022 : Using Grief as a Launching Pad to a Brighter Future with Maria Giudice & Diana Chaparro-Clark
We all deal with inevitable transitions in our life and career. Take the example of men and women in their 50s, who may be starting to feel their age creeping up on them. The fear of becoming irrelevant crops up. They are faced with the question: “Who am I becoming?” Our guests look at this transition as a journey down one mountain and up a new one: In our youth, we prioritize building our career, wealth, and status; but as we get older, we begin to shift our focus towards creating lasting purpose.
“Grief is the marker of an ending.” It’s the end of a job; the end of the old normal. It’s the dip that must be endured in order to bounce forward into the next stage of life. Overcoming grief requires you to understand that you’re at the beginning of a transition into something new and exciting. This understanding will give you the courage to face that grief and allow you to have compassion for yourself as you navigate this difficult period. In the context of COVID-19, realize that you have an opportunity for introspection. Use this downtime to define what positive changes you’ll be putting into action in the new normal. The point is this: Grief is necessary. It must be endured. But it also incentivizes preparation for an even greater future—that is, if you allow yourself to use grief as a launching pad. After all, “the Bubonic Plague led to the Renaissance.”
Steve Chaparro, Maria Giudice, and Diana Chaparro-Clark discuss how to deal with making big transitions in one’s life and career—a topic more relevant than ever in the midst of often overwhelming uncertainties during the COVID-19 pandemic. Stay tuned.
Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:
- How to deal with life-altering transitions in your career
- Overcoming grief, especially during lockdowns imposed during COVID-19
- Why you need to be compassionate with yourself in order to stay productive during a tough transition
- How “sitting in the grief” will allow you to plant the seeds for your new beginning
- Using collective grief to build greater connections with your community
- Why you shouldn’t compare your circumstances with those of others
- How to support loved ones who are going through grief
- The importance of being present
Resources Mentioned in this episode:
- Maria Giudice on LinkedIn
- Maria Giudice on Instagram
- Maria Giudice on Twitter
- Hope Culture Counseling
- Diana on LinkedIn
- Diana on Instagram
- Diana on Facebook
- Reach Diana at [email protected]
About the Guests:
Maria Giudice is the founder and CEO at Hot Studio, “a leading experience design company … dedicated to creating elegant solutions for complex design challenges.” She is a highly sought-after speaker and consultant for creative leadership. Maria is also the author of three design books, including Rise of the DEO: Leadership by Design (2013), which has been translated into several languages.
She graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Fine and Studio Arts at The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art.
Diana Chaparro-Clark is a licensed marriage and family therapist, working with children, adolescents, and adults at Hope Culture Counseling. She helps her clients overcome grief, including the grief that often accompanies life and career transitions. She feels most fulfilled when helping families of varying situations, including blended families, navigate crises.
She graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology at California State University, San Bernardino, and a Master of Science in Counseling at CSU Fullerton.
Sponsor for this episode:
This episode is brought to you by the Culture Design Studio, a consulting firm that helps people and cultural leaders who feel constrained in their ability to engage their employees to become champions for their people through a series of facilitated workshops. They provide a practical and collaborative process to transform the culture within your creative organization.
Culture Design Studio has worked with organizations like Design Thinkers Group, Red Bull, USAID, Bacardi, and the Office of Civic Innovation
If you’re looking for more than just a consultant and want someone who can facilitate your organization through a structured conversation to transform your culture, Culture Design Studio is the one for you.
Contact them today to learn more about what they can do for you and your company.
Full Transcript: Powered by Otter.ai
Announcer
Welcome to the Culture design Show where we feature conversations with leaders and thinkers who are passionate about culture and design. Now, let’s get started with the show.
Steve Chaparro
Steve Chaparro, here. I am the host of the Culture Design Show, a podcast where I feature leaders and thinkers at some of the top creative firms in the world, including architecture, design, technology, and marketing. What’s the one thing they all have in common? They all believe in the power of culture, and design.
