S2 E15: Surrender to the Flow with Nikki Trott

Honey, I blew up the business. What a great episode. Today Nikki Trott is on the podcast. Nikki's a collaborator, power buddy of mine. I don't know how we met actually, but we were working together because she's trying to do good in the world at scale with an incredible zest for life being channeled into some amazing projects. She just announced the launch of Barefoot Ventures which helps fund impact startups. She's also the founder and chief strategist of the Conscious accelerator and the host of Going Conscious Podcast, a global top 2.5% podcast. Like this podcast, she's also a speaker and a board advisor and a great, wise, interesting person. She's going to get into today how she kind of surrendered, which is a funny word to think about in business, but she surrendered to the flow of life and listened to her intuition and left a high flying career in fashion to set up her business which looked after impact led businesses. We get right into it and all the stories that led to that and all the stories that led to her following that intuition to setting up this fund. So she's now in, she's in the finance industry, going from the fashion industry. Quite the story. If you don't know me, my name is Dan Kirby. I'm your host of Honey Abloh the business. Because that is what happened to my business. We saved it, we turned it around. It was pretty messy about six years ago now we did turn it around. I learned a lot. That's why I'm sharing this podcast, these interviews with amazing guests like Nikki, so you can learn and take it on your entrepreneurial journey and learn from all the mistakes that I and we and all of us are making. It's a rough and tumble world out there. My business is doing better than ever now. The tech department, it's cool. I want to thank them very much for sponsoring this podcast. Thanks guys. If you like what we're doing, you like my mission, My mission is by the way, to create the world's most authentic podcast for entrepreneurs. If you like that mission, share this podcast with your networks on social media, give us a five star review on Spotify or Apple Podcasts. You know the deal, share it, become part of our community and get active. Drop me a, maybe drop me a message on, on LinkedIn. I'm happy to talk to you. You know I'm here to help. So without further ado, let's get into the podcast Guardian. 3, 2, 1. Welcome to the podcast. Nikki Trott. Awesome to see you. Thanks for having me. Well, it is a real honor to have you here because we're, we've turned into somewhat collaborators, conversational partners, co podcasts, threatening to come on each other's podcasters. And here you are finally, finally, finally. And it's always worth the wait. But I, it's a great honor to have you here. It's the right moment. It's always the right moment. And because we've been, we have actually been sort of working together in parallel and sort of helping each other out and it cut serendipitously and I feel like that's a nice spirit to come into this podcast. So the timing is just right for now. And what I want to get into actually, because you've we you on this sort of incredible, interesting new inflection point in your career entering the world of finance. But you didn't start in the world of finance, you started in the world of fashion. And I want to go back to the good old days. Perhaps you started your career in, in the fashion world, but then consciously, I would say blew up your career to sort of do something a bit different. So what happened? What transitioned you from the sort of world of high fashion and highfalutin jet set travel into the world of impact finance where you are today? Yeah, good question. I did blow up my career, but I also blew up my whole life at the same time. So I think for the first part of my career, I was really working towards what I've been told success looked like by other people, what I'd absorbed all the way from being a young child. And don't get me wrong, I loved it. I loved the whole journey, wouldn't change any of it. But I was working in fashion. I was the youngest director in a company, working with many of the world's biggest, most famous brands. And that's what I'd wanted to do before I was 30. I wanted to become a director, earn a certain salary level and live a certain lifestyle. And I'd achieved it and didn't feel like I was anywhere near done. It didn't feel fulfilling. And I think was at that point of going into my own personal journey and starting to really question the way that things were being done. I actually today had lunch with someone I hadn't seen for 10 years and we met in the fashion world. And so much has changed for both of us in the last 10 years. And I told her the moment that I think my whole life changed and that was the moment that I decided to start walking to work. I was living in London and I was in Bethnal Green in the east. And I was spending about 40 minutes on the central line in the morning with some very miserable looking people. No connection between anyone. Everybody becoming angry when there was a slight delay and the tube was held up and it just was really miserable way to start the day. And I just thought, what would happen? How long would it take to walk? And I put it in Google maps, it said one hour. And I thought, well, one hour walking versus 40 minutes of a really unpleasant journey. I think I'd choose the hour, actually. And from that moment, I started walking an hour to and from work every day. And that totally changed everything. I reconnected with my body. I realized that I can do things differently. I can just choose how I want to do things and just try it. Doing something that people think is crazy, it's just walking for work for an hour. But the amount of people go, what? You can't do that. But anyone, you know, with physical ability to can actually. And also I started listening to podcasts and I was listening to Russell Brands under the Skin and I was going through my own personal transformation. I was becoming vegan at that time, starting to meditate, reading Eckhart Tolle for the first time. All of this stuff was happening in my inner world. And then on the way to from work, two hours a day, I was listening to the most incredible people who were so aligned with what I was starting to discover and how I was starting to think. So that was really a huge moment for me. And that led to me realizing it's only me who's