Episode 20 | Face the Fear and Do it Anyways with Lauretta Nkwocha

Laura: 0:00

Welcome everyone here at Boss It. We would love to hear from you. Join us in our Boss It community by heading over to our website, bossitclub.com and join our mailing list. As we grow, we will be launching our community of fellow Boss It BFFs, and we want you to be a part of it. Okay. Sophia Noreen. Let's dig into this I can't wait to tell them all about how we got here

Sophia Noreen: 0:25

Welcome to the Boss It Podcast. My name is Sophia Noreen and I took an Etsy startup and launched it in big box retailers within 12 months. As a creative with an entrepreneurial drive, I left my full time career in healthcare to find better harmony between career, family and self care. We believe you can have it all. Yes, you can launch and run a successful scalable business while maintaining harmony in all aspects of your life. We believe we can learn from each other and draw on many experiences to create the best life possible. During each episode, we will share proven life hacks that will keep you on top and striving every day. There should be no hesitation. Make a plan. Take action. We are here for you. This episode of the Boss It Podcast is brought to you by the Full Focus Planner. Guys, trust me, it's super difficult to run a business, plus have yourself organized with everyday life. Trust me. I know. We have found that the Full Focus Planner is the best planner to help me and it's the best planner that will help you stay focused every day. What I love most about this planner is that this, it does a really good job of breaking down your quarterly goals. And then it helps translate them into weekly goals and daily goals. Head over to the link in our show notes to check out this fantastic planning tool. All right, guys, let's get started. Hello everyone. And welcome to another amazing episode of the Boss It Podcast. And I am so excited to have Lauretta on our show. She is a singer, she's an actress, and she's also a talk show host, and I am so excited to interview her because I know she has a lot of tips for us girl bosses. So let's get started. Lauretta, how are you doing?

Lauretta Nkwocha: 2:05

Darling. All I can say is that it's Fri-yay!

Sophia Noreen: 2:10

Yeah, it is Fri-yay today.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 2:12

Right. For any of us parents that are supervising our children who are homeschooling, or if you're doing the full thing yourself and homeschooling your children- it's a lot. So to be able to like on a Friday, speak to another adult, put some makeup on, pour a cocktail. I am happy.

Sophia Noreen: 2:33

Oh, I'm so happy. And we're so happy you're here because you have such a crazy story and we're going to hear all about it. I want you to give our listeners your personal mantra and what keeps you going every day, because you are a busy lady.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 2:48

My personal mantra. And first of all, I'm a fan of tattoos. So even though I know you can't see this, but literally one of my mantras is tattooed on my body and that is face the fear and do it anyway.

Sophia Noreen: 3:03

Oh my gosh. That's fantastic.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 3:05

You know what I mean? Like, why would you want to be held... but unless you know that you are going to be damaging yourself or damaging someone else, face the fear and do it anyway, because what's the worst that can happen?

Sophia Noreen: 3:20

Exactly.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 3:21

You fail.

Sophia Noreen: 3:22

Exactly. And you learn from your failures, right?

Lauretta Nkwocha: 3:24

Thank you. And I think I used this quote before, but I'm coming from the theater world and whatever else, like lady M says to Macbeth, he says to her, what if we fail? And she says "We fail!" So what?

Sophia Noreen: 3:37

Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. I love that. Okay. So now your story how is your story related to your mantra? And you can start from anywhere because I know you have such a crazy story for us.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 3:46

