true.

Victoria:	And before you know it, you’re like, “Oh great, you’re in a deeper hole of contraction.”

Jaime:	Yes.

Victoria:	So, absolutely. And one of the things that I find that people struggle with was giving themselves permission to actually feel good before they hit the ultimate goal or milestone. And that includes like, “Can you celebrate your wins in the meantime,” right? And so, one of the things I think is really important is that people don’t realize the way they compound their emotions. 

They tend to compound them toward the negative into a spiraling state where they’re like, “Oh no, I don’t have the success. I feel like a failure. I’m a loser. Oh my God, they’re gonna laugh at me. What will people think?” And then, before you know it, they feel so sad, they feel depressed, they feel scared. That’s what people are used to. What I really help my clients do is like, “Well, how do we get you into compounding your positive emotions?”

Jaime:	Mm-hmm.

Victoria:	Meaning like, “Okay, wow. Great, we hit our milestone!” Before we move on to the next milestone, why don’t we pause and say, “Wow, I’m so grateful, and so happy, and so thrilled.” Let’s celebrate. Let’s actually get into a practice of celebration where the celebration is really throwing a party in gratitude. In honor of like, “I’m so grateful this happened.” 

And then when you start to create that upward spiral of positivity, again you get into this more expansive state where everything feels possible, you’re in joy, you’re in bliss. Left to our own devices, we will choose safety over joy, and bliss, and rapture. And so, it does require this constant reminder of like, “Okay, great. Don’t burn out. Go on a vacation. Give yourself permission to enjoy yourself.” So, a lot of entrepreneurs feel guilty –

Jaime:	Mmm.

Victoria:	– for going on vacation. They’re like, “Oh, I’ve taken off too much time. I need to go back. Oh, three days. I feel restless. I need to get back online.”

Jaime:	Mm-hmm.

Victoria:	And it is interesting to see what people’s receiving muscle is. It’s almost like we have these upper limits on how much joy we’re used to letting into our life. And so, part of the reason why I believe my clients have been able to be so successful is they learn the value of, “How do you enjoy life while you reach for more?” How do you set those big goals, and find that by celebrating, and enjoying every moment, and being grateful, and taking vacations, you actually become more productive, more successful, and you can hit bigger goals as a result?

So, this is a key kind of misconception, I feel like, that we feel like there’s a badge of honor to be working hard all the time, not realizing that it’s just like you’re running yourself into the ground like a horse, versus – and I’ve had unicorn companies, but I joke like, “You think you just need to run faster, but there’s actually a way to have wings and feel like you’re flying.”

Jaime:	I definitely do. The hustle culture mentality makes it seem like it’s mutually exclusive. Like I can’t have both, so I have to let one go in order to have – I can’t have success and vacation at the same time. And –

Victoria:	Yeah.

Jaime:	– that’s not how – it’s crazy how often it’s hard to get somebody to celebrate.

Victoria:	Yeah.

Jaime:	The resistance that comes up from celebration – which is part of the joy of life.

Victoria:	Right.

Jaime:	Why do we resist it so hard? Why do you think they resist it so hard?

Victoria:	Well, one thing is waiting for the other shoe to drop. There’s this feeling of like, “Oh, let’s not celebrate ‘til we’ve hit it consistently.” And by the time you’ve hit it consistently, you’re over it, and you don’t think it’s a big deal, and then you’re like, “Oh, we need to set a bigger goal now.” And then, they think that the reason they don’t feel more is because the goal they need to hit, it needs to be bigger. So, I’ve had clients who were like, “Oh my God, I’ve heard the biggest news of my life,” whether that was becoming a billionaire, or becoming a parent. And they’re like, “I didn’t feel much.” And then, be like, “Oh, that must mean that it wasn’t big enough, or I need to set my sights on something greater.”

And it’s like, “No, you’ve just been numb. You don’t feel much of anything.” And they’ve been priding themselves off of like, “Well, as an entrepreneur, I need to write out the highs and lows, and so by minimizing the impact the lows have on me, I’ve made myself numb and neutral. Which I felt like it was serving me, but now I also can’t enjoy my life. I don’t feel joy, I don’t feel alive, I don’t feel any of that life force energy that we’ve learned is possible.” 

