In this episode, Celi Arias, CEO and Founder of The Grown Ass Business, discusses the leadership self-care guide.
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Learn how to listen to The Hospital Finance Podcast® on your mobile device.Highlights of this episode include:
- Why self-care is so important for those in any leadership position.
- Three things you can do each day to ensure that you’re taking care of yourself.
- How self-care can, as a leader, help an organization thrive.
- How self-care can eliminate burnout and chaos.
Kelly Wisness: Hi, this is Kelly Wisness. Welcome back to the award-winning Hospital Finance Podcast. We’re pleased to welcome Celi Arias. Celi, an expert scale strategist, is the CEO and founder of The Grown Ass Business, where she guides entrepreneurs through her proprietary methodology, Key Growth Systems, to build strong foundations for their businesses. Recognized as a top coach by The Upside in 2024, Celi helps her clients break free from revenue plateaus and burnout by teaching them to view and manage their ventures as true businesses. Celi’s clients often come to her feeling stuck, confused, and exhausted, unsure of how to move forward. She provides clarity and control, helping them identify and optimize the essential business departments necessary for growth. The Grown Ass Business Method incorporates five key systems that every business needs to succeed, allowing entrepreneurs to wear multiple hats effectively until they can hire specialized roles. Her impressive educational background includes two bachelor’s degrees, an MBA, a Master of Divinity, and two additional certificates. Welcome and thank you for joining us today, Celi.
Celi Arias: Hi, and thanks for having me.
Kelly: Well, we’re discussing the leadership self-care guide today. So, tell me about what you do and what led you to do what you do.
Celi: Oh, well, it’s a long story, but I was entrepreneurial my whole life, I would say. Even as a kid, I started my first official business when I was about 11. And in my 20s, I started a fashion global line. And it was my first experience with burnout. And I know that is our main topic for today, so it’s near and dear to my heart. I ran that business for nine years, and I closed it eventually and sold it off just out of pure exhaustion and doing all the wrong things the wrong way. And that’s when I decided to get an MBA because I thought there was information that I was missing and get into startups. And eventually, I created my own methodology to help entrepreneurs and small business owners grow and run businesses easily without the chaos and the stress and confusion and burnout. So that is what I do today.
Kelly: That sounds fantastic. Sounds like something we really need. So why is self-care so important for those in any leadership position?
Celi: Well, honestly, I mean, it’s kind of an old adage, but everything is top-down, right? Even if you join a new community or a new networking community and you get kind of a strange taste in your mouth, let’s say, or you go to an event and you’re like, “I don’t like the vibe in this room,” or, “I don’t like the event,” a lot of times if you meet the founder or CEO of that product or offer or event, you realize that their vibe, their energy, how they’re approaching the situation trickles down into everything that you experience. So, if you are in a leadership position, you may think that it’s absolutely okay to run yourself ragged and be stressed out and be overworked. And that may be your operational MO and you might have gotten really far in life by doing things that way. But it is impacting the people on your team, the people beneath you that experience you. It does trickle down to them. They then run themselves ragged and are stressed out, and it’s probably impacting your family life too. So, if we could be doing things to support ourselves as leaders that make us show up totally differently, not only for our roles and responsibilities, but for our team and the people that report to us, we change the overall experience of the business that we’re helping to run.
Kelly: That makes a lot of sense. What are three things you can do each day to ensure that you’re taking care of yourself?
Celi: Okay, well, I love this question because it allows me to be super basic. So, there are a lot of trends right now around self-care and burnout. And I feel like sometimes maybe self-care gets a bad rap because you think it’s coming home and setting yourself up with a massage or a bath and candles and salts and crystals and all these luxurious things. But to me, self-care is really about nervous system regulation. So, one of those certificates that you mentioned in my embarrassingly long bio is after many years of coaching business owners, I found that I couldn’t just coach business owners on the strategy and the tactics that they needed to take action on. As much as I wish I could only coach on that and I just could get people to take action, I noticed there was this element and it’s the human element of the business owner that I needed to address. Because if I couldn’t really speak to the soul and heart of the person and figure out what was really going on for them, I couldn’t get them to act on the strategy and get them to see the results. So I went and got certified as a mindset coach. And what I learned in that work is that nervous system regulation is the secret to life. So, what I mean by that is, without getting too into the neuroscience and because I’m sure your audience already knows this stuff, ultimately, if I have been triggered in some way throughout my day and my nervous system becomes on high alert, that means several things. That means I become reactionary, defensive, I go to my go-to adaptive behaviors, and I’m just operating from my subconscious mind. But it also means my neocortex, the frontal lobe of my brain, which is what I like to call the CEO brain, is no longer available for me.