going to create the path. I can stay in this very comfortable existence with my lovely boyfriend and my nice apartment and my great job, or knowing deep inside myself intuitively that there's more, I can just go for it and follow what feels right. So I left my job, I left my boyfriend, I left my home city of London and I went went to Berlin and for the first time was living alone and setting up my own business. Wow, so you kind of did a proper job then. Yeah, well, that only takes us halfway there, doesn't it? Because that doesn't really answer your question. So I need to go to telling you less detail about this. But essentially I then built my first consulting company for fashion lifestyle brands, which did really well. And I was working half the hours for twice the cash. But still the fulfillment was lacking. And I realized that I was helping to sell products that did not align with my values. And the pinnacle of that was when I was going to New York for a digital marketing conference that I was Contributing to for a big luxury skincare brand. They gave me a facial and were telling me how there was caviar in their cream. And I was just lying there thinking, okay, I'm vegan, I would never buy this. It's a thousand US dollars for a small pot which is more plastic than cream. What am I doing? My gifts that I've been given in this life must be for something more useful. They must be. And that took me to then say I have to say no to things that don't align with my values and I have to just do an experiment. I haven't got much to lose. At that point I was single, living in Berlin, pretty affordable. I didn't have to support a family. I, it was okay. I had a bit of savings from my, my London salary. And I thought, well, what would happen if I just radically surrendered to this? And I have to recommend the book by Michael Singer, the Surrender Experiment, which I adore, where he talked about his journey of just surrendering at every moment. So we can touch more on it if you decide to ask any questions about it. But then I took a number of different decisions which ended up leading me to impact consulting, where now I only advise brands and businesses that want to make a positive impact and bring my, my brand business expertise to them. And through that journey, I was invited to consult a new friend. A year ago, it was a new friend of mine who was setting up an impact investment company that was really looking at applying the permaculture principles to the world of finance. And Brendan had spent three years already racking his brains about how that could be done. And he invited me to help him package all of this into a company and a brand and a way of speaking and communicating a new era for finance. And from that collaboration we worked so beautifully that he invited me to be his partner in the fund. So I come still, of course, very much on the brand and business side. I'm learning a lot about finance and there's a lot I don't know. But I speak the language of the founders and I'm used to seeing things from that perspective in a funding way. So that also really helps. Wow. So, okay, so that's a real whistle stop tour of your blow up, multiple phase blow up. I would suggest I want thing up. It's kind of easier to just blow everything. Blow it. Yeah. And what's already. I want to take you back actually to sort of this origin story because I think I'm really intrigued by your hopping off the, off the kind of travelator as it were, hopping off the Underground, getting off the Central Line and breaking that pattern. Yeah. And this sort of moment in time that. It's actually quite vivid, you know, you're kind of there in with the herd, packed in, doing what everybody else does. And then you broke out of that Tube map and found this physical lead, a different way of seeing the world and a spiritual element of that. If you're reading Michael Singer and Eckhart Tolle and. And then you've got this whole other sort of parts of your mind opening up to that. But can you take me back to this? Because you said there were certain people kind of looking at you like you gone crazy because you've left the. Left, the Tube system, you're walking. So what was. What was you, Nikki, back then, when you decided to step off the train and actually walk? What was kind of like what was in your head at that point? Well, when I mentioned people looking at me, there was more people at work. Or when I mentioned I walked, I've started walking in and it feels amazing. Or people would say, wow, you're. You're sprightly today. Yes, I walk to work now and I'm full of energy and I feel brilliant. And so people go, what? So it was more that, of course, no one walking partly on the street was even thinking or cared what I was up to, but it was just generally not something that people did. It's. It was just. And how did that make you feel? I never minded doing things differently. I always did things a bit differently and I always felt a bit different. But I think that that even was back when I. I love dancing and I love music and I would party a lot and I never wanted to take party drugs. Everyone around me was. Everyone in London who I knew in fashion was on a lot of different things, just wasn't. Wasn't my thing. And so I was always used to being that person who just made my own decisions. And my mom used to tell me that she would. Wanted us, me and my sister, to be very independent. And she used to ask us, when we were tiny, what breakfast would you like? This one or this one? And. And have us kind of make our decisions. And I don't know whether that made an impact, but I think for me, fitting in with the crowd has never been very appealing, because I know that it doesn't make you happy or it doesn't make me happy to just stifle who I am. It's, I think, a long, lifelong journey to find out more about who you are. You Said you had to, you wanted to get into your body. What again, what did you mean by that? Well, up until that point, I had been treating my body like an external case. I think the fashion industry probably doesn't help, but my body was something I abused. I was drinking heavily every weekend with all my friends, wasn't sleeping enough, was kind of proud of the fact that I was totally fine on a few hours sleep and really treating my body as something external that needs to comply to how it's meant to look, should be dressed appropriately for the image that I'm presenting and needs to keep up, needs