EP262: Becoming a FIT-CEO with Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann

Leadership is more than just strategy – it's a holistic commitment to your mental, emotional, and spiritual well-being. In this episode, we’ll explore the four crucial "R's" of leadership with Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann. Tune in to discover how to cultivate resilience, prioritize self-care, and unlock peak performance without burning out.
 

 Key Takeaways To Listen For

• The 4 R’s of leadership fitness
• Why self-care and setting boundaries are essential for high achievers
• The power of visualization and mental toughness in leadership success
• How gratitude and reflection can transform your mindset
• Practical steps for maintaining energy and avoiding burnout

 Resources Mentioned In This Episode

• FitCEO: Be the Leader of Your Life by Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann and Lillian So | Kindle and Paperback

About Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann

Rebecca is a seasoned CEO, leadership expert, and author dedicated to helping executives build resilience and lead with impact. With over two decades of experience at Citigroup and Wells Fargo, she has led high-performing teams, spearheaded business transformations, and managed global operations. As the founder of RMK Group, Rebecca advises CEOs on strategic growth and leadership fitness, integrating mental, emotional, and physical resilience into executive success.

A Fulbright scholar and Stanford MBA, she is a sought-after speaker on leadership, business transformation, and high-performance cultures. Rebecca’s latest book, Fit CEO, explores the essential principles of self-care, renewal, and resilience for leaders striving to maintain peak performance.
 

 Connect With Rebecca

• Website: RMK Group, LLC
• LinkedIn: Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann 

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Transcript

[00:00:00] Dr. Nate Salah
Hello, my friend, and welcome to this episode of A Call to Leadership. I'm Dr. Nate Salah, your host. I'm so glad you are here. Well, fitness, leadership fitness is important, not just physical, emotional, mental, spiritual, financial. Of course, I'm talking about so many of the pillars in our great summit leadership model, which are shared by leaders all over, including one who I have the privilege of speaking with and sharing with you today. Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann is a guest on the show, Rebecca, she is such a resource. She's a former Fortune 50 global executive. She's got a proven track record of leading successful business, turnarounds, all kinds of aspects of business. She's most famously, she was asked to lead City Bank, California out of a headline-making crisis back in 2008 for those of us who remembered.

[00:00:59]
 And she's also the founding member of RMK group. She advises city. CEO's on accelerating business growth. She is also the co-author of fit CEO, be the leader of your life that helps leaders maintain holistic health and well-being sold copies worldwide. We'll have that in the show notes. And ultimately we're going to talk about those things. She's been recognized as one of the Bay area's most 100 influential women in business for 12 consecutive years by the San Francisco Business Times. What a treat. We're going to dive in and unlock what it means to be a fit CEO. Can't wait for you to listen in. This is A Call to Leadership. Rebecca, welcome to the show.

[00:01:48] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
Thank you, Nate. Happy to be here. 

[00:01:51] Dr. Nate Salah
Oh, my goodness. What a treat. You've got such a wealth of experience, your care for leaders. You're writing in the space, and your time with us today is, is an honor. So we are so thankful for you. You have a heart for leadership. You have a heart for leaders to be fit, and why, and through your experience, you know, what has brought you to this place where a fit leader is necessary? And what does that mean? 

[00:02:25] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
Sure. Fitness is a catchword for many layers of fitness. There's the physical fitness. There's the mental fitness, there's the emotional fitness, and there's a spiritual fitness that we really explore in the book. There, of course, are many other, other kinds of fitness we can get to, like financial fitness. But really the heart of the book, or the, my passion, and my co-author's passion, It really has been about if you are physically strong and physically in good shape, you can withstand more just as with, if you're emotionally strong, spiritually strong, psychologically strong, as you say. So as a leader, um, or of your life, or as a leader of a company, you're constantly dealing with lots of stressors coming at you. And it is just much easier to be resilient. And effective as a leader, if you are fit and we can explore all the outcomes of that. 