And when you’re in a leadership role, what you want to do– more important than thinking about self-care and getting a massage, what you want to make sure that you’re doing is that your nervous system is calm so that you can access your neocortex, right? So that you can make decisions and react to situations from that place in your brain that is analytical and logical and rational and is ultimately the CEO or the leader that you want to be. So, the way that I think about self-care is what works for my nervous system. So instead of telling you about my morning routine that your people might eye roll at me if I break down my morning routine, what I would say is explore nervous system regulation tools and practices that you notice work for you. And if it’s okay, I can give you several examples of them and we can go through them. But one of the reasons that I say explore which one works for you is because I found in this journey is that not all of the tools that are recommended for nervous system regulation– they don’t all work for me. So, what that meant was they’re not all going to work for my clients, and I needed to be open to that. But if you’re asking me for the three tips, what I would say is, number one, find the one to two, maybe three practices that really work for you, that you notice allow you to calm down, to relax your body, to not be tense, to not be reactionary. Number two, create a schedule for yourself. I would say put alarms on your phone. Maybe three to five times a day. Set an alarm on your phone that reminds you to take that nervous system break.
The reason that we need to do this is because we tend to be creatures of habit, and we tend to go about our day every single day like the day before. So, if you’re now trying to suddenly say, “Oh, yeah. That makes sense. The neocortex. She’s right. More than self-care, I need nervous system regulation.” You’re not going to do it because you’re going to be operating from the operating system that you’ve been operating from for several years. So put an alarm on your phone and just put on that reminder, hey, take that two to three-minute nervous system regulation break for yourself and see how that changes your day. And then step three, I would say, is choose the things that are most doable to you, right? If you say, “I’m going to wake up in the morning and I’m going to make my bed and then I’m going to brush my teeth and then I’m going to put on my yoga outfit and then I’m going to meditate for 30 minutes and then I’m going to journal for another 15 minutes and then I’m going to–” right? I know that sounds good in theory, but in practice, you’re most likely not going to do that. So, the key to this is choose the things that are so doable for you that there’s no reason not to do them. So does that make sense?
Kelly: Definitely. I love all those great actionable tips. I mean, I know I’m a creature of habit and it is challenging to create routines and things that are in our best interest. So yeah. Those are all great.
Celi: Yeah, so I’m just going to spout off some things that actually do work for nervous system regulation. And my suggestion is try some of these out, try some on for size, and see which ones really work for you. So naturally, the number one go-to is breathwork. On that timer that I said to set, you could just have that reminder that says, “Oh, take a breathing break.” And you might do what’s called flagpole breathing. That just means inhale for four, hold for four, exhale for four, hold for four. You might do that just for five rounds. And that’s all you have to do. If breathwork works for you, this is one of the easiest ways to kind of reconnect with your body, ground yourself, and calm your nervous system so you’re not in fight or flight mode. That’s number one. Number two is EFT tapping modalities. Number three is get up and move your body. If you are a really heady person like me, one of the things that I do in between each call is I get up and shake it off and shake my body. For those of you who are working at home, now you know these walking pads that are super popular on the internet, and you can get them for like $100. I have a walking pad under my desk. So, for example, I have a rule of thumb that for at least one of my meetings a day, because most of my meetings are virtual– for at least one meeting a day, if it’s 30 minutes of that meeting, I’m walking on my walking pad.
So, what that does is even though it’s in the middle of my day and I’m working– and I might have back-to-back calls just like you all do. But for one of those meetings, I promise myself that I’m walking. I’m walking at a slow enough pace that it’s not about getting steps in and it’s not about getting a workout actually. It’s about actually just getting into my body and not being seated and not being in my brain. Another really fun one, if you are somebody who you’re like, “Ugh, no to breathing, no to tapping, no, I’m not going to shake it out,” you might want to do something like a rage room. Instead of booking a massage, you might want to do something like heavy workouts or go to a rage room where you get to pick up a bat and break things. That’s actually very releasing and a very healthy thing to do. Especially if you aren’t going through a high pressure, high stress period in your business or in your role, to allow yourself the absolute release of getting out any unexpressed emotion and anger and frustration that you’re holding onto can be beautiful for your nervous system. Another simple one, for me– I don’t love breath work personally, especially when I’m really in my head or if I’m really stressed out. So humming, just in those five breaks a day that you’ve planned into your phone, just take 30 seconds to just let yourself hum a song. It actually calms your vagus nerve, which is what connects your nervous system. And those are just– I think I gave you about five or six. And there’s a lot of other great things that you can do for your nervous system, but those are kind of my go-tos.