to keep up with me. You know, that was kind of the thinking. And so there's a great disconnection with the self and the body thinking that it's just a casing that needs to keep up and not really realizing it's an integral part of this expression that I am here in this world. And so you go off, you kind of getting out, you're going against the grain, swimming upstream as it were. Literally walking up the street with your headphones on, listening Russell Brand and you're literally physically breaking out of this groove and then you're kind of mentally breaking out of the groove and having these different parts of your experience or brain or mind opened up by these things. Again, it seems to be a kind of a start of a start of a process that's continuing to unfold. But again, I'm always curious of this sort of early stage, like the discovery point of this inflection point. Again, was it, was there a particular moment in time where you thought, hang on, I've got up in getting this wrong? Never. I mean it almost historically, like you kind of, if you've got this new way of seeing the world, you see, like, okay, I'm. Was there a moment where you thought I need to. Really? When was the. Sorry, when was the moment you. Because you did change things that you thought this has to change. I'm one of those weird people who likes change, which I, I don't meet many people who do. I like the feeling of being really alive and for me, being in a rut or just on a hamster wheel, I start to feel that my growth is plateauing. If my growth is plateauing, I don't feel so alive. Um, that's, I think, how it is for me. So I'm always pursuing those uncomfortable situations where I know I can continue to expand in the way that it's uncomfortable because it's new and unknown, but it's comfortable because I know in my intuition, it's the step I meant to be taking, if that makes sense. So I think for me that's always been underpinning these things. And so the moment I knew needed to change was that facial I told you about where I lay there and thought, I think I've been given skills for something greater than this and the only way I'm going to find out is by trying. And the Safe zone never really appealed to just say, but I'm earning good money and I've got great clients and what if I leave this business? What if it, what if it never, what if I never achieve something as good again? What if this was my big break? I think for me that, that unknown, exciting, exploring the possibilities, that excitement is, is greater, that's a greater pull. And you feel like it was a kind of the pull, the call to adventure. Perhaps you could call it this sort of intuition or the, the feeling that you've got this other horizon to go for a different horizon that's spurred on by your caviar based facial creams. As you can tell, I've been a regular applier of the caviar. Well, you are glowing. Indeed a big fan. But again, these visceral moments you like you buggered off to Berlin and then you got your facial and thought, so this, this isn't making any sense to me from a values point of view and what happened next. Yeah. So, you know, I think it's also worth saying that I'm, I'm aware of how lucky I am that I can make decisions like this and I really don't have anything that I'm risking. So I think also we create so many cages in our own minds where we, we create fears that are not rational, we block ourselves. And I do find it incredibly thrilling to just say what if, what if I just go beyond that. What will happen? What is the worst that can happen? And when I'm advising founders now, that's one of the questions that I often pull out. What is the worst thing that could happen in this situation? The absolute worst. Let's face it, let's look at it directly, let's really name it. And when you do that, you often find it's not like what would be the worst thing that could happen for me in that situation would be that I decide, no, I should prefer London to Berlin. I'm going to carry on. I'm going to just call a couple of those clients and consult them again or carry on. But it's, it's not, it's not such a big thing, but we can make it feel like it's a big thing. So I went to Berlin. I got into. I. I was able to create extra space. I decided it was important to create space in my week. I started exploring the newfound connection with my body by going to Pilates a lot in training. I did a teacher training as well. I found that very. It was very spiritual for me to connect with my body in a new way. And. And it really grounded me and enabled me to understand presence and the power of the now. And from there, it's also dancing a lot. So I would go to Balance Berghain three or four Sundays a month. Every. Every Sunday afternoon, pretty much. And I'd be dancing there and connecting with the music and my body. Um, and I also discovered psychedelics. Having never taken drugs, I was in Mexico City with a group of friends from Berlin and decided to experiment with psychedelics, which is also another way of opening up the mind and finding new ways to surrender. So all of these things were happening at the same time whilst I was consulting more and more brands and founders. And at. At one point I realized, okay, I've created my own business, I'm following my value of freedom, which is very important to me, but in the end, I'm consulting a similar type of company. And I just want to radically put it out there and just say, I only work with companies who are genuinely committed to impact and want to do good. And I name my business Conscious Accelerator intentionally to put people off who hate the word conscious, because that's fine, but they're not my people. They're not why I'm here, to serve. So that was also an intentional branding exercise of communicating where I'm at. And I was terrified of announcing on LinkedIn. I remember that that was the direction I'd taken because I. I thought people were going to think I had gone a bit loopy or become a hippie or, you know, what happened to her? She had. Was on such a good path and then she went into all this conscious stuff. I was worried, and this is six years ago, that people would just think I'd gone a bit crazy. But then I realized, firstly, people don't really care that much about what anyone else is doing. They're so wrapped up in their own stuff. Secondly, I'm not going to, on my own transformational journey, still resonate with all the same people I used to. And that doesn't