[00:03:24] Dr. Nate Salah
Well, you hit around the head, stressors are always coming at you and I love your philosophy. Of course, it's right in alignment with what we teach at Great Summit with our four pillars of spiritual, psychological, which encompass, of course, mental, emotional health and, of course, financial and physical health. All of those we consider our pillars and our drive as leaders to. If you will, if you imagine a home and within that, that facility, a building are all the relationships we have. And as a leader, we shepherd those relationships, our relationship, as you had mentioned, spiritual with our creator, the relationship with our family, the relationship with our community, the relationship with nature and creation, of course, the relationship with our business and those who we get to walk alongside of in our business endeavors. So being fit is important. It's so important. It's come incumbent upon us to be fit. And so I'm so I'm so thankful that you've identified that as a central aspect of leadership effectiveness, right? Because we want to be effective leaders and Appreciate it. One of the biggest challenges we face as leaders is understanding how to cope with not only the stress, but also experience resilience and of course, then encompass an endeavor as a leader to build resilience and others as we grow.

[00:04:42] 
And I, and I'm, I'm one for the one, I'm, I'm a student, I'm a fan, and I know our listener is also a student and a fan. You've had so much experience, you've been in the, with the C suite, you've been all through the organizational realms of business with influence and understanding the mechanics of people, and you've identified some key or essential factors, if you will, that are necessary for leaders. Uh, and they're your four, four R's you talk about in your, in your book, and I'd love to just spend some time in this area and talk a little bit about your, your four major R's and really what they mean to leaders purposefully engage them in their day to day. So what's your, what's your first R? 

[00:05:33] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
First one is reset, so if you think about being hit by a stressor of some kind. The first. R is about reset, and the principle is really about focus. So take a step back, evaluate your current state, and then make the necessary changes to align with your goals. And that really is giving yourself permission to start anew as needed. So, like, if I'm hit with a crisis before I get, I think a lot of people, we all do just react. And jump in. But the best part about reset is move out of reactivity to proactivity. You just buy yourself that moment to step back. And it could be you're in the middle of a board meeting and, and directors are hitting you with questions, and you're feeling bombarded. You can just reset mentally and say, okay, I'm not being attacked. I'm going to go on offense. It's a whole mindset, too, that you can play with about resetting. And so I work with a lot of CEOs around. Don't let things happen to you in meetings and react and think you're gonna change the culture, change someone's mind in a reaction way, pause. Like maybe this isn't the moment to even talk about that thing that's stressing you with the team. So, it's a really powerful concept. I don't actually think people use it enough. 

[00:06:50] Dr. Nate Salah
Well, you mentioned something important is to, you know, what I love about this is resetting the context. Because one of the things that we can fail to do is misidentify the context as if it perhaps, as you had mentioned, is an attack on us or something is being happening to us. And I like to look at it like something is happening through us. So we, you know, what, what's, you know, when I hit the reset button, and it's not just anything about as leaders, not even, I mean, yes, in a boardroom or, or, or with, uh, could be with a customer or employee could be at home with a family member could be anywhere. Or it could be at the, it could be at the, uh, checkout line at a, a Subway. It could be anywhere that there may be a conflict situation. And to, what I love to do is when I, when I, if you will, mentally a mindset shift, hit the reset is, okay, let me take myself out of the equation. Let me just step out for a mental moment. As an observer, and if I can step out and observer, perhaps I can have greater dominion over my emotional state, be more self-aware, be able to regulate, and to be able to identify the specific parameters of the direction of this conversation so that I can take in the information and perhaps begin to make a better assessment of the current context rather than being bombarded and feeling overwhelmed.

[00:08:25] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
Yep, there's two metaphors I love depending on who I'm working with at the time, you know, everyone has a different style, but there's two metaphors. I think are very powerful about how to step back one is getting on the balcony You know, if you're in the orchestra, they need to step back, just go up to the balcony. Another one is if you're in a room like a board meeting or a direct reports meeting or any meeting, um, think of something that's in the middle of the table at arm's length, not on you. So these are just different tools of how to reset, even if you're live at something. You know, I think some people think reset as I go away for a week.