Kelly: Wow, some of those I’ve never heard of before and that I’m going to actually try out myself and share with my daughter. So, thank you for that. So how can self-care as a leader help an organization thrive?
Celi: It’s really the ripple effect. What I can say for myself as a leader in my business and what I can say that I see in my clients is, for example, because I never allow stress or pressure to show up in a meeting or change my mood, I notice the amount of calm that my team members have in solving a problem. It’s really interesting because I do come from the corporate space and the startup space where everything is always on fire all the time, right? So, it’s not that, oh, she’s just born that way and she’s just calm and what does she know, right? It’s actually that when I stepped into this work of bringing mindset work to my business owners and entrepreneurs, I realized that I needed to embody it myself. So, what I noticed in my team is that they’re very calm. Any problem that comes up, and they come up almost daily, we don’t have the firefighter type of house on fire must go fix this right now type of energy, right? Things happen and my team goes, “Oh, hi. This happened, and here’s my solution, and here’s what I’m doing about it, and I’m on it.” I’m like, “Great, thank you. You’re amazing. Thanks for having my back on that.” And that’s how things go down in my business. And what I notice in my clients is that the more they work on this stuff for themselves, the more they start to model a different energy and behavior for people on their team. And not only does their team notice it and begin to behave differently just because of modeling, but their family members often notice it.
So, it’s just like children, right? We copy and we emulate the leader and what they’re modeling to us. If I as a leader am modeling that it’s okay to be in panic mode and stressed out about every little thing that happens, then I’m modeling that to my team and I’m transferring that to them. If I’m modeling to them, “Oh, our whole website went down? Gosh, that sucks. Okay, let’s call our tech team and figure out what we can do about that,” they kind of go, “Oh, okay. She didn’t have a freak out and she didn’t fall apart and she didn’t blame me or point fingers at me.” It creates a totally different type of environment. So, I think that one of the things is it empowers your team to step up, solve problems without fear and without fear of pushback from you as their leader, which is game changer. And then what it also creates– what I’ve noticed is if I’ve ever hired a person who can’t get on board with how we do things, they don’t last very long. And it’s very, very palatable in my team, “Oh, this person isn’t fitting in because of how they speak to us or how they treat us or how they bring stress to our meetings. This person doesn’t fit in with our–” I have a very small team, but we definitely have a company culture of getting things done but enjoy and being in excellence and enjoying what you do. So, I think that if you want to be an impactful leader, one of the best things that you can do for your team is model that everything’s going to be okay. Everything is solvable, and we can do this. And we can do this together. It’s going to impact the productivity of your team, ultimately.
Kelly: That totally makes a lot of sense to me as a parent and as a leader. How can self-care eliminate burnout and chaos?
Celi: Oh, well, I ultimately– here’s how I like to think about that. To me, the ultimate leader has the power of discernment. The ultimate leader has the self-awareness and willingness to point the finger at themselves and willingness to look within. And in any situation, they have discernment. And what I mean by that is that they can recognize in a situation, “Oh, is this a tactical error? Is this an operational error? Is this a team error? Is this a mindset error on my part? Is this a leadership error on my part?” If you have discernment in every situation that comes up on what is the right problem to solve here– because most leaders are often spending a lot of time and energy solving the wrong problem. But if I can look at any situation that comes up and go, “Let me actually pull back and figure out what the root cause here.” If I have discernment and I can do that, and I can recognize when I’m the bottleneck and I’m the problem, versus, “Oh, no. This is just a tactical thing or an operations thing or maybe it’s a cultural thing.” A lot of times, systems and operational issues are tied in with team culture, actually. When I have that discernment, I can quickly make decisions that create the ultimate solution for that problem. Now, if I can do that, I am constantly in a state of making decisions for my business from a place of, “How do I best use my energy here? What is the best use of my time here? What should I be focusing on that’s actually going to move the needle or help my team or impact this situation that’s come up?” And I actually asked my audience once and I got brilliant answers, but burnout actually comes from when you’re just working and working and working and you don’t see an end in sight. You don’t have an end vision. You don’t seem to ever move the needle. You don’t move ahead. And you just feel like you’re working yourself into a hole and now there’s no light at the end of the tunnel.