And so, that’s why again, you feel the emotions that you improve your emotional intelligence so that you have access to your aliveness, so that you actually feel, “Wow, I’m living life.” ‘Cause that’s the other thing, is we tend to only remember things that are tied to an emotional state. And so, we think we want our lives to be like this, but if our lives were like that, we wouldn’t remember anything. It would be this neutral state where we’re like, “Oh wow, the years flew by. What happened? I don’t remember.” And it’s really in the ups and downs that we are conscious and awake where we’re like, “Oh wow, this is really hard, or this is really fine.” 

And so again, it’s like how can you be more awake to life and have more memories and more awareness of the life you’ve lived, and actually you do need the ups and downs. As much as you think you don’t like them in the moment, that’s how we can separate the seasons of our life.

Jaime:	Yeah, you can’t tell what a down is if you don’t have an up, and you can’t tell of the opposite, right? You can’t tell what an up is if we don’t have that context to be able to go through it. But I also know that when I was sort of – and even still now – I was like, “Well, I don’t want my emotions to be all-consuming, because then I’ve got stuff to do. I don’t like being not in control, and it feels so like I’m riding the wave of whatever patterns, even negative patterns, that I don’t even want to do.” So, I get that we need to sort of reprogram ourselves, but it feels like in order to do that, if you open the floodgates, I won’t get anything done.

Victoria:	Yeah. No, I definitely hear you, and I would say don’t take any action from your place of feeling your emotions. So, if you’re feeling angry, I would say go yell into a pillow. Or go to a boxing class. Or go for a run. And so, I do think that these moments of processing can be contained. You can put it on your calendar, like, “I’m gonna work this through in my workout class.”

Jaime:	Yup.

Victoria:	Or, “I’m gonna work this through in breath work, or during mediation.” And ultimately, the reason why you wanna feel it to its state of completion is because you just wanna get back into that place of, “I feel okay again. I’m okay.” And part of why we feel these emotions and know we can be with them is ‘cause we wanna start training our bodies to know there’s nothing to fear. Don’t be afraid to take that bold action ‘cause you’re afraid you might fail. And then what? “Everyone’s gonna laugh at me.” Okay, now you feel judged. Well, why don’t you just feel that and be with that so you can teach your body like, “Oh, I’m okay.” Even if those things happen. 

“Even if I feel judged, even if I feel fear, I’m gonna be okay.” And then, once you do feel okay, you have this emotional freedom, where you’re no longer avoiding things, or avoiding people, or avoiding opportunities because you’re afraid. You’re gonna feel something on the other side if it doesn’t work out.

Jaime:	Definitely. It’s a lot more childlike than adultlike when it comes to something like that.

Victoria:	Yeah.

Jaime:	So, I mean, I have a heavy bag. I totally get you. I’m like, “I gotta hit something. I have a heavy bag in my workout room.” And it takes a lot less time than I assume. I project like, –

Victoria:	Yeah.

Jaime:	– “Oh, it’s gonna be this big –“and it’s usually not. But you said completion. How do you know when you’re at completion?

Victoria:	It is when you’re not resisting it. So, I think that if you feel it fully, and it goes away in a couple of minutes, great. Applaud yourself. You did it. Move on to the next thing. But it’s when we think in our head, “Oh, it’s gonna take forever, I don’t have time to go there. I don’t wanna go there right now.” All that resistance actually takes you more time. 

‘Cause not only does it take energy and exhaust you to try to hold it in, but you’re gonna actually be living and operating more from that state of contraction for longer, because you haven’t really felt it fully. And so, when I say feel fully, it doesn’t mean – instead of making up that story for why you can’t or don’t want to feel it, allow yourself to go there, and then actually surprise yourself. I find that it usually disappears as quickly as it comes on.

Jaime:	And that’s why I’m laughing also. ‘Cause it is. I’m usually like, “It’s this big, huge thing.” Anyway, yes. As you start –

Victoria:	Yeah.

Jaime:	– navigating through it, it’s like, “Oh, that wasn’t what I thought it was. Okay, great. Good to know.”

Victoria:	Yeah.

Jaime:	And it’s such a big deal. And I’ve got kids, so I’ve seen them go through crazy meltdowns, right? No matter what sort of level they’re at. And I can hold them and contain them. Why can’t I do that for myself? So, it’s just interesting how I have learned growing up that it was all in my head, or all in my body, and I couldn’t handle it. 

But what’s interesting is, especially going back to where we were talking about burnout – ‘cause when I have clients that are sort of teetering on this edge, they feel like the trajectory of getting over it or through it isn’t as simple as feeling things and recharging. Or joy. You know what I mean? So, can you give me a trajectory of an example of a client that you’ve worked through that sort of got through burnout, and then found sustainability in their business?