There's a lot that I'm trying to save for memoirs, and I'd be saying for years, I'm going to write my memoirs one day. I bloody well will. But my story, comes from Nigerian family, mother, and father that moved from Nigeria to England, to London to basically have a better life. It was within the time when England, United Kingdom where welcoming people from Africa from the West Indies, from Jamaica, welcoming them to come in into England and help the economy and basically find a better life. A lot of them, especially with African families that I know a lot of the parents or grandparents came to England, got a better education and then took what they learned and took it back to Africa to better their own home towns. Because you know, there's the pride about where you come from and wanting to make it as good as it possibly can be. With, the Queen and the Royal family having so many countries in their pocket Nigeria was certainly one of them coming from a family where my father, whom I have taken on responsibility of diagnosing him, he passed away many years ago now, but I think he was bipolar. He had a very aggressive, very violent streak in him. And my mother and me and my siblings were on the receiving end of his aggression. And I think him not really understanding his feelings, his emotions, and how they can be like a roller coaster; mental health was not such a big talking point, in the late seventies, early eighties. And my mother, unfortunately, she is in that statistic of battered wife, who started her life and grew up as a young adult being very strong, very, very strong minded and very, had a lot of support from her father and her mother and siblings. But then going into this marriage and within the first year, just seeing what this man was like, it really, it made her shrink as a human being. And it's unfortunate that she had to go through that and that her children had to witness that. And some of us were on the receiving end of it. But I think once my mother got the courage to leave him and it's too many years in the making, going back and forth from leaving him running away in the middle of the night, going to a battered woman's home, this, that whatever else. Like, so many different variations of her trying to break free, but most succeeding when it finally did happen, it literally was her running away from Nigeria, with my younger sister as a baby in her arms, and coming back to England. I was left with my father because I was at the age where I wasn't yet at a private school. My older siblings were away at private college and whatever else. So I had to kind of bear a lot of the brunt. Fast forward to my mother finally gaining back her power, she wasn't doing therapy in the regular sense of the word. She just regained herself somehow with the assistance of her mother who was still alive back in Nigeria, helping to empower her and the friends that my mother made when she came back to England. And then also her own cousins and relatives that were living in England. Some of them literally bankrolled her. One of them was the one that sort of bought her a plane ticket so that she could escape in the middle of the night from Lagos in Nigeria, which is the capital city. Escaping in the middle of the night, had no money, that was her village, basically a group of people that helped her come back and start her life over, which she did. So me knowing her story and seeing some of it firsthand myself, I think that has empowered me and all of my siblings go for what you want. Just literally it is face the fear and do it anyway because you get one chance. You get one opportunity, want to do as much as you can correctly. But even if you make mistakes, at least have the courage to go for things because your life can be wiped away and taken away from you. In an instant, you know, my mother, she passed away in 2006 and it's still something I grapple with today, but she was so supportive of anything that we, as siblings wanted to do, as long as it was something positive. As a traditionally African woman, she was supportive of whoever we chose to love, no matter what race, no matter what creed, no matter what color, no matter, she didn't care about that. And in fact, she had arguments with her peers, about the fact that she was so liberal and in the way that she raised us. She raised us also to be very respectful of her. She didn't have to raise her hands like my father did, but we respected her so much. You didn't want to disappoint her.

Sophia Noreen: 8:13

That's right.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 8:13

We had such a close bond. Love, music, laughter, hugs .Silly, sometimes embarrassing conversations were the norm in my household. And even to the point of when we would talk about sex. Like, I was very inquisitive about sex and I was a very late starter. I waited until I was 21, I think, mostly because of my conversations that I was having with my mother. Very open. And even the point when I knew, okay, I'm ready to do it. We had a a conversation before, like planning the whole night. It was with a boyfriend. It was something that she and I talked about. Just ask them It was, yeah, it was...

Sophia Noreen: 8:53

You were supported.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 8:53

Totally 100%, 100%. I know. That's got nothing to do with entrepreneurial-ism, but yeah.

Sophia Noreen: 8:58

Well, we talk about everything.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 9:00

Yeah. And following your dreams and following what it is that your heart's desire is. And knowing that you've got, especially the main human in your life that you respect and love supporting you and pushing you and saying, yeah, go for it.