This podcast is brought to you by Culture Design Studio, we help people in culture leaders who feel constrained in their ability to engage their employees to become champions for their people. Through a series of facilitated workshops, we provide a practical and collaborative process to transform the culture within your creative organization. We’ve worked with organizations like DesignThinkers Group, Red Bull, US Aid, Bacardi and the Office of Civic Innovation. So, if you’re looking for more than just a consultant, but someone who can facilitate your organization, through a structured conversation to transform your culture, reach out to us at culturedesignstudio.com
Hello, everybody. This is Steve Chaparro. I’m so thankful that you are all checking in today for our LinkedIn Live conversation. I tell you what, this is something that I have been looking forward to for a long time. And I say a long time because we’ve been in COVID for you know, probably what, eight nine weeks now, but I’ve had this sense about this topic, and I reached out to our guests today, and I thought we’d have a conversation on the podcast, Culture Design Show, so I’d love to just get started by introducing our guests for today.
Diana Chaparro-Clark is a marriage and family therapist. She’s based in Orange County, California. She is the founder of Hope Culture Counseling where she works with children, adolescents and adults. And in her sessions, she helps her clients deal with anxiety, depression, trauma, anger management issues and the topic that we’re going to talk about today, which is grief. And yes, if you’re curious, we do have similar last names because.. guess what, she is my sister. But I will leave it up to you to guess which one is older.
Maria Giudice is the founder of Hot Studio an experience design firm. She has also held key leadership roles at Facebook and Autodesk. She is also the co-author of the book, The Rise of the DEO, which is otherwise known as design executive officer. And now, after three decades at the forefront of business in design, Maria now has a new mission to build the next generation of creative leaders. And she does this by coaching individuals, teams and companies who are interested in building their leadership skills at work. In life, Maria and Diana, welcome to the Culture Design Show.
Diana Chaparro-Clark
Thank you for having me.
Maria Giudice
So happy to be here.
Steve Chaparro
I was telling Maria, we were talking last time. What I love about your name is our mom’s name is Maria. And Dan, his middle name is Maria. So the name of Maria has a great heritage in our family.
Maria Giudice
You know, that’s like the universe speaking. Yes, right now. Things happen for a reason, I believe.
Steve Chaparro
Yes, absolutely. We believe that for sure. Well, I wanted to begin with Diana, I’d love to hear if you could share with our audience, a little bit about your work. And then we’re going to the topic of grief a little bit down the road after we do our introductions. But Diana, if you can share with us a little bit about your journey as a marriage and family therapist.
Diana Chaparro-Clark
Hi. Yes, sure. I’ve been a marriage and family therapist for about 13 years in private practice for about four years. enjoy it very much. It’s been an interesting ride. I really am attracted and attract clients that I really struggle with grief and anxiety, and kind of high achieving types of personalities. And so it’s an interesting time to be a therapist because it’s something that we’re simultaneously kind of going through together. And we’re kind of all scrambling to try to figure out how to manage ourselves, as well as support other people. So it’s been a ride. So, but there’s been some surprises. So it’s it’s kind of interesting to see as we, as a society go through something together. So, I’m glad to be here. Yeah.
Steve Chaparro
Thank you, Diana. And Maria, I’d love to hear a little bit about your story. I kind of talked about it a little bit briefly. But if you can share a little bit more in detail about how that arc to your journey has brought you to what you’re doing today.
Maria Giudice
Yeah. So as you mentioned, you know, I ran my own agency for 20 years and then I worked in corporate America for five years, and left corporate America a couple years ago, really going through the stages of transition and grief. Which really got me interested in my new mission, which is to build the next generation of leaders through coaching. So in a lot of ways, Diana and I have very different we have similar paths, but in different contexts. And so a lot of people manage what it means to be a leader in today’s world, a lot of anxiety, a lot of change changes exponential. And so I support people through the process of transition change and leadership.