matter. They're not meant to come on the journey. And thirdly, those who are meant to come on the journey with me will feel great about it. And of course then I was surprised after I announced it how many messages I got from people still in the fashion industry saying, hey, I'm also looking at this stuff. I'm passionate about sustainability. I know we've got to change, what can we do? Let's work together. So I'm sure there were people who also maybe didn't like it, but I never heard from them and never thought of them. So quite right. Just for people's benefit who don't know perhaps what an impact led businesses or an impact startup is. How would you define that? Yeah, it's a word that's flying around a lot and there's definitely different ways people use it. I think the simple way of describing is we started with sustainability and sustainability is all around creating an organization which does less harm. And I think a really good example of this is my husband said to me once, he said, you know, we're vegan and, and we, we eat a plant based diet and we have to not think that we're doing anything good at all by being vegan. We're doing nothing good, we're just doing less harm than people who choose to eat in a different way. We're still doing harm with what we're eating, but less harm, that's not doing something good. We need to be clear about that. And that was a really, I think that's a really good way of showing a sustainable business that's a bit more sustainable than another. Well, of course it's better, but it's just doing less harm. So then we went into the phase of regeneration. Well, how can a business be sustainable in how it operates but also give back more than it takes from the environment and community, from people and planet? And so impact is about the internal and the external. It's making positive impact on people and planet. And I know that this is a word where if you look at the definition of impact or it could be negative impact, it could be positive impact. Wasn't my decision that this is the word that everyone uses in industry, but this is the word. So impact investing, impact entrepreneurs, you can call it conscious investment, conscious business, whatever, regenerative as well. But whatever these words are, that's what it's relating to. It's the internal and external impact on people and planet. And again that's that word conscious as well is a, is a word du jour and it's a kind of very polarizing word or a confusing word for people. So you enabled your, so you have this just sort of recap. You've had this breakout of London, London, you've had your kind of business starts in Berlin. We have the face cream moment in New York. And back to Berlin to. I like a bit of techno, by the way. I'm. I'm partial to a bit of techno. I'll send you my link to my soundcloud. And then we had this leaning into impact for the various prompts and the experiences in Mexico and different ways of opening your thinking. And then you created the consciousness accelerator and you were worried or thought you maybe, you know, make people think you've gone all weird and hippie. So, so what does conscious mean? Yeah, it's a good question because really it means being aware. And I think that that's a great definition to stick to. It's. It's really about being aware of the wide implications. It's like if you drop a drop of water into a sink that's full, it's not just seeing where it lands, but it's seeing all the ripples that flow out from it and being aware of the interconnectedness of everything and how any action impacts something else and everything else ultimately. So I think that when we see ourselves as separated individuals, when we see our businesses as fighting and competing, then we, we lose a lot of that connection, which is, which is such a shame because it's something that can really help us to build greater businesses, more resilient businesses and more profitable businesses. Yeah, it's funny because my blow up of my business, hence the podcast name back in 2017 was an act of awareness raising. Let's just call it consciousness raising for me because I got my stupid walnut shelled ego smashed open, which it needed to have happened in the ongoing midlife crisis of crisis that was my 40s and, and I needed it because it is just break it open to kind of look outside of myself and go, oh yeah, there's a world of way of seeing the world kind of that is perhaps different and perhaps if I, if I expand my awareness, I can perhaps have a better relationship with that outside world and people and the business. And so for me, raising my awareness or consciousness has been a fundamental thing that I've been practicing for the last five years to be able to have a better relationship with me and my wife and kids and business and friends and world and you or whoever. And it propagates out the ripple effect. So I think that for me it's a kind of, I think it's really interesting and that the word conscious, I think Kind of comes with some baggage attached to the. I mean, I'm getting interested to see you thought some people might be negative about it. Why did you think people, people would be negative about that word? Well, I don't really want to go into the whole British press using the word woke and appropriating it into something, well, pretty horrible. There's a lot of people who are not very open minded and that's okay, everyone's on their own journey. But I think we can be in our society quite quick to shoot down anything that's not already scientifically proven. And I love that scientists themselves, any good scientist will tell you that science is the best guess at a moment in time and size wouldn't exist anymore if there wasn't a lot left to yet to discover. So I think that we need to be much more balanced in how we bring our own understanding of the world from our innate intuition, our own inner wisdom, our own connection with ourselves, with all of the incredible resources and knowledge science that exists around us. And so for me, conscious acceptance accelerator brings together those two words. It's the feminine and the masculine. Or, or it's the kind of esoteric and, and the, the business as usual. And putting those words together I think creates a new energy around business. But the reason that I was worried about sharing it was just thinking not everybody in fashion is going to be ready for this right now or, or, or open minded enough and what, what