Sophia Noreen: 9:12

Yeah. I absolutely love that. I absolutely love that. And your mother's soul. I know she's still with you and she's watching over you guys and yeah. Wow. Knowing that you've come from that history, you definitely need to write a memoir because that has really shaped who you've become today and all of the things that you do, you know, getting on stage and putting yourself out there. And so many people shy away from that. They shy away from that opportunity because they're scared. But you've been through something. Many people may have been through that, but they may not be using that history to give them power. And I feel it because your mother, was essentially a role model for you guys. She had gone through that and then she pulled out of that and then she grabbed you guys on the way there. So thank you for sharing that with us. I think that is very deep. And I feel like our listeners, they're really touched that you have been able to open up like that. I want to know a little bit more, maybe give our listeners some of the meat and the potatoes of what's happening today and how you've used your history and your strength to really get up there and get on stage now.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 10:15

Okay. So being onstage" is just the most natural place for me to live, which is basically, my podcast is called "Living Out Loud with Lauretta" because I literally do live my life out loud. Now that could stem from anything or any area of my life, like PTA mother. I was huge PTA mother for the last two and a half years. VP of Cultural Arts. And I brought a lot of stuff into the school It was a position that was basically created for me because I expressed so much interest in certain parts of our curriculum. And we've got a very small school district here in Babylon in New York. And I love it so much, but it's like, do everything out loud. Don't be afraid to ask questions. Don't be afraid to go for things for fear of failing. Because I never want to be, if I'm lucky enough, to be an old woman on my death bed, I never want to have regrets. I do not want any shoulda coulda wouldas. I would want to be like, "You did that! You know what I mean?

Sophia Noreen: 11:19

Yeah. You even got the voice down. You can just made it a little crackly voice, like your ninety year old self.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 11:26

Right? Girl, shoot! You know you did that.

Sophia Noreen: 11:28

Yeah, that's right.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 11:30

There's no one in my family that speaks like that. It gives you the idea, right. And it really gives that story of yeah, you need to know that on your last day, when you're getting ready to breathe your last breath, yes, I did all or most of what I wanted to do. I lived my life as authentically as I knew how .I was as good to people as I want people to be good to me. I had fun. My goodness. Did I have fun.

Sophia Noreen: 11:56

Yes.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 11:57

Yeah.

Sophia Noreen: 11:58

I love that. I absolutely love that. And I think tying it back to entrepreneurship. A lot of people are just afraid to pull off that band-aid and go for it. They have this idea. They have some goal in their mind. They have a vision and they just don't want to step forward and try because of fear. It's just eating them, right?

Lauretta Nkwocha: 12:20

And overwhelming them. Literally, I come from a space of I know nothing, or at least I'm going to say six months ago, a year ago. Let's put it that way. I knew nothing. Technically I was on Facebook. I think I was barely on Instagram. The whole aspect of learning about computers or laptops or whatever. And just the technology, learning how to promote. Learning about marketing. This is not stuff that I went and studied. And I'm still, I'm learning stuff now. I'm learning stuff every single day, but I'm applying myself. I'm excited to learn because I know my brain is being used. And it's better going to serve what it is that I'm trying to do. You have to be bold and say, okay, I don't know everything, but I want to learn.

Sophia Noreen: 13:02

Right.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 13:02

Who wants to teach me? And if you can't afford to pay, who's willing to do me a favor? I'll scratch your back, you scratch mine. You know what I mean?

Sophia Noreen: 13:10

Yeah. You can swap your services. No problem. That's actually a very good tip. Just from a practical standpoint. You don't always have to go out and throw money you can always go find a friend and swap services.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 13:23

There's a lot of stuff out there actually available for free. Do you know what I mean? Especially now we're all in quarantine. I don't know when this episode is going to add, but we, as a nation, as a world, as a planet; we have been in quarantine for it seems for many months. There are a lot of things that are available online that you can either pay the minimal amount of money or get it for free and actually educate yourselves to better yourself for the industry that you're in. Or if you have an idea that you're thinking I'm not sure that the world wants this or needs this, I'm not sure if it will work. This is the time to try. And goodness, this is the time to try.