[00:09:00] Dr. Nate Salah
Yeah, I love that. And I think we go from victim to victor in some ways with that, because we sometimes, when we're attacked, we feel attacked. Let's just say we feel it, and we may be attacked. Yes, it may. It may actually be an all-outright. Just call it what it is, right? However, by being able to step out and just hit reset, we're able to. Say, okay, you know, perhaps it's an idea that's being attacked. Perhaps it's a, uh, an issue and perhaps I can get in on it and say, you know what, guys and gals friends. Yeah, there's some validity to this conversation. Let's let's unpack and see how we can take this issue and turn it into a win. That's that's a much different attitude. And I think that's part of what we're talking about with this reset piece, right? We're talking about. Yep. In some ways, the attitude we assume when there's a high-challenge situation among us, whether it be in any of these contexts we've already discussed, and, of course, You know this, I know this, and many of our listeners know this, if they've listened long enough, you, there's a lot of things you can't control. There, you cannot control, oftentimes, what people say and do around you. However, there's one thing we can control, and that is our attitude. That is how we respond. And I think just by taking a moment and hitting the reset, and I think, you know, tell me about how you, what you think about this. Just making it a general practice, like it doesn't have to be a high-challenge situation. It can just be a situation in general. 

[00:10:30] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
Well, I love your example of a subway, uh, and you know, if you're, if you're in a, we've all had the experience where you can be at a shop checking out, and you can have this amazing cashier who's just bright and cheery and makes your day, or you can have someone that could really drown your day, right? And so how you react in that. 

[00:10:50] Dr. Nate Salah
And I found you can make it fun too, Rebecca. So, I'll give you an example. Sometimes, and you probably experienced this, our listener has likely experienced this. Sometimes, you're driving on the highway, and somebody just zooms right past you, perhaps even cut you off. And the natural reaction would be to be offended or, Oh my goodness, this person is going to get somebody killed or, and those are valid, certainly if it concerns, right? However, I tend to have some fun with it, and if someone's in the car with me, especially my son being in the car, I'm like, oof. They might really have to use the bathroom, like find the nearest. 

[00:11:27] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
Might be delivering a baby. 

[00:11:29] Dr. Nate Salah
That's the next one. Yeah, it could be an emergency where, hey, you know, there's a whatever. There could be a thousand reasons that that's happening other than whatever the reason is that I'm offended by. And I think giving that that moment to hit reset and have maybe perhaps just look at it from the perspective can change our response. 

[00:11:53] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
Love it.

[00:11:55] Dr. Nate Salah
So, so that's our first step. Then in the in, in first R, this process, right? First, R hit reset. I love it. 

[00:12:02] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
Yeah. And again, these R's are not like steps. They're just things to, in your toolbox, think of it that 'cause it, the order does not matter. The order could be anyone. The second R that we talk about is resilience. And really the principle resilience is highlighting your emotional and your physical resilience. And that's why I talked about how do you build that mental strength and how do you build that, um, physical strength to withstand challenges? Right? So, thinking about all kinds of challenges and I have a little bit more here, but all kinds of challenges literally fatigue you, right? So, cultivating a mindset that views obstacles as opportunities. Um, when you just gave a great example of, or as obstacles as, Oh, wow, maybe there's an opportunity for growth there. Maybe there's even a new business model there. So I, the whole concept of resilience is, are you building mental and physical strength to withstand the setbacks? So I think that's a big one that we'll, we explore in the book in many ways.

[00:13:07] Dr. Nate Salah
I think it's an essential. I've talked about it before on the program and as well as, uh, in life, as you know, in in leadership, resilience is a non-negotiable. It's an essential. If you were to ask what are the top three characteristics or principles that any leader would need to to have massive levels of effectiveness, resilience is always in that in that top three, right?

[00:13:32] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
And that physical strength. What's interesting is I used to have to travel 200 Sometimes 300, 000 miles a year, and how I met my co-author who was my personal trainer is I traveled all the time, and I got tired of like how hard it was to put my carry on over my head. I'm five foot one. So, it is just not ideal for me. And, um, I really worked on building upper body strength and I'm, that's how I met Lillian. And then after working with her for years, I said to her, I'm writing this book someday. You wanna, I'd love your voice in it. So when you see the book, it literally has student voices on it. It's like I have a leadership concept for three pages. There's about a page of your body, pen to paper, and different exercises. So very much a book you could read, or you could do. And that's where this comes from. 