will be the impact of that? These contacts that I've built over 10, 15 years, how are they going to react? And it was a moment of, of weakness because it doesn't matter and I didn't need to care. But in that, in that moment I did care and it just, it just temporarily held me back for a couple of weeks, you know, until, but I'm interested on that because this is a really good little, little moment because I had a real hesitancy. Well, so this podcast and it was like, you know, blah, blah, it's been done quite well now and it doesn't feel like anything. But at the time I thought, yeah, hypothetically talking about the time I blew my business up, yeah, that's a good thing to help other people. But on the morning of Going Live, there's a whole different thing where you're thinking I'm crazy, I'm going to like, like torpedo my career. So those two weeks where you held back, what, what, what were the fears that in your mind and how did you get over them? I don't think I thought about it that Much. I. I'm just acknowledging a feeling that I had where I noticed that I was hesitating. And I thought, why am I hesitating? This is really exciting. And then I looked into it and checked in with myself and said, okay, I'm wondering how people are going to react. But I, I thought I was somebody didn't really care how people think, what people think of me. That is obviously not completely true. And then I had to ask myself, what is the worst that could happen? And then I saw the worst that could happen would be that people who are not aligned with me will not like what I'm doing. So guess. Yeah, great. And I think, well, you can only please a certain amount of people certain amount of the time. We talked a little bit about esoteric and practical and the feminine and masculine. And you mentioned Michael Singer earlier and the concept of surrender or his book, the Surrender Experiment. And again, this is another word, surrender, like conscious or conscious, I suppose is what, what does that even mean? Someone's listening to this and isn't even aware of Michael Singer's book. Could you firstly, could you just sort of talk about that book? Because you seem to be an instructional book. It's a book called the Surrender Experiment by Michael Singer. Can you just talk about who's Michael Singer and what is this book? So, I mean, he's a very, very successful businessman and author and I think the Untethered Soul is the most well known of his books. I have read all three of his books, but the Surrender Experiment for me was the most interesting because he talks about how he decided early on in his life to just surrender to everything. And he was surrendering to whatever opportunities came and whatever felt right at any moment. And he ended up then being a hippie in America, building a temple. And you know, I was reading and thinking, wow, this is pretty amazing. I mean, he's taken this to quite an interesting scale, but also it doesn't really resonate with me. I'm not looking to live a life like that or create a temple or, you know, I am very firmly rooted in business and know that's where I'm meant to be. And I love and love it and enjoy it. And so I'm not really sure about this, but. But I like his sentiment. And then as he continues, I don't want to ruin it for you. He also narrates the audiobook himself and it's quite short, so it's really, is really worth listening to. But then he ends up building a multimillion dollar company from the Same process, he never set out to do so and incredible things happen and he's. His life story is absolutely mind blowing. And it didn't come from overthinking, forcing something, knocking people out. The way this kind of old world thinking that most of us were educated with, it just came from a process of surrendering. And so I think people are scared of the word surrendering because it makes it sound like you just give up or you're not taking control or you don't really have your own vision. You just, you're just on the train, wherever it's going to go. And that's not how I see surrender, but that is how I thought about it at the beginning too, until I had done more exploration and also more experimentation in my own life. And with anything, I think, you know, learning from experience is the only way that you can really understand something. But for me then surrender became something that needs to balance with vision. So I think we need to have our vision, a clear understanding of how we're going to get there. Very specific goals that you're focused on, but at the same time also to be flexible and open enough to respond to what is put in front of you. Sometimes it's not expected and sometimes we can just stay on, on our lane because that's what we said we were gonna do and that's what we promised and that's what we set out and almost get caught up in the mind, in the thinking part of it and not take something that is quite obviously a really great thing for you because it's not what you had planned. So I'm always thinking about this and working on this with the founders who I advise is how do you have a very clear vision, know what you're working towards, have your goals, and also communicate that to your teams in a way that they can then get on board with, but at the same time be open and flexible enough to surrender to the opportunities of the world. And without doing that, I don't think we're able to maximize the opportunities that we have, because I don't believe that any human being can sit down and say the next 10 years are going to go like this and not take anything that comes out of the magic of the interactions, the relationships, the chance meetings, the secret happen in life that then could take you somewhere even greater. Yeah, and it's a good shout. And I think part of one of the paradoxes of being an entrepreneur is your sort of drilled into you that you have to be the sort of great leader, entrepreneur, explorer, forging for the. From ahead. And there's a truth to that. But then there's the sort of. The flow of things can get lost in there. A little example I'll give for my own company is last. So I've set the podcast up and I started interviewing people. I got introduced to a woman who's very prominent in impact investing in the. In London, and she came on the podcast and maybe about six or eight months later, we got sort of chatting about something else, and she sort of gently nudged me and my company in the direction of working with