Victoria:	Yeah. I would say that they all know when they find me, they’ve been burned out. It’s not like they’re like, “Oh wait, there is that moment of burnout.” When they find me, what it sounds like is, “Okay, I’ve been letting my inner critic run the show, I’ve been telling myself that I can’t rest until this is done, –

Jaime:	Mm-hmm.

Victoria:	– there’s always another fire to put out, there’s always another problem to solve. I actually have constant brain fog. I feel just tired all the time. And I don’t know what’s wrong with my employees. Why can’t they just get it done?”

Jaime:	Yup. Finger pointing is great.

Victoria:	Yeah. It’s like, “Why do their emotions get in the way? It’s so straightforward. Gosh, I have to do everything myself.”

Jaime:	I’ve heard this so many times. This is great.

Victoria:	Yeah. Sort of the state that they’ve been in is they have this belief that it is exactly their contraction that is motivating them, and that is keeping them alert and vigilant, and creating their impending doom generator is why they’re successful. Because they’re always seeing all the things that can go wrong and getting ahead of it. And they quickly realize that that is fear-based decision making. It’s rooted a lot in the ego not wanting to look silly. Like, “Oh no, something happened I didn’t think of ahead of time. And now I look stupid.” 

And then, what they start to realize is that, “Wow, I’ve really been driven by these toxic fuels. I’ve been letting the external validation of what people might think about the way I live my life drive how I live my life.” And when we start to connect them to their essence and their truth of what matters to them, their missions, what lights them up, they start to almost fill that gap of the external noise of validation with the truth of who they are, what they want, what their desires are. And they’ve started to realize like, “Wow, at the end of my life, when I look back on it, the only person whose thought matters is that older version of me who’s like, ‘You did it! You’ve lived it! Well done!’” 

That’s the only opinion you should care about. Not all these other people who might be judging you for how big your dreams are, or if you fail, and etc. So, I think that again, a lot of it is this transition from living from the outside in, to them living from the inside out. And when you start to learn how to live from the inside out, you do start to motivate yourself based on this more renewable, sustainable, expansive fuel of your truth, and what matters to you. And I do believe that when we do that, we are more attuned to our intuition, our wisdom. We can hear our own voice better than the loud voice we’ve had in surround sound. Or in your critic voice.

And as a result, we start to flow in this way where we need synchronicity, and things feel like we can collapse time. And things start to happen in no time at all. And these phenomena that I talk about as examples of bending reality start to become your new baseline. So, instead of living in this hypervigilant reality where you need to always prove you’re right because then you feel safe. And so, even though your beliefs are not healthy, you’re kind of committed to proving you’re right with your limiting beliefs. Then you move into this new phase where you’re like, “Oh, okay. Now I’m expansive. I feel good. I’m happy. I’m blessed and grateful.” And that becomes the new baseline.

Jaime:	Jerome’s like, “I want that. How do I get that?”

Victoria:	Yeah.

Jaime:	And it takes a lot longer than they want it to also, ‘cause the overachievers are like, “Could I have it yesterday? That would’ve been way better than trying to get it right now.”

Victoria:	Absolutely, yeah. No, I do think that time – sometimes to put us in that scarcity mindset of like, “I want it to happen tomorrow. I want it to happen yesterday.” But it’s like, “Well, if you start to see it as you are investing in you over the course of a lifetime, –

Jaime:	Mm-hmm.

Victoria:	– and the truth is like, “Honey that sold for $4,000,000,000.” You asked him today, “Did it matter to you how long it took?” And he’s like, “No.” In the thick of it, when he was working really hard for 7+ years on it, and he didn’t see any light at the end of the tunnel, he wanted to know that it was gonna work out. But then, once it happened and now he’s enjoying his life, and he’s investing his money intelligently, he’s like, “Yeah, you don’t really care on the other side how long it took you to get there.”

Jaime:	One of the things that I find really interesting, especially ‘cause it’s not measurable, right? It’s part of the squishy, nonmetric, and you can only see it when you look back, and go, “Oh, I have come a really long way,” and I can’t put it into segmented goals in any way, really. Or can you? I don’t know, maybe your book tells me how to do that. But that’s what the rational mind sort of wants. I want to be able to see progress, so it doesn’t feel like I’m stuck in a loop of not making any progress.