[00:14:21] Dr. Nate Salah
Oh yeah. And you know, I love, I love the, the putting yourself into a mental toughness state. I love that language. And strengthening the mind is so critical in the resilience factor. I give you a quick, fun example. So I for years I taught a course, which was an elective course in the business department, one of the universities, and it was business policy and It was not an easy course. And I being the kind of person who wants the to bring the best out of out of each of the students when day one, the students would come in. Of course, this was also let me tell you, it was adult accelerated. So, 25 to 65 where the average student ages, and they came in after work was six o'clock at night to 10. Tough, right? You've been busy all day working and you got to go four hours in this, in this coursework. So, first night I would tell students, I just want to set the bar for you. And the bar, uh, is whatever, as high as the bar is, that's, that's what we'll reach for. We won't reach, generally speaking, any higher than, than wherever we set the standard. I'm going to set the standard is just as high as I know you can go. And, and that standard is this, I am going to treat this course and your, your involvement, your experience as the development of academic Navy SEALs.

[00:15:44]
 And, and so eyebrows get raised and even some students go back to the director and say, Hey, this was an elective. I wanted an easy class. And, and, and of course the director would say, Hey, look, stay in professor Nate's class. You're going to be better for it and here's what I would finish it with. I'm not going to allow you to walk this road alone. We're going to do it together. We're all going to do it together as a team and setting the tone there. Rebecca setting the tone as academic Navy SEALs raises that mental toughness bar so that when they face a high challenge situation in that course or beyond they, their identity begins to shift, and I think there's I think there's important piece to discuss around identity. How do we identify ourselves? Same with me. I did triathlon and marathon for many years, and there will be days where I would say, man, it is a tough day. It is a tough evening working later doing whatever. But hey, Nate. You're an Ironman. You can do this, right? There's such, there's so, it's so important. And of course, in faith matters, you talk about spiritual, you know, if you're a, if you're a person of faith and you say, you know, I'm a child of God. Wow. What a, you know, what an elevation in your identity. And I think there's a place for really evaluating that piece in the resilience model and saying, hey, how do I identify myself as a winner, as a person who is resilient, a person who engages and doesn't burn out, a person who approaches mastery rather than misery, and own that.

[00:17:25] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
Wonderful. Love it. And I just love the setting a tone, uh, raising the bar, mental toughness in the class. And you with Stanmore, you know, if you It is so true. It is just as powerful as visualization. If you visualize yourself as being tough or visualize yourself as winning, you have a much higher probability to win. And if you actually visualize doing the activities, you have a much better chance of actually hitting those activities correctly. Very smart. 

[00:17:54] Dr. Nate Salah
Indeed. I think of Jimmy Valvani. I'm sorry, Jimmy V. He was a coach, a basketball coach, and he had it. His, his students, his, his, his team start their, their day with an exercise called cutting down the nets and they would, it would physically cut the nets. Now, cutting the nets was a symbol after you'd win a championship, you would cut the nets. And so this visualization of being champions. And the physical act of that, engaging in that, participating in that, there's, uh, as you, as you know, as you had mentioned, there's, there's research and studies to support the, the visualization of success as a contributor to, as an antecedent, if you will, to success itself.

[00:18:43] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
Absolutely. So powerful. 

[00:18:45] Dr. Nate Salah
Visualize yourself winning. Visualize yourself achieving. Visualize yourself crossing the finish line. Whatever that might look like. 

[00:18:55] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
Love it. Absolutely. And we forget, we have all these amazing free tools at our Disposal, we don't always tap into them, even, I mean, I've written about it and I forget sometimes, but I just have to visualize this. It will happen, you know, tell the universe. 

[00:19:11] Dr. Nate Salah
So, so resilience. We know that's, that's an essential aspect of, of leadership effectiveness or being a fit CEO. What else? 

[00:19:20] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
So another R, and there's so many R's, these are just four of them, is renewal, and that's really around the principle that says continue, you know, we all have the need for continuous self-improvement and rejuvenation, it's really the, the child's mind or the open mind or the curious mind, everything gets back to the mind, and engaging in activities and practices, restore your energy, Or open up your energy or create some kind of enthusiasm and creativity. And as we call it, sometimes you hear us talk about those as juices, right? So I think renewal of that open mind, curious mind, the learning mind, self-improvement mind is so powerful and goes from renew to rejuvenate. You'll notice I love R's. I guess mine name’s Rebecca, so you know. So renew or renewal, you know, is the next R.

[00:20:14] Dr. Nate Salah
Yeah, boy, I, you know, this is an area I think that we've missed. It's easy to say, I'm going to be resilient. It's easy to say, I'm going to develop mental toughness. And, but renewal, for some reason, the, the renewal part is difficult for people, and I think in part. Because sometimes we may feel guilty for taking time to renew, we may have forgotten the benefits of it. We may have even forgotten how to do it. We might have forgotten that it's important to renew so that we can be a better person. Thank you. Inventive again to recharge. 