Sophia Noreen: 14:02

Yeah, exactly. It's almost like a gift, right? We've gotten more time in some ways, because we're not allowed to go outside and socialize. We are very limited on what we can do. And if you are thinking about something, if you're thinking about doing something, then you are better off trying now. And don't live in fear. Try. Don't have any regrets.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 14:23

In general, it's something that should be taken in all areas of life. Now, having watched my mother who was fearful. And I know there are many people who are in relationships or situations where they are afraid of destroying maybe a unit to family units. They feel like if they were to make the move that is right for them, that it's going to destroy the family units. If you have children or you're like, okay, I'm responsible for this person's feelings or whatever, first and foremost, you're not responsible for anyone else's feelings. Second of all, if you are not fully happy within yourself, or at least as happy as you can be as happy as you strive to be, how can you be a good role model, parent, friend, spouse, all of that? Even just you, how can you be a good, full human being for yourself? If you're not actually just trying to do everything that you can to fulfill either your dreams, your business dreams, your personal dreams, financial dreams, all of that.

Sophia Noreen: 15:27

Yeah. You have to take care of yourself. And it's difficult. I think you've hit on a couple of points. Women, men. I find a lot of women, and specifically, if you do start a family unit that it becomes difficult, right? Because you are like, oh, I need to do this. I need to do that. You may put yourself at a second level of...

Lauretta Nkwocha: 15:43

Or last. Not even second. You're last in line, which is actually, it's the total opposite of what it should be. You should be first and it's not a selfish thing. I need to take care of myself. Not like, oh, I'm going to take care of myself and no one else. No. Make sure that you are okay, so that you can then be fabulously okay for everyone else.

Sophia Noreen: 16:04

That's it. Can you serve if you're not taking care of yourself, if you're not at a hundred percent, how are you going to serve others, right?

Lauretta Nkwocha: 16:10

Yes.

Sophia Noreen: 16:11

Yeah. I love that. We're almost going into the advice. I feel like we're leading so well, but is there anything else in your story that you want our listeners to know? I know you're a podcast host, talk show hosts. You've been on film. You've been on theater. You sing. Is there anything you want to highlight that could really help our listeners really just take your mantra to the next level? Is there a time when you were scared to get on stage? Maybe that story would be nice.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 16:35

Every time I go on stage. Absolutely. Every time I pick up a microphone. Absolutely. It's terrifying. It's terrifying. But it's like having the biggest high once you get through it. Sometimes it's almost like I black out during it. Now I used to say with theater, for instance the first week, maybe first two weeks of opening week, you are terrified. You're still trying to remember your lines. You've done six weeks of rehearsal or three weeks of rehearsal. So you know that the work is there. It's in the back of your head. It's there in your sub-conscience. However you are terrified the minute, you know, okay. It's the five minute call. It's time to go. Terrified onstage. You get through it, even with the mistakes. But the more you do it, by the time it gets to, for me, it was like, by the time he got to the end of the first week of runs, I was then in that space where I was comfortable. You're never not nervous. If you stop being nervous about either performing or speaking in front of a group of people or speaking on Zoom or going for an interview or going for an audition, if you ever stopped getting nervous, then that's when you have to look and go, okay, why? What is that? Do I think I'm just so fabulous that I don't need to be nervous? No, you ought to have some butterflies in your stomach. You ought to have some nerves. But you face that fear and you do it anyway. And you use that. You use that as an energy to propel you because that energy comes out as fire. My gosh, I don't know how else... there was, I just saw fire coming out of my fingers.

Sophia Noreen: 18:13

You're visualizing it.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 18:15

But yeah, because it becomes energy, positive energy. But you have to believe it's in the root, in your gut. You have to believe that you have the tools. So you've done the training you've learnt as much as you can about whether it's something entrepreneurial or not. You've learned as much as you can about your industry or whatever. And you just have to believe even if you don't really believe. But so many people are telling you, and if it's people that you trust that are telling you, listen, babe, what you've got here is amazing. Even if you don't believe it, trust them and just say, okay, eff it. Let's go.