impact startups, because we were working with startups. And then we started doing it, and then I suddenly went, hang on, we love this. This is really good. And then suddenly a year on or 18 months on from that, this is a very much a commitment from our business. But it was a. We didn't consciously set out to do this thing. And in fact, there was a lot of resistance to do it, but it just seemed to be the flow of things. And so I've read the Michael Singer book, the Surrender Experiment, and I found it really fascinating because just to clarify that he. A lot of the stuff he ended up doing, he didn't really want to do, but his life flowed in that direction. And the surrender was to sort of go with the flow of life, as it were, and then to position himself within that flow, even though his rational mind was saying, no, no, no, you don't want to do this. And so it's almost letting the world unfold in front of you is how I'm kind of reading this. Like, read the runes a little bit, and if it feels right, even if it's uncomfortable, maybe the discomfort. Coming back to your point about feeling good in discomfort is part of the point. It's part of the growth. Yeah, exactly. And getting comfortable with that discomfort. And again, by asking what's the worst that could happen can be key to growing and really expanding. I see it like a river. You're flowing in the river. You're flowing in the direction that you want to be going in. But then you see that if you just move a little bit over to the left, there's a rapid that's gonna flow way better. And on the right side, there's some reeds and things that's gonna be kind of sticky. So why not just flow around in the rapid bit? It's. It's adjusting and just seeing, always seeing what's there. And I think that this is also conscious. Again. I mean, my husband and I say in our relationship every morning we Want to wake up and say, I choose to be with you today. I choose to be with you. It's not just because we're married. So I guess that's where I find myself. And I think that this is the same in business, is saying, what do I really want to be doing today? How can I make the greatest impact and what are the opportunities that are in front of me? I never saw myself in finance, and I think if I hadn't employed surrender, I would now be a partner of an investment company. So that would be a shame to. To have missed that because I was so blind and only sticking to what I had said I was going to do. And I think that's a good example, actually. Could you unpack? I mean, you touched on it briefly. Obviously you met your business partner and you got different skill sets and how you're working. But kind of, where was this sort of talking about the flow and the surrender of you? You started in fashion. You're a kind of creative brand person in business. You've kind of got into impact and that kind of like, that makes sense. And suddenly now switcheroo, like, it's like a kind of you just went cut from like your life X years ago to your life today. Suddenly you're in finance. It's like, what the. How did that happen? So, so how does. Can you unpack that example? So how do you employ those principles of surrender and the principles of going with the flow of the river and how you got you to where you are today? Yeah, absolutely. So after three years in Berlin, I just met my husband and we decided a few months after we met to become nomadic and travel the world. So we both rented out our apartments. We spent the next three or four years traveling the world, slow travel and working from wherever we were, building our businesses and all sorts of different situations and places. And that also helped me to understand flow and being in the right place to connect with the right people. I meant to at any moment. And so as my business was growing and thriving and I was working with a lot of founders, I was also helping a number of them on fundraising, how to position their business for the next fundraising round that they had, and seeing it from the founder's side and just thinking, who decides where this money goes? This makes such a big difference for the potential. Business has to change the world. Because my ultimate belief is we have to change the world with business. Governments are never going to do it and we have to do it now. And I believe it's the greatest business opportunity of all. Time. And we have to let go of this idea that, okay, let's do something good and accept that we'll earn less. No, no, no. I think that this is the route to absolute abundance and harmony and growth. And so I was thinking maybe I need to go on the money side and see how we can change that and diversify the decision makers and where the capital is flowing to and why the capital is flowing and the terms on which the capital is flowing, which was something I then came to learn a lot more about. And so it was just in my mind for one or two years. I think I have a sense that the funding is going to be coming up for me and I wasn't consciously trying to create the opportunity for that, but I had a sense that it was coming and I stayed open and then it flowed. When I met my business partner and he asked me to consult on his business and then we worked so well that we ended up launching it together as partners and going from there and it's. It. I, I actually have met other people who have funds who also come from a brand and business background. I met one brilliant guy running a very beautiful ethical fund who, both of the, the founders don't have a finance background, so I don't know how on earth they navigated this crazy world of finance. But it's a great combination for me and my partner that we have the finance and private equity expertise and network and then also brand and business and understand all sides of that together. And I'm learning a lot and you know, I like to be uncomfortable in learning. Well, there you go. It's a new territory. Exploring the outer edge and reapplying those, those, those skills. Yeah, it said, you said the, the consciousness, the being conscious, raising one's awareness, the one's vision and then the flow of life. And so, so really that's a, a way of, as you are going more into this world, the, the intuition around money, the money side. And when was the. Because I did. Am I right in you thinking you, you went to, you met first met him in Rome at the conference because I believe you've just been speaking at the, in Amsterdam on