Steve Chaparro
Yeah, I very much appreciate. I mean, the reason why I loved the idea of bringing you both together was because on one hand from a counseling perspective, Diana, you you are actually working with people from a clinical perspective walking along with them through these different stages. But Maria, you know, not only are you helping them through those from a coaching perspective, but you’ve been through some of those those transitions yourself, and I love that you Thinking of like, what can you do? Or, you know, anyone can ask ourselves, what can we do when we reach a certain stage in our career where, you know, maybe at one time we were the creative maybe at one time, we were the business builder. But as time goes on, we start to see ourselves transition to different parts of our life. And I think there’s probably grief and anxiety just about those transitions alone, let alone something like COVID-19.
Maria Giudice
Oh, absolutely. I mean, Now, what’s interesting is Diana mentioned, we’re all going through transition. We’re all going through a state right now. We are saying goodbye to a past life and are uncertain about what this new life would be. But I got very interested when I left my job at Autodesk. First of all, being a woman in her 50s. I’ve also started noticing people later on in life in their late 40s, early 50s are starting to really question Who are they coming? Yeah, there’s a lot fear about Coming irrelevant, getting older. And I’ve noticed that people transition from what are called one mountain to another mountain, one mountain, the first mountain is building career, your wealth, your status, all these things went as we’re building a career are important to us. But as we get older, we start looking more at meaning and purpose in life. And that triggers a whole wave of grief and transition that I went through and thus become really fascinated with some as well.
Steve Chaparro
Yeah, and I think people can relate to this at different levels because not everybody is necessarily going to be have been that business builder that has grown an agency safer for 20 years, but in everyone’s different journey, they’re going to I believe resonate with different things. I remember I got first laid off from a job at at 36 and then I got actually was about 33. Then I got laid off from another job at 43. Each of those times, were very difficult for me because I asked myself a lot of those questions that you are talking about Maria? You’re, I’m asking myself about my identity. You know, who am I? If someone didn’t want me at their firm? What does that say about my abilities? And how am I in times that I thought that I was going to be able to transition very quickly because I had transferable skills, and nothing manifested for 18 months, that was a huge hit to my, you know, my own psyche and even took me through some really grueling periods of transformation myself. And I can imagine that we’re all experiencing that in different ways right now.
Maria Giudice
I would assume, Diana, you could probably relate with your clients in that context as well.
Diana Chaparro-Clark
Oh, definitely. I think this pandemic gives us two things. It gives us the kind of the gift of time which time is kind of changed, it feels longer, slower. And so to somebody that is really taking this opportunity to think about me purpose, it can be a gift. But for people that are not feeling good and really, you know, struggling, it’s really a torturous experience. So it really just depends on how you choose to use this time. You know, and to me like personally, it just depends on the day, some days I feel really excited about this time and other days, I just wish it would just speed up so.
Steve Chaparro
Well, I think sometimes it’s not only about the day itself, but it’s about the hour of the day, even itself, because sometimes for me, it’s an hour by hour journey. Dan, I wanted to ask you so I’m going to now the topic of our conversation and that is grief. I want to talk first of all individual grief. What are some of the things I mean, obviously, this is your work and you’ve been working with people who experience grief in their life and anxiety even before COVID-19 but share with us what has been your experience just about one the helping people through grief itself, and then to helping people through grief during this period of COVID-19 how that may add some different nuances to the experience?
Diana Chaparro-Clark
Well, I think grief in general, you know, it goes in stages is like the five stages. And I you know, I know Maria, you you talked about this lesson when we spoke just to inform everybody, it’s denial, anger, sadness, bargaining and acceptance. And they’re not necessarily in any linear order. And the difficulty for like, the layperson with grief is when you see somebody going through grief or kind of knee jerk reaction is to get people to feel better. And my job as a therapist is to be with the client in their grief, and just to be with him as kind of a companion through it. And the ironic thing is, is now with COVID, I’m actually a real companion because I’m actually in it with them as well. And so I think, you know, it’s an interesting thing, because this time is really a time of uncertainty. So the grief is of certainty right of security, but it’s also So this opportunity to be mindful and present, and you can be present in something that feels negative or you know, positive, and there’s no judgment on wherever you are. And I think the productive type of person always tries to wrap it up into something that me is meaningful. And sometimes it just is. And in a way, that’s kind of a relief, because we don’t have to solve it, it’s gonna resolve somehow, right? But there’s not as much pressure to find out what that end goal is going to be. And so it’s been a journey because as a therapist, we really do want to give somebody comfort and sometimes the realities of the fears are real. And so we just got to kind of sit with that.