Sophia Noreen: 18:52

Let's do it. That's right. Yeah. I think that's wonderful. And I like how you said you're still nervous. Like every single time, even though you have done this hundreds, thousands of times have gotten in front of people and you have acted or you saying, or you've hosted, and you're still having that nervous butterfly feeling, but it's propelling you. And then after you finish, you're like, oh my gosh, that was wonderful. And you have no regrets.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 19:18

It's the biggest high. And I'm going to say too, even like with the gigs that I do now, and we perform primarily live events, a lot of parties, a lot of weddings or birthday parties, for galas, fundraisers, whatever. When we finish by the time, it's the last song, I'm literally, if I'm wearing a watch, I'm looking at the watch on my wallet or I'm looking at my phone. Oh my gosh, it's over already. I need two hours to then decompress or calm down because it's the biggest ,best high. You know what I mean? You've gotten so worked up, but your excited, because you have the tools, it's okay. I know, okay. I'm not Mariah Carey. I'm not Beyonce, but I know I can sing a bit and I know I can put a song across. So I'm hoping that they're all gonna like it. I know that love doing this. So I'm just going to go out there and have fun and hopefully they'll feed off my energy.

Sophia Noreen: 20:16

That's right.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 20:16

And it's the same being an entrepreneur. You told me your story on my podcast about how you leverage what you were doing and turn what you were doing into the industry that you have. You are unsure. Everyone is unsure when they're getting started. Even maybe a year in or a few years in. People are telling you or you're getting meetings with big stores and whatever. And you're like, "Seriously? Okay. Whoa. All right. Okay. I'm having a meeting with Walmart. Oh, okay. Let's go them."

Sophia Noreen: 20:46

Yeah, that's right. That's right. You don't actually know where you're going to go until you start. Once you get out there, you feed off your energy. It propels you forward because just like when you're performing or being an entrepreneur. You're going into this world of the unknown and it's scary, but like your mantra is the perfect fit for this episode because you do it anyways.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 21:07

You have to, because someone else is going to do it and then you're going to sit there going, oh, I don't even want to say shucks anymore. I'm trying to not curse, But you're going to sit there going, oh gosh, I had that idea. Why didn't I do it? Or I was thinking of doing that, why didn't I do it?

Sophia Noreen: 21:20

Yeah. I was thinking of somebody, somebody who was making a funny joke. It was like, I came up with Instagram, but I didn't do anything about it.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 21:26

Hello? You snooze, you lose. I'm sorry, another corny one, but it's true.

Sophia Noreen: 21:33

This entire episode has been full of advice, but I'm going to ask you the question anyways. What is one piece of advice you would give our listeners for starting their entrepreneurial journey? And I know that as a performer, you are an entrepreneur, you do go out and you do gigs Take us back to the time when you just started. Is there any advice that you would have for those individuals that are just starting out.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 21:57

Okay. With me, I know that I always felt confident in my acting. So I went to one of the top drama schools in England, the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama. I have said for years that literally if you put me on stage with Dame Judi Dench, I will feel confident in my ability. Coming to America and then, getting my own apartment in Manhattan, I was like, okay, while I'm going for auditions for acting work, I need to be able to pay my rent and not use all of my acting money that I earned in England. Coming to America and then, you know, I'll say, okay what can I do to earn money while I'm going for acting auditions? Okay. I can sing a bit. Let me see if I can get a job singing. I happen to see this advert and in the backseat backstage newspaper went and got a job in the band and I've been singing with this band forever. I have had imposter syndrome for at least the last 14 years recently. My husband was like, "okay, babe, you are a singer. Just own up to it. Accept it. This is what you're doing." Every time I'm going out to perform, I have that fear of oh my gosh, they're going to realize, oh, I'm not a real singer. Blah, blah, blah, whatever. Just do it anyway. You love singing. Go ahead and do it. My advice to anyone first and foremost is to learn as much as you can about your industry. Me, now as a new podcast that I never even considered podcasting until this year, and I knew nothing about it. So I've learnt as much as I could. And I'm still learning now. Learn as much as you can about your industry and know that what you've learned at least has given you some tools to be at least able to launch what you have. Your idea is your idea. And even if there's someone else doing it if people didn't double up on ideas, there will only be one grocery store in the whole world. So whatever you're bringing to the table, it's going to be something slightly different from someone else because it's you doing it? You're not the same as someone else. So learn as much of the technicalities. Learn as much as you can about money and marketing. All of the things that are involved in making your particular avenue, your particular lane, as successful as possible and then commit 100%. If it's your side hustle and you've been doing that on and off or whatever, if you love it. But yeah, we'll have to hold down a full-time job and maybe kids and home or whatever else commits. There are how many hours in the day. There are many of us this quarantine who are waking up, going to bed at 9:00 PM, waking up at 2:00 AM. All right. If you're awake at 2:00 AM, use it. Use that time. Work the time.