this, this round two of this conference. Can you speak on like what, how did he actually go and meet, meet him? And what was that? What, what spurred you to, to take your trip to Rome? It's another beautiful example of surrender. So I was having a session with one of my clients and she just mentioned at the end, hey, I've been invited to a summit in Rome. It's be for good leaders from around the world. It's the first time they've ever done it and I think you'd really like to be there. And I thought that's interesting. And I knew I meant to go. I didn't need to look it up or ask how much it was or look at the days. I just knew. I really feel like I meant to be there. And I had a five month old baby and I was breastfeeding a lot still. And you know, my husband and I are 50, 50 partners in how we commit time to parenting. So I said to him, hey look, this thing came up and I looked at the website and showed him and just said, I think I'm really meant to be there. And he said, then I thought you, I'll take those days off and we'll come to Rome with you. So we all went to Rome and I knew only this one person, wonderful woman there. And I just went and ended up with I think 10 new, 15 new friends who I'm still friends with now over a year later and another five new clients. That was not my intention. That naturally came in this a few months after when people started started calling and then another 30 or 40 brilliant contacts, some of which I've collaborated with on various projects. So it was just so much came from that. And you know, every afternoon my husband was coming in 40 degrees, dripping in sweat in his T shirt and shorts, coming to the, to the conference and I was popping out and breastfeeding my daughter and he was taking her off again and you know, we made it work. And I think sometimes it's just following that feeling that so what I'm meant to be at. And, and I think that there's a really. When you get more in tune with your body, maybe this goes back to why it was so important for me to tune into my body because that's how I can now completely tell the difference between a feeling of I really feel that I meant to go there versus I should. You know, it's not a fear driven I should, if I don't go there then I'll miss out on a fomo. It's not a negative fear based feeling of should. You know, other people would expect me to. It's a, it's just a pure I'm meant to be there. And just allowing that to happen without expectations as well, that's so counterintuitive Again in the world we live in, the culture we're in, where's the data, where's the proof, where's the Rational argument, where's the business case? And it's. So I ran a workshop yesterday and it was. Suddenly everyone was like, really getting into it and suddenly you could. Someone then said, yeah, but the metrics, the metrics. And it's not that. That's not important. But then all the kind of creative spirit that was emerging, that was really, really interesting, got, like, buttoned down by the accountant bit of the brain. And I think what you're speaking on there is this sort of feel you didn't go and rationally set out a business plan that would say, I expect to have this as a result of this investment. That all the signals were like, like, don't do it, you've got a baby, you've got to breastfeed the baby, you've got a husband, you've got things, you've got to work, you got. You've got like, how much money is it? When is it? All these things that were stacked up, but then there was this one thing that said just. Yeah, it just feels right. So. So again, how do you sort of. Again, for people listening to this, who perhaps struggle with this, or perhaps that doesn't make sense to them at all, how does. How does one nurture that ability? And how. Why would you encourage people to sort of. To explore that? Yeah. And, you know, I think you make a really good point that the data is so important and I love data, I love numbers. And it's fascinating and it's. It's hugely important, but I don't think that that deepest gut feeling is ever wrong. And the way that I help people to start on this journey of listening to it in business is think back to a time when you felt, and I could even ask you this, you can. You think kind of a time where you felt that that went badly or that didn't work out. And I knew, I knew, I knew it wasn't going to be good. Yeah, We've all experienced. Even if it's like, just in a friendship and you just meet someone, you're like, yeah, I think that they seem pretty cool, but, like, something about them is a bit off and I don't really feel good, but, you know, it's probably fine. And then a month later you're on a holiday together and they've done something awful and you're just like, yeah, I never really thought that was a good thing. I think we've all experienced that. It's funny because your rational brain can make up lots of arguments and generally, for me, it's the way where we Made poor decisions is. It's a fear based decision. Yeah, exactly. I don't know sales alone. This is the classic sales low cash flows type. Some. Something like that or something's dropped out. Oh shit. This is. Oh great. It seems a bit squirrely. Yeah. But it's a couple. It tops up the figures this month and then six months later you're repenting at leisure as this whole thing's ending in tears and it's taken up like 10 times as much time as you ever got paid for. And that's, that's a recurring pattern for me. And it's always a fear based thing. Exactly. And in that moment I could have thought, okay, I, you know, I'm picking things up again after having a baby and I'm not making my usual level of income yet. And then my husband also has to not work those days. And you know, like you said, there could be many fear based reasons not to do it. But, but I think that if we've all experienced having not listened to the feeling and that the feeling was right, why not just give it more of a chance? Because your data shows not listening has a hundred percent fail rate. So what have you missed out on then by not listening? What, what could have happened? Don't you want to find out next time? Yeah. And that I think is a nice summation of what IU could conceive as surrender. Okay. It feels right. Rational mind's given you about a thousand reasons. Just go with it. You don't have to. I can think of a few examples which I'm pushing a lot of time, but of a way I've applied that not just in business but in life where things