[00:21:03] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
Yeah, we talk a lot about in the book how placing your own health, if you will, this complete concept of well-being the reset, the resilience, the renewal, all of it into the concept of taking care of oneself. It is not selfish. It is not. I'm going to repeat that, taking care of oneself is not selfish. And of course, we have a chapter, I'm sure many other people do too, but we have a chapter on putting your own oxygen mask on first, and you're in an airplane, it will tell you, put your oxygen mask on first before you help your child or the person next to you with their oxygen mask on, because if you're asphyxiated, you can't help anyone. So that is really a central tenet of. Renewal. You cannot be the leader you want to be. You cannot help others grow, be mentally tough, be resilient if you aren't oxygenated. So put your own oxygen mask on first. And what does that take? So today, I've been in meetings all day. I ran outside into my garden and just took a minute. Grab some of this great sunshine. That's renewal. Renewal can take two seconds. It's not checking into a ranch for five days. And I think that's the other part that we talk a lot about in the book is little, um, instances throughout your day to renew, refresh, take breaks, um, listen to a piece of music, maybe read a poem, do something you don't normally do. Maybe that unlocks the creative part of your mind. 

[00:22:35] Dr. Nate Salah
It's so important and part, I think part of the disconnect or the challenge might be. We're so focused on production or results or efficiency or getting more done. 

[00:22:50] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
Achievement, achievement, achievement. 

[00:22:55] Dr. Nate Salah
Yeah, that's it. And what can happen is our achievement can begin to flounder with the lack of renewal. And the, the true rest that we need when we're doing that, and you had mentioned a ranch or a retreat, that's great when it's appropriate. And I always suggest that to get away for a duration of time to simply just be, I've had some of my best ideas. When I've been away on a sabbatical for whatever reason to to just simply get out of the minutia and at the same time, that's not necessary all the time, as you had mentioned, built some margin into the day. For a moment of, just rest, you can, like you said, I love the vitamin D. I love to go outside and just feel some of that sunshine. Just take a moment to relax. If you have a book at the office, feel me when I say, I don't know. It's just weird reading a book in the middle of the day at the office. Oh, well, that's just because it's programming. Let's, uh, let's talk about re rewiring some of that programming and giving yourself whatever the margin is that's necessary. We are the masters of our calendar. We can build in margin and it's okay because that margin will essentially give us greater effectiveness. 

[00:24:23] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
As leaders, I think one of the things that this is always reminding me of yet so hard when you're a high achiever is to remember that we're human beings, not human doings. So it's fine to be, I don't know, giving ourselves permission to just be. 

[00:24:40] Dr. Nate Salah
Totally. Yeah. And for me, I give you an example in the morning, so I'll take my dog for a walk. And I've talked about on the show. Initially, when I, we, we first got our puppy, I was. I was a little angry, a little upset because I was like, Oh my goodness, this is going to, you know, I'm going to have to walk this dog every single morning and being, you know, I'm a numbers person. So I did the calculation on how many days of productivity I would lose over the course of the next 15 years, this dog being alive and it might sound trivial and even comical and you would, I suspect you, you're not going to be surprised that the relationship grew on me tremendously. And I began to cherish, uh, those mornings as our quiet time together, and it was time for me to simply renew every morning. And now, I couldn't imagine a day without him. In fact, there'll be days where perhaps the dog is in, um, the boarding because it spent some time with other dogs. I'm like, oh my goodness! My buddy's gone. I'm gonna have to go by on my walk by myself. And it's and Rebecca, it is rain, sleet, snow, shine. It was, I don't know, six degrees this morning here in St.

[00:25:52] 
Louis. And we bundled up together. I put my doggie bundle. She had her whole bundled outfit on. I had mine on, and we went out. And we trudged around in the snow and explored and it was really just beautiful. We watched the sunrise together and there was a barge down the river. We are right by the Mississippi River, just watching that as the sun rose. So peaceful, so renewing, and I wouldn't give it up for anything now. And it's, it's amazing. And I think, I guess the point I'm making is. Sometimes, we have to challenge our own self-limiting beliefs that we think something is a distraction or perhaps it is going to take away from our ability to achieve and when in fact it is just what we needed. And it could be anything. It could be more time with the children and just renewing with them. It could be a moment with the spouse in prayer and reflection. It could be so many different activities that are designed to help you renew, explore that. 