Sophia Noreen: 24:38

That's right, yeah.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 24:40

That's my advice.

Sophia Noreen: 24:41

I love that our series was all about productivity and how you can optimize your time. So I love that tip. Learn as much as possible and optimize your time. Use it.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 24:51

Darling. I've never had sleep issues until this summer and whatever else. So if I'm awake at 2:00 AM or 3:00 AM, and my brain is just turning over time, what's the point in lying there in the bed and just tossing and turning? No. Put your clothes on whatever. Brush your teeth, come upstairs. Get into a comfortable space. I parked myself on the nice big couch. Light a candle. I put the TV on and turn the sound down. I get my iPad. Put my ear buds in and I'm working. Let me learn about this. Let me learn about that. How do I do that? Let me edit this episode. Let me do something. Use the time wisely because by the time the sun comes up, first of all, you're there when the sun is rising. You're feeling grateful, but you're alive and happy. And then you get on with the day. And if you have to take a cat nap or a disco nap, I used to call it. If you have to take a cat nap at some point, take a cat nap. 10 minutes. You're done.

Sophia Noreen: 25:40

I love the disco nap. I love that. That's such great advice

Lauretta Nkwocha: 25:44

I used to take disco naps. It's fantastic. You do just seven minutes. And then you're like ready to go take a shower, paint my face, pour a cocktail, put my heels on. Off I go.

Sophia Noreen: 25:56

God, I love it. We need to go vacationing together. Oh my goodness. Okay. We have a few more questions for you. How do you manage your time and goal set?

Lauretta Nkwocha: 26:05

First and foremost, the umbrella for me to sort of propel me forward and to keep me going, is that notion and the knowledge this is not a dress rehearsal.

Sophia Noreen: 26:17

Wow.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 26:18

It's one time. This one movement, however many years it might last, I have this one time to get it right. It's not a rehearsal.

Sophia Noreen: 26:28

I love that.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 26:29

And then I'm very much into scheduling. Like my calendar on my iPhone, it's every single day. Pretty much everything is scheduled, including people might go, "what?" For the children who are home remote-learning once their school day is finished. I have an alarm that goes off 3:00 PM. I don't care what you're doing. The school day finished. My son does extra speech afterwards and his speech lesson ends at three. My daughter by then, she's probably already started on homework or maybe by then, she's chatting with some friends. 3:00 PM, alarm goes off. It's time to go outside. I don't care what the weather is doing outside. Unless it's snowing, even though if it's snowing, actually, they would love it. But if it's raining and cold, I say, okay, let's yeah, let's not go outside. But if it's not raining, if it's just cold, then wrap up, go outside. You've got many things. We have, this summer, we made sure we had a lot of things in our backyard. We are very blessed to have a good space backyard. So they got the trampoline. They got the swings, the slide, the this, that. Whatever else .We go basketball. We got football. We got, all of that that you utilize the space, go outside, get some vitamin D, run around, get crazy. But I schedule everything. Then you come in, then it's snack time. Dinner is at the same time, Sunday to Thursday. I even schedule times to actually catch up with friends that are still in England or friends that are not in America and they're on a different time zone or whatever. I schedule everything. And it's like putting post-it notes, maybe on your wall or on your mirror. as one thing gets done, you take the post-it note down. I put a check on my calendar. I put, the green box emojis. I put the check in front. That's been done. Okay. What's next on the list? Things I don't get to, I carry them over to the next day. Or maybe if it's a weekend, then I carry them over maybe to Monday. But scheduling is imperative for me. I'm not the best timekeeper. And most of the clocks in my house all set like about seven minutes fast.