Victoria:	Absolutely. So, one of the things that I do have is in one of the chapter exercises that I’ve learned from my very good friend Jennifer Hudye. I believe it’s from someone named Dan Sullivan. He has a framework called, “Positive Focus.” And we’ve kind of morphed it to something we use with our clients, which is that we decide what categories most matter to us. So, for you, that’s your kids, your family, your partnership, your community, your friends, your health. Whatever it is, you would start to track, “Okay, how well did I do on this?” And you can do it on a weekly, quarterly, monthly, yearly basis. 

My clients often start with a Sunday practice where they go through the past week, and they’ll say, “Okay, how did I do on wealth? How did I do on my mission? How did I do on my fun? Did I have fun this week?” And it’s like you’re rating on a scale of 1 – 10 how you did, and then also what it would look like the following week. And even to hone it in a little bit more, with this framework, it’s actually tracking your highlights. What was working with your wins from the past week? ‘Cause I think it’s overachievers. We tend to focus on what’s missing, like, “Oh, I have this, but I want that,” or, “This happened, but not that.” We tend to focus on our weaknesses, and what’s lacking. 

And again, this often gets us into contraction, which is not a great state to create fun. And so, when we get to highlight, “Okay, what are the top 10 wins from the last week,” and then, “What made this win possible,” and then, “What’s one action step we can take to double down on what’s working?” ‘Cause that’s ultimately I think where a lot of us miss the low hanging fruit, is to double down on what is working. And a lot of us wanna believe that like, “Oh, we just wanna follow someone else’s clues, or someone else’s model of success. I just wanna do what that person did.” But the how will look differently for each of us. 

And it is really that commitment to understanding, “Okay, well what are your unique strengths, what is your unique match you’ve given, what does it have to look like for you to be successful?” And I think that this blueprint, while super simple, allows us to quantify and track something that can feel difficult to pin down. And to assign numbers. ‘Cause I do believe we say this in the startup world. You can’t measure what you can’t track, and then you can’t improve what you can’t measure.

Jaime:	Yup.

Victoria:	So, if this is a weekly way – and trust me, if you’re an overachiever, there’s only so many below seven’s you’re gonna give yourself before you’re like, “Okay, I need to do something about this.” So, it is being really honest with your self-grading.

Jaime:	How do you prioritize – ‘cause that’s the other thing. I paint my vision board, but it has so many sections, right? How do you prioritize what you’re working on, and at what time? ‘Cause you can’t do that for 12 or 20 different specifics. I mean, you could, but I don’t know that you’d have enough time to be able to do them all.

Victoria:	Absolutely. So, I think there’s definitely a season for everything. Sometimes, you just happen to be in the season of life where you’re like, “You know what? I’m just gonna really double down on my family.” Maybe during the pandemic, a lot of people were taking care of their family life. And maybe some people were taking care of their health. So, I do think that there is this element of like, “Okay, what most matters to me right now? What do I wanna give most of my attention to?” And I also do believe that if you start to see it as and investment and a commitment in yourself over your lifetime, you do remove some of that time urgency as well. ‘Cause even your question of –

Jaime:	Yeah.

Victoria:	– it’s 12 things. How do I make sure they all get done by next week?

Jaime:	Yup.

Victoria:	And it’s like no. Actually, when you remove time as this kind of scarcity kicker of, “Oh no, is it gonna happen,” there is this ease, and almost like there’s an allowance for it to happen in a way that was beyond what you could’ve imagined, right? So, part of the reason why I love vision boards is ‘cause you are getting really clear on the what, but most importantly, you’re leaving space for the how to be better than your best plan.

Jaime:	Totally. I know. Most of my clients are looking maybe a month out, maybe three, right? And it’s like, “You’ve –

Victoria:	Yeah.

Jaime:	– gotta look up a little further.” You have way more time than you give yourself credit over your life.

Victoria:	I was gonna say. Yeah. There’s that expression that we tend to overestimate what we can do in a week, but then underestimate what we can do in a few years, or a year. So, one of the things I would recommend for your vision boarding, and for your clients, is to look at these three-year timelines. That is what I actually use. So, on my wall here, I have my version of the vision board, but it’s where I wanna be three years from when I made it. So, this is a Vivid Vision process that maybe you’re familiar with.

Jaime:	Is it Cameron Herold’s Vivid Vision? Yeah.

Victoria:	Yeah, that’s the one. Vivid Vision. So, I find the three-year timeline to be phenomenal for the reasons we just suggested. It’s far enough away that I can dream so big, and that you can actually get it done. It’s a really concrete quantifiable amount of time where you’re like, “Okay, here’s where I’m at. I’m gonna cross these things off. I’ve accomplished them.” 