A lot of times burnout comes from this feeling of, “Oh, my gosh, I’m never getting out of this hole I’ve built for myself and it’s never ending.” And if you can’t see the light at the end of the tunnel, if you can’t make clear decisions, you just can’t seem to get out of the situation you’ve created for yourself. So, my way of staying above it and out of that hole is, am I regulated enough? Is my nervous system calm enough that anything that comes up, I can take a breath, I can take a step back– and sometimes I literally mean I physically take a step back from my computer, guys, because our bodies need the literal action of moving away from a situation. If I can be regulated, then anything that comes up, I can actually make a decision that will help me solve the problem rather than just working around the clock without thinking clearly, right? And one of the other things that I often do is when something comes up– if I get a nasty email from someone or something that needs a solution, I don’t answer the email or the text right away. I don’t answer that client right away. I literally leave my office, take a step back, and let my body calm down before I answer anything that can be inflammatory just like how your body heals, right? If you’re able to do these things for yourself, you can work a very full schedule, be very productive, and not feel burnout. A lot of my clients are always shocked by how much I work. I run a coaching business that has two programs. I have always one to two large private clients at the same time. I have my own YouTube show where I do weekly interviews and weekly solo shows. I’m writing a book, and I also have a family. And my clients always think I’m a total lunatic workaholic.
Kelly: [laughter] Right.
Celi: And they’re just like, “You are so crazy.” And I’m like, “Yeah, but you never actually see me exhausted or stressed out.” And I’m doing what I do from a place of absolute joy and fulfillment because I am always working on this thing we call self-care, which is I’m always checking in on my brain and my body and my nervous system and going, “How you doing? How you feeling? Do you need to fit in another–” for me, working out and being in my body is nervous system regulation. So, if I stop working out, I know there’s a problem. It’s my sign that I know.
Kelly:Yeah. Same. I agree.
Celi: Right? So, it’s like, “Oh, I’m starting to get a little bit–” does it happen to you where you start to get tense and you start to snap at people and you get mean and you’re like, “Ooh, I’m getting a little spicy this week.”
Kelly: Yes. Definitely.
Celi: And then you can look in your calendar and go, “Well, that makes sense. I skipped three workouts.”
Kelly: Exactly. Yeah. My husband can even pick up on it. And he’s like, “You need to get back to the gym.”
Celi: Yeah. Yeah. So that’s how you start to– I’m not even going to say how many hours a week I work because it will shock you. I work a lot, and I love it, but I don’t work on burnout. I make sure that my body is running, that I’m eating healthy and is running on an operating system that feels supported. And the moment that I notice I’m starting to get snappy with people is when I go, “Oh, you know what? I’m sorry. I need to go on a walk, or I actually need to make sure I get my workout in, or I need to start–” I don’t have the alarms on my phone anymore. But sometimes during certain phases in my business, I put the alarms back on. I’m like, “Oh, I realize I am not taking breathing breaks, and I am not moving my body and shaking it out. I need to put the alarms on my phone again.” Just put the training wheels back on. But you can actually run a very demanding department or business and be a leader and never hit on burnout if you are actively, proactively and consciously taking care of your nervous system.
Kelly: I love all that, Celi. I’m going to put a lot of this into practice myself. So, I really appreciate you joining us today and for sharing your insights on the leadership self-care guide. Thank you so much.
Celi: Yeah, you’re welcome. Please let me know how it goes.
Kelly: I will.
Celi: And let me know which is your favorite tool when you’ve played around with them.
Kelly: I certainly will. And so, if a listener wants to learn more or contact you to discuss this topic further, how best can they do that?
Celi: Well, I have this really funny website. It’s called grownassbusiness.com. And you can always go to my website and learn more about my programs or check out a lot of my free content on social media.
Kelly: Sounds fantastic. Thank you for sharing that with us. And thank you all for joining us for this episode of The Hospital Finance Podcast. Until next time…
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