[00:26:54] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
And I think part of that challenging our own self-limiting beliefs are things like you can be a leader and healthy and happy and successful and beautiful and all those and make money and, and, and versus people think I can't be physically fit and Successful people have all these self-limiting beliefs. So, um, yeah, we demystify that.

[00:27:22] Dr. Nate Salah
We do. We do. And, and, and I think we don't have to do it alone either. We can do it in concert with others, with our cohorts and our coaches, and those around us to observe that observe where it's working. I love to do case studies, if you will, on individuals and see how those pieces are working together. I used to use the terminology. A work life balance, of course, you've, you've used that, I'm sure, and every, it's just very common. And I've eliminated that terminology because it's rare to actually have perfect balance with anything. However, there is room for harmony and mastery. We can, we can have work life and physical and spiritual and emotional, mental, financial harmony rather than balance. And I think that harmony is exactly what the doctor ordered. When we as conductors of our lives are conducting, you had mentioned earlier, the orchestra conducting, conducting the symphony of our lives, each piece, we want each piece to be a masterpiece. And sometimes some instruments play loudly, sometimes they don't play at all, sometimes they're quieter in the background, sometimes they need tuning, and so on and so forth. And that's really just the other, all the elements of our life. 

[00:28:43] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
I always, I get asked that question about do I believe in work-life balance, or I say I don't actually believe in that sentence, what I believe in is having a whole life. Where you have all the parts, and in your symphony example, there's also going to be disharmonious music that is super moderate, and there are moments for that, you know. Because nothing can be everything all the time. Days ebbs and flow, and not every The reason why I don't love I like work-life balance, but to be in balance all the time is impossible. You have to have disbalance if you will, or imbalance to actually appreciate balance. So you need all the yin and yang.

[00:29:21] Dr. Nate Salah
Yes, I agree. And the wholeness aspect, I'm glad you brought that up. That's, that's, that's exactly the terminology that, that we use in our, our educational, uh, Experience great summit for reaching for wholeness in these areas of life and if you will, an integrity, wholeness is having an integrity within these domains, these relationships, these parts of our lives and also in that wholeness, having grace on ourselves when perhaps, as you had mentioned, something may be out of alignment. That's going to happen in life. That's also part of, I think, what you're talking about, this renewal process. 

[00:30:01] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
And in the book, every chapter ends or almost every, nothing's everything, almost every chapter has a section called immediate and imperfect action. So the chapters are super short, three pages or so, and then there are a few bullets about immediate and imperfect action to try and get the habit or the concept into your life immediately and perfectly, or there may be. Our fourth R, which is reflection, to reflect, you might have a pen-to-paper exercise, and principle of reflecting emphasizes the importance of regularly assessing, like, where am I, where am I against where I want to be, progress, or should I, am I learning from the experiences that I have, am I having, and am I making adjustments consciously, so it encourages the way we wrote the book, literally with the end of each chapter, A habit of introspection and mindfulness. So what's fun about the book is it has different concepts that we also practice in every chapter. And I think that then you understand better what's working, what's not working, and where you are in your journey. 

[00:31:12] Dr. Nate Salah
Absolutely, that last concept of reflection, of course, as you as you had said, rightly, there's so many, so many hours, if you will. And I'm a P guy, so I like peas. So so you just pick a letter, right? And roll with it. 

[00:31:26] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
I'm gonna call you Pate instead of Nate. 

[00:31:30] Dr. Nate Salah
So, so, you know, reflection. Wow. This is a it is also a time thing. Right. If we've got to build margin to take, to reflect, and I love, especially when there's a, a break in a cycle or a season is ending or a month or, or a, uh, a project. Take time to reflect. Take time to reflect. And here's what I think. Celebrate some wins in the reflection. We rarely take time to celebrate the wins. And, and, and we're not talking about basking over the next month of, you know, Hey, team. However, give ourselves some credit. And is this again, high achievers, right? High achievers, high achievers. Just spend an inordinate amount of time looking for the next goal and not taking a few moments to walk in, uh, gratitude, appreciation, reflection on all of the different pieces that have, uh, contributed to the success. And here's the other thing about success, I think, and this is where I think gratitude in reflection is essential.