Steve Chaparro
Yeah, yeah. Maria is one of the reasons why I mean, I obviously I’ve been a fan of your work and in your book, but I remember it was about two or three weeks ago, we were both part of an AIGA gathering here in Los Angeles virtually. And you were one of the speakers of that day and you presented many was interesting. It was like the conversation of grief had already made its way into the conversation with the first two speakers of the day.
Maria Giudice
Yeah.
Steve Chaparro
And then you, its like as if you had foreseen that this conversation was going to rise, because the topic that you share that day was just so on point with what I’ve been thinking about and what the conversation was. And you were talking about your interpretation, like your take on grief, or whatever you had some different terminology for. So I’d love to hear that from you.
Maria Giudice
So yeah, so the grief is really a sign of tension. When you go through these stages, you’re gonna wake up in different emotions. That’s one of the things about this COVID crisis is that you’re going to have good days, we’re going to feel hopeful about the future. And then there’s Sunday feel like really negative about the future, and we have to honor these emotions. They are normal. Everybody is going through this process of sadness of endings, and it’s entirely normal to go through these different emotions, So first we’ll normalize the fact that we all are feeling kind of weird right now. But grief is really it’s the marker of an ending.
And, and this is what, this is what really helped me when I lost my job at Autodesk. And I could not understand why I was feeling so sad and angry. I knew I was angry. When you lose your job, you get angry, you go through the stages of grief, but, but I stayed on wires feeling so I was feeling grief about it. And I read this incredible book called transitions. Making Sense of life changes do you know this book, Diana? Know how to write that. And it really codifies what needs to go through transitions.
So it’s also connected to the stages of grief. So first stage of any kind of transition, which is what we’re in right now is readable In the ending something. And Diana mentioned that could be like the ending could be a good outcome or a bad outcome. Like, getting married is an ending of being single. Right, you might marry but you’re still gonna grieve what your single life was, you know, so there’s a stage of life really kind of sitting in your motion honoring the fact that you are ending something and you’re entering, you’re entering the unknown. It’s, it’s uncertain, it’s unknown, it’s unsettling.
And so you go through this emotional stages of grief. And then eventually you kind of step into another domain, which is building bridges called the neutral zone, but I kind of call it like, I kind of call it equivalent to your body is sort of like lying in the coffin in your soul hasn’t risen yet you’re in this like state of neutrality, between it’s unknown what the future holds. And uncomfortable. Yes, very comfortable to sit there not knowing what is next for you. And this is an area of time of great introspection, which is I think we’re coming out of the shock and awe of COVID. During this move into action, what does this mean for us? What is new? How is this going to relate to the purpose in life? What is your houses can relate to whether or not I’m going to have a job. So you’re in this stage of introspection. And you can sit there for a while. It can take years to be an introspection, where you’re kind of searching and asking questions like, Who am I becoming? What’s next? What does this all mean?
Yeah, and usually, the next stage is a new beginning. And you’ll get this like spark you’ll hit like, you’ll hit a point where Things will start clicking, you’ll find insight and you’ll get curiosity and you might get creativity might come out of this stage and a new beginning happen and you will. It’s like a resurrection. And I love this arc, because it gives us hope and optimism about the future. Like, it’s good. We’re in this weird state, but eventually, amazing things are gonna come out of it. And that’s where the optimism that’s, that’s where the opportunity is coming.
Steve Chaparro
Yeah, I love that. And I remember that during that conversation. It was very interesting in that gathering where there is you’re one of three speakers and is almost as if the other two speakers had laid the groundwork for your presentation, because in that conversation it talked about or one of the presentations they described how in the pandemics or plagues of the past, what were born out of those things, some tremendous innovation, tremendous art and culture was born. It was almost like it was the fodder and ground for a lot of these great things.