And I’m so happy to say that I have the Honey founders on here, and I wrote out that I wanted Honey to be my first example of a multi-billion dollar exit. And it happened within a year. So, I do think there’s so much power in this intention-setting, and this vision boarding process. But then, obviously, alignment comes from not only your thoughts and feelings, but your actions have to be aligned as well. You don’t get results from just putting vision boards up.

Jaime:	Definitely.

Victoria:	Unfortunately.

Jaime:	Wait, darn. What? No.

Victoria:	Yeah, exactly. I don’t teach my clients just, “Let’s just focus on your vision.” No, it really is how do we get your thoughts, your feelings, and then your physical actions, like your embodiment? Who do you need to be to get those results, is ultimately what we’re working on. So, when my clients come to me, they think I’m gonna give them something like a tactic or a strategy, but then very quickly, they’re like, “Oh, no. This is changing who I am.”

Jaime:	Mmm.

Victoria:	At a fundamental level. Who you become in the process of building that multi-billionaire company is what you celebrate.

Jaime:	Well, and then – yeah. No, go ahead. I’m excited.

Victoria:	Yeah. I think when we get caught up in the mouse doing celebrations where we’re like, “Oh, I don’t want the other shoe to drop,” it’s like, “No, why don’t you celebrate and honor the version of you that took the bold action? The version of you that was more courageous than you ever knew, that had –“And you saw what you were made of, in a way that you never knew beforehand. And that’s what we’re celebrating.

Jaime:	And that’s the propulsion that you’re talking about. That gives you the energy to keep up and going, and having –

Victoria:	Hold on…

Jaime:	– an inspired action, and feeling good about your inspired action, instead of being –

Victoria:	Yeah.

Jaime:	– like, “I must do all the crap that I don’t want to do.” Which is –

Victoria:	Totally.

Jaime:	– what will drain you. I love this conversation. All right, I’m gonna have a chat with you again at some point, ‘cause I know we have to start wrapping up.

Victoria:	I’m just getting started.

Jaime:	Oh, thanks. I wish you lived in Austin. All right, so my last question is what is one action listeners can take this week to help move them forward towards their goal of a million?

Victoria:	Hmm… okay. One action that I think is to get really clear – and you kind of alluded to this – but why do you desire this goal of a million? So, making a list of, I would say go for 100. 100 reasons why you and the world benefits from your company hitting $1,000,000. Because I think again, if the reason is in lack of, “Oh, I need to prove that I can, I need to prove I can be successful, or I just need that much money in the bank to feel safe. I need to pay down my debt,” All those are very uninspiring reasons to make money that is actually gonna make it harder to make the money. 

So, to your point of propulsion, how do you get something that’s inspiring, something that you you’re gonna actually take inspired actions from, I would love your listeners to make a list of 100 of their best reasons why not only they benefit, but the world benefits, their family benefits. All the positive ripples that come from them hitting their first million.

Jaime:	I love that you said 100 too, ‘cause they’re probably thinking three, right? Or five. And you’re like, “100.”

Victoria:	Totally. Yeah, because the three or five is gonna be the super tired like, “Okay, sure. I can do this in my sleep. Whatever. I don’t have to think hard.” But it’s like I want people to really have a conscious answer to this. Not like their sleepy autopilot, “I have to pay my bills. My family taken care of.” It’s like, “No, I want you to really dream.” And I find that the bigger your dream, the juicier your dream is for why you wanna make money, the easier it is to make that crazy amount of money. Not the provide-and-protect safety amount of money, I mean get the multi-billion dollars. That would be really fun and exciting to have.

Jaime:	I love it. And you know, ‘cause you work with the billionaires. I absolutely love this. Where do we get your book? Tell me where we can find more about you, but also tell me where the book is? ‘Cause I want the book.

Victoria:	All right. My book is Bending Reality. So, it’s being distributed by Simon & Schuster, so you can find it wherever books are sold. So, very excited about that. And then, if they preorder the book, I’m giving actually four incredible coaching techniques that I do with my clients. So, every one of my clients has done these, and I’m gifting them for free as a thank you for preordering. And that’s on my website at victoriasong.me/bending-reality.

Jaime:	Awesome, and we will definitely link to it. So, if you’re driving, you guys can all get it later. Thank you so much Victoria for coming on the show! It was a pleasure!

Victoria:	Thank you so much!

Categories: All, Business, Featured Millionaire Interview, Millionaire Interviews

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