Sophia Noreen: 28:28

Interesting.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 28:29

Yes.

Sophia Noreen: 28:30

That's a good trick.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 28:31

Even though I know that. I still look at the clock and just my view, my eyes have seen. It says that time. Okay. So get moving as if that is the actual time. That's a very recent thing that's like in the last maybe year and a half. To make it deliberate not the clocks in the homeschooling area so that the kids are aware that this is the real time. And but for me in my bedroom and my dressing room and the bathroom. All of that. Everything is set like a little bit faster. But yeah, scheduling to me is imperative because once you schedule, you get so much more done.

Sophia Noreen: 29:04

You have been literally the example I needed to confirm what we've just talked about in the series before your podcast. Literally that's half of the battle when it comes to your time management is you have to own your time and you've done that. You've owned every single hour that you're awake and that's fantastic. And I like how you've also owned the time that you are socializing with friends, because if you don't schedule it, it doesn't happen.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 29:30

And even making calls. So usually I would say, okay, on the weekends, that's when I can chat. If the weather is nice, we're going out on bike rides and there's family time or whatever else. So then I'm not necessarily getting to the calls. So I've realized now that by the time the school day ends and the kids go out to go and play or whatever, I have maybe an hour and a half to myself to work on what I need to work on. Then they come back in and I'm prepping dinner or whatever; when I serve, when I place their dinner on the kitchen island and they sit down to eat, I then have maybe an hour and a half, maybe two hours, where I could have my earbuds in. The phone's sitting. Now I could be washing up. I could be prepping dinner for myself and my husband, but talking to a friend.

Sophia Noreen: 30:17

That's right.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 30:18

Exactly. And I had never, I don't know why this did not come into my head until literally like two weeks ago. this is a new thing.

Sophia Noreen: 30:25

Oh girl! I can't do these domestic tasks unless I listen to a podcast or talking to a friend.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 30:30

What I've always done is listen to the news and I overload with. So I've listened to the local news. Then I would go to the BBC news. PBS. Yeah. So I decided, I guess, two weeks ago okay let's cut back a little bit down so you can actually have conversations with other people that you love and you miss talking to. Not everyone needs just the text message. Some people you need to actually just have conversations with or Marco polo, which I love me and my sister who lives in Chicago. Now we all Marco Polo a few times a day, every single day. It's fantastic. Voxing that's another one for some of my friends and family, especially the ones that were in England. We need face time. We need to actually be able to see each other and talk.

Sophia Noreen: 31:14

I love that. Oh my goodness. Such great tips. Okay. We have one more question for you and I know you are a busy lady, so let's get that question in. How do you check in with yourself from a physical standpoint and also from a mental health standpoint?

Lauretta Nkwocha: 31:28

Therapy is, I think imperative for any adult. Especially in the times that we're living in, where we are dealing with totally unprecedented circumstances. So to have someone I'm not saying you shouldn't talk to friends or family or whatever, but there should be someone in your circle that has not known you for years. And it's not your friend who is not going to be honest and speak to you the way you need to be spoken to or whatever. A therapist who you need to feel that comfortable with that. You can tell them absolutely everything and you have to tell them absolutely everything so that they can correctly speak to you as another human being. So there has to be that sort of distance. But that's how I keep a check on myself. But also being honest about how I'm feeling I don't have a problem with that. I'm a very outspoken person. I am the queen of TMI. But it's like always being honest about how you're feeling. You can't be afraid of saying things to your inner circle or to your spouse or to your life partner or your children. You can't be afraid of saying things to them that might hurt their feelings. If it's honestly how you're feeling, be tactful Be respectful and tactful about what you say. Choose your words, but don't choose what you say about the truth. Speak your truth, always speak your truth. Because if you don't speak your truth, you can't expect someone else to know how to deal with you or handle you if you haven't given them the full picture.