[00:32:46]
 I think that gratitude is the great antidote to most of our ailments that we face when it comes to our mental or emotional health. Self limiting beliefs that you talked about earlier and gratitude in the little things, for example, the fact that I can breathe contributed to the fact that I can communicate the fact that I can listen and hear contributed to the fact that I can learn the fact that I can see Allows me to see the individuals and the situations that have contributed to the victory that we have among us very basic gratitude. I would my go to every day when someone says, Hey, how you doing? I always say I woke up. It's a good start to the day. And of course, as a, as a, as a person of faith, either way, it's a win. Now, I'm going to say it worked. What an amazing machine. I think about this all the time. What an amazing machine it's now, granted it has, you know, it needs some, uh, some repair and maintenance from time to time. And if we take good care of it, it's going to take good care of us. What an amazing, amazing machine we are as a human being. Just reflect on that, reflect on that daily. I love to reflect on it every single day. What makes this conversation possible between you and I? Reflect and have gratitude that we can have this conversation together.

[00:34:25] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
So appreciated. Yeah, I end most of my notes with inappreciation when I send a note to somebody in work, business. 

[00:34:33] Dr. Nate Salah
Yeah. Yeah. And, and, and so that's such an important, if you will, game changer in the conversations and leadership and the fitness, of course, your, your fit CEO, uh, book and model is how we show up.

[00:34:48] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
First, I have to do this when you say it. 

[00:34:50] Dr. Nate Salah
Yes, yes, yes. Fit CEO. You got to show the book, show the book. 

[00:34:54] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
It's one word. 

[00:34:54] Dr. Nate Salah
We'll have it, we'll have it in the show notes where people can find you. How we show up is such an important piece, again, back to the identity thing, I was just talking with a friend, and we were talking about, uh, our matters of faith, and we were talking about how we represent ourselves. We were on the discussion of, you know, of Jesus, uh, which is, you know, just about everybody knows who Jesus is here in the, in the West, not everyone, everywhere. And I had mentioned that, you know, some, to, sometimes some people, the, the, the only Jesus, and we're talking about, we were talking about the love of Christ. The only Jesus people will ever see is the Jesus in you, and represent that love, that caring, that desire to see the best. And God's best for people. And like, you know, depending on how you show up and just think about if you're listening, think about how you show up, think about as a leader, and reflect on that for just a moment.

[00:35:54] 
Do you show up as a shepherd, as someone who's guiding others to their very best? And your energy, our energy, Rebecca, you know this, our energy is contagious. And I'll be the first one to tell you, yeah. My energy. I'm a pretty optimistic guy, but it's not always the case. You know, sometimes my energy is I'll go home and sometimes I don't bring my best to my family, and I need to make sure that I bring my best to my family. But sometimes I don',t and I miss it. And I have a choice back to the choices. I can just chill in the garage for a couple more minutes, and bring me. The kind of energy, as I reflect on my day in the past, as I reflect on the remaining of my day, to bring the kind of energy that's life-giving for all who I shepherd. That's part of that reflection process that I'm so glad that you have written about in your book. 

[00:36:50] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
Yes, and in my faith, when asked about God, if someone says, well, how do you find God? Where is God? We say it's in each person's face. You're looking at a lot of fun things, you know. In the book, we have five sections, and they are commitment and boundaries, intention, self-care, and heart. The end with heart. But one of the things that keeps coming up for me as we're talking is a fifth of the book is on boundaries. So part of self-love is also having boundaries of, you know, maybe if you are having a bad day and you're not at your best. It's okay not to show up for something, to cancel something. It's okay to take something off your calendar. Because if you're not going to show up at your best, and this is the hardest one for me, saying no. I say yes. I'm a yes person. Yes, I'm going to show up. Yes, I'm going to be there, and I commit, and I follow through. So I think one of the things that I've also learned is looking at my counter and saying, what can I, you know, saying no, you know, people, Oh, you have to be there. You have to be there. Come, come, come. But if it's going to drain my energy and therefore I won't be there, but not at my best, maybe I shouldn't go. So these are all these balancing counterbalancing parts of the equation of showing up at your best is also when maybe you should not show up. So you can rest, you know, cause I think these are some harder ones for people. So, the book actually has a lot on boundaries. 