have cropped up and it's like, yeah, but like it's a thousand really good reasons to say no, but I just want to do it. And, and, and oftentimes I rarely have regretted those things. I mean they might have been very instructional or challenging, but I've really regretted those things. And it's an interesting, I would say challenge and opportunity and perhaps something to, for everyone's listening to take away from today to sort of go, okay, just meditate on that, reflect on that journal, on that, sink that in. Like, where are times where you could go to this next level or a different aspect of your life, including your business? That is new territory going to that zone that. Nikki's right. What you say as well about it being easier in your personal life, it's something that I can see that I've always done. If I don't feel Good about a guy. I'm not going to go on a date with him if I don't know that this is the man. I'm not going to marry him if I whatever, don't want to go to visit that country. I don't have to write a proposal about why I'm not going. I just go where I want to go. And then when we're in business, we're much more in this fear based, mind based scarcity mindset. And for me, surrendering is linked with abundance. It's not, it's, it's just saying, okay, I'm, I know and I trust and I know that good things are coming from this and I'm gonna go with it. And it's, it's just a much more positive place to be. And on my podcast Going Conscious, I recently interviewed Monica, a friend of mine and an impact investor. And she talked about how in her investment decisions she uses her intuition. And I thought that was amazing because I, for one year now have been on an experiment to make all business decisions based on my intuition. So data is, is that I see the data, I read the data. So that informs my opinion, it informs me. But then I go with what feels right in my body. So that, that has honestly led me to so much clarity and to a bad experience that I had a couple of years ago, which was, I mean, bad. It was the experience I needed where I trusted someone who branded herself as an ethical entrepreneur and a big success. And I trusted her and gave her some of my time. And then she did not come through on what we had, what she had promised. I realized all along I knew she was manipulative. I knew that there was something that was not good. So it was a great lesson for me to say, yeah, I'm not going to do that again. I'm really going to let my, my intuition and feeling guide me. And it brings so much more clarity to just being able to fully say yes to things and absolutely go for it. I think that's really great. It's aligning your brain, your mind, your and your body. And by the way, for any of the irrational minded people, you do have brain cells in your spine, gut and in your viscera. That's why it's connected through the vagus nerve to your brain. And so your viscera and your, all the internal organs is your subconscious that connects to your brain. So it is connected. It's scientifically actual biology. Biology. We're not just talking woo woo here, right? You mentioned in passing your fantastic podcast going Conscious. Can you please share us a little bit about that and where can we find out more about you and connect with you? Nikki? Yes, thank you. So Going Conscious is on all of the major platforms. We've got well over 100 episodes now and some great stats which I won't list off here, but you can find. List, list them, list them. 2.5% of all global podcast and a whole bunch of other acolytes. She's incredibly successful and so it's a great, great show. And what I love about it is the fact that you're kind of bringing people who you are meeting and part of your life onto the show. And that's something I'm trying to do here, actually. More. Yeah. And I think, yes, it's great stuff. You definitely should listen. If you're into this idea of tuning into a sort of your body and looking at raising your awareness, then check out that podcast. It's great. Yeah, the podcast is all about people who have shifted to impact and creating greater profit from greater positive impact. And it's, it's with all sorts of inspiring business leaders and founders. So goingcontjust.com or just anywhere you can find out about all of the things I'm doing on NikkieTrott.com N I K-K-I T R O-T.com There you can link to my impact investment fund, Barefoot Ventures, to my brand advisory Conscious accelerator, to my podcast, Going Conscious. And you can also find me on LinkedIn, Nikki Trott, or on Instagram, Nikki Trout. All those links should be clicked by you and followed up, dear Listener, because Nikki is awesome and a trailblazer and a real pioneer in multiple ways and she's also brilliant. So if you are thinking about doing it, we've done some collaborative work. She's worked, helped me with my brand and my business and she's really astute, plain and very insightful. Plain speaking and insightful. And so I would highly recommend her, genuinely. And what a fantastic conversation. Thank you for coming and sharing so openly. Great journey you're surrendering to and I'm honored to have been a small part of it so far and hopefully we can continue working together. So thanks for coming on the podcast and I'll see everybody next time. Thank you so much. Are you an impact startup founder? Are you looking to do good in the world? And do you want a team to build your tech product? But importantly, do you want that tech product to actually do what you want it to do based on the vision you've got? Then maybe just maybe my company, the tech department could be a good fit. And as a founder of a startup, particularly in the early stages, every penny you invest is critical. It's adding value, it's creating improvement to your business. So our difference is we focus first on improvement and that mindset shift is unique and we turn that mindset shift into a method which, which we called the tech boot camp and it works really great. We get great feedback from all of our startup clients and when you've got your business profitable and you want to build your in house team then we can help you with that too and hand over in a way that's not weird and we're not hanging onto the code or anything stupid like that. So if you like the idea, check us out at www.thetechdept.com T H E T E C H D E P t the tech department thetechdept.com the worst name to pronounce as a domain name on a podcast. Check it out.