Sophia Noreen: 33:03

I can only read your mind. Yeah. They can't read your mind.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 33:06

Exactly. So I'm about speaking my truth. Asking myself questions. And I have a lot of inner dialogue. If you're feeling something and you're like, okay, and I'm only saying this because I have come from the place of not doing exactly that, hearing that inner voice, hearing that intuition. 'Cause that's what it is. And it's not just us women that have it. Everyone has intuition. But getting that intuition, not listening to it. That's when we get into trouble

Sophia Noreen: 33:33

Oh my goodness. Yeah. And it's so true. We wait too long to essentially voice what we're thinking. I think therapy is part of self care. So definitely I think everyone should have a therapist, to be honest.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 33:44

Everyone! Once you reach adulthood .Especially in these days, right now, there are many children that need and it's not necessarily something that the parents can necessarily help or accommodate because they're dealing with their own trauma about what we're going through right now. But therapy is absolutely imperative and it should not have any sort of weirdness attached to it or any kind of taboo. We need to take care of our mental health.

Sophia Noreen: 34:09

We'd have to. If you're functioning as an adult, that's fine. But everybody needs that outlet. Everybody needs to go and try to take care of their themselves from that perspective. So I love that. I love how raw that advice is. Going and managing your own mental health and having a therapist that's raw advice. For a lot of people, our culture as South Asians., they don't acknowledge mental health to be a thing. And we have a little bit of a crisis in our area of the GTA, in the greater Toronto Area, with many children from that environment, just feeling the pressure. And they don't have that outlet because if they're not being validated. Anyways, that's another topic for another day. Before we end this, we need to know where we can find you. Where are these listeners' point? They want to listen to your podcasts. They want to catch your show.

Lauretta Nkwocha: 34:55

Thank you. I would love for anyone and everyone to listen to Living Out Loud with Lauretta. It's available on iTunes and Spotify, and iheart radio, Radio Hydrogen, which is an Australian radio station don't ask, I have no idea how and why that came up, but I accept it. @iamlaurettankwocha on all social media platforms. Nkwocha is spelled N for Nancy, K W O C H A and Lauretta, my mother's choice. She spelled it .L A U R E T T A, laurettankwocha on Twitter, on Instagram.,TikTok, Facebook, everywhere.

Sophia Noreen: 35:39

Are you on YouTube as well?

Lauretta Nkwocha: 35:41

I'm on YouTube. Thank you for reminding me. Yeah, goodness me. It's the most natural place for me to be. So Leave It to Lauretta and the Family. That's the one where I also post the video clips or full episodes, really all of my podcasts. So that's where you will find us. If you want to look at all the other work I've done on TV and film, you can find me on Link Tree. And the link is in my Instagram handle. Loretta Nkwocha. There aren't many with that spelling. That's for sure.

Sophia Noreen: 36:08

Perfect! That is so amazing. We're going to have all of your links in the show notes. So guys, make sure you go and click on the show, note links and go follow Lauretta. Go check her out, her singing and her beautiful family on YouTube. Anyway, guys, that is all we have for today. Thank you again for listening. And remember, make a plan and take action. And yes, you can have it all. So my fellow bosses, did you enjoy that episode? Now is time for you to make a solid plan and take action. But first, remember to subscribe and follow the Boss It Podcast so you receive a notification whenever we drop an episode. Remember to leave us a review on iTunes. Take a screenshot of your review and share it on Instagram as a post or a story and tag us @BossItclub. If Instagram is not your thing, no worries. Email your screenshot to [email protected]. As a massive thank you, we will be sending you our Top 50 Tips for Starting and Scaling a Business. This list is exclusively for podcast reviewers. So don't miss out. Now remember bosses: make a plan and take action in all aspects of your life. Yes you can have it all.