[00:38:10] Dr. Nate Salah
I love that. Yeah, I think boundaries are essential and boundaries are based on our values. So I think starting with, Hey, what are my, what are my, what's most important to me, my principles, and then building our boundaries around those and staying true to them? I think that maybe sometimes people won't necessarily agree with their boundaries, but they'll respect them when you respect and you require them in your daily walk. So huge, huge, very important piece to the journey. And I'm so glad you brought that up to identify what those boundaries are and communicate them to yourself and to others. And it is difficult. It's difficult to cancel a meeting or to say, hey, I'm not going to be able to make this. However. If you are any unable to bring your best and I look at it like this, sometimes we, we look at our mental or emotional fitness or health in the moment, as though we can compromise it because it's not physical, if you will.

[00:39:14] 
So, I'll give you an example. Say you broke your arm, and you were on a baseball league. Okay. You're not going to be playing until your arms healed. And it's completely acceptable. There's no one who's ever going to say, Oh, what a loser. You should still try to play with that broken arm. Right? Because you're right. Yeah, you're not going to be effective on the team. However, when it comes to our mental or emotional state, if we're having a broken arm, if you will, proverbially, if there's something going on, and we've got to take a quick step back, because we need a little healing in a certain area. Why are we so much harder on ourselves and why are others, uh, judgmental of us in that space? It shouldn't be the case. We should honor that just in the same way as the other areas of our health in physical terms. 

[00:40:03] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
It's not visible. That's what's so hard, right? 

[00:40:07] Dr. Nate Salah
Yeah, it's not visible. That's what makes it more challenging. However, We feel it. Yeah, we feel it. And I think back to the boundaries being true to that and saying, Hey, today, I've got a broken arm, if you will, so to speak. And I need to I need that to heal. I need to get that some rest. I'll be better tomorrow there sometimes. And playing that out. Maybe there's a conversation that you were going to have. For example, maybe there's an email you were going to send, and you were not in the proper state. You, uh, was the, uh, the, uh, you had to halt, right? You were either hungry, angry, tired, or lonely. And we have to, and just stop, don't send an email, wait till, wait till the morning. It's so much better unless it's, of course, urgent and perhaps have someone else vet it or run it through your AI assistant and let your AI assistant reformat it. How would you?

[00:40:57] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
Tell your AI assistant, please make this friendly.

[00:41:00] Dr. Nate Salah
Yeah, here's where I'm here's where I'm at right now, and because I have yet to when my emotional or my mental state has been compromised or I'm in an unhealthy place in the moment for whatever reason, I have yet to see something I've done or said that was better than when it would have been said or done in a healthy emotional and mental state.

[00:41:26] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
And so hard to be, again, self-aware. So, then, we have to give each of ourselves grace. That's probably, being kind to ourselves is probably one of the harder parts of this. To also know, none of us are perfect, which is why we end every chapter with immediate and imperfect action. 

[00:41:45] Dr. Nate Salah
You bet, yeah. And listen, if you're listening, And you're like, Oh my goodness, I actually just sent that text and, uh, I was in an unhealthy mental or emotional state, and I may have worded it differently if I was in a better state, there's no harm in saying, Hey, I wasn't in a, in a great place when I sent that to you. Forgive me. Here is how I would have said it had I been there. And we can receive grace, and we can give grace. And if someone's not willing to give you grace, then perhaps there's another boundary that you can consider through some reflection in that relationship, and at the same time, um, It gives us an opportunity to do better and improve with every interaction we have. To be what? Fit CEOs. How about that for another plug? 

[00:42:34] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
As the leader of your life. 

[00:42:36] Dr. Nate Salah
That's right. As the leader of your life. Rebecca, what a treat. What a treat to have you on the program and share these nuggets of wisdom with our listener. 

[00:42:45] Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann
Thank you. It's been an honor and a pleasure to be here. Really appreciate it.

[00:42:49] Dr. Nate Salah
You bet. Well, my friend, I am so thrilled that you joined me on this episode. And before you go to the next episode, especially if you're binge-listening, take a moment. I would love to get your honest review right here on your screen. Your feedback is so important. It helps the podcast. It encourages me, and it helps me, it helps me to give you more and more and more value. So, I can't wait to read your review. I can't wait to be with you on the next episode. I'm Dr. Nate Salah. This is A Call to Leadership.