But I want to go back to the individual experience. And this is a question for both of you. What are some things that you are noticing as individuals are navigating this period of grief in again, we describe that grief is the end of something, it’s the end of certainty. It’s the end of a job. It’s the end of a normal, all these different things. What are some specific things that you are seeing the people that you work with? What are they experiencing? I think, Diana, I’d love to hear from you. because on one hand, in regards to the high performing clients that you have, and then Maria, as far as like your design leader, folks that you’re working with, so I’d love to hear from each of you. What are some things that you’re seeing when working with your clients?
Diana Chaparro-Clark
Well, probably one of the the biggest symptom that I’ve kind of encountered is loss of motivation. So there’s like a really lack of being able to concentrate and be, quote, productive. And so a lot of the clients that I’ve talked to, they’re really judgmental about their themselves and they’re like, I don’t understand, you know, I I’m at home, like I have more time, like I have nothing else to do, I don’t understand why I’m not getting things done…
Steve Chaparro
I was going to write that book…
Diana Chaparro-Clark
…And the one thing that I’m trying to encourage my client to do is kind of like what Maria was saying about that introspective period. You have to allow yourself to feel and to be before you do when you be you feel without judgment. And so sometimes, people that struggle with anxiety, they have a lot of judgments about their feelings instead of just allowing themselves to feel without judgment. And so that feeling period, I’m talking like having an ugly cry, like, maybe do sound like a workout where you just feel completely depleted, physically to be able to kind of expel and express that emotion. Because you have to have space in order to be creative and to move on to that transformation. And so giving yourself that space to be able to, to be really emotional or irrational for a little bit. And then once that’s expelled, then you can have the space to be able to move on. And sometimes that happens on a daily basis. Sometimes we feel really good, like we talked about in the morning, you feel like sometimes I feel like that I’ll wake up and I’ll feel a little sad. And I’ll just have a little cry before I start my day because it just feels sad sometimes. So I think it’s just allowing yourself to be where you are. And then you can kind of move on to the next thing.
Steve Chaparro
One of the things that I found for myself is that in going through this whole period of really trying to just allow myself to be compassionate towards myself, I’m compassionate to say, Hey, I’m not as productive as I had hoped to be. I didn’t get you know, a full eight hours of work in or maybe there are people out there, you know, on the internet that are just bugging me. So it’s compassionate towards oneself and to others. And I think that has been so helpful for me is to just understand that you know, give ourselves a little bit of break and allow those moments because Those moments are as much as part of our healing, as our good moments are.
Diana Chaparro-Clark
Right, and I think it’s redefining what productive means productive can be taking care of yourself and taking a walk, and that can still be productive. And that actually does lead to actual productivity. So if you have a day where you kind of take some space from your actual work, and you take care of yourself, that is still a productive day.
Steve Chaparro
Yeah. Maria, I’d love to hear from you. In terms of the types of clients that you’re working with, I believe, from what I understand there are a lot of these creative executives, or even just up and coming What are some of the things that may be very similar to what Diana described, or maybe even nuanced about creative leaders?
Maria Giudice
Yeah, well, no, I think absolutely. Yes. And what Diane, about motivation, and praise leaders, you know, they feel they have this word, they must be creative and must be creative. I’m right. But you can’t be creative when you are in a state of negativity frenzy, inciting That’s, that’s an act, right? So if you’re in that state, you’re in an emotional state, you are in a reactive state, your body actually your brain in your body kind of closes down, you’re in threat response. You’re kind of like protecting. And I think a lot of people right now in response, right, because they’re the uncertainty, fear that they may lose their job, the fact that they have to balance being a human being with their work, at the same time, they have to be taking care of the kids and like, looking at Trello at the same time, it is like really hard for people to kind of like, you know, kind of navigate that space. There’s a lot of anxiety and there’s a lot of like threat and response your mind can be open and creative and generative.
So with my clients, we talk a lot about that your body’s in threat. How can we get You above the line, how can we get you a place where you can be curious and creative and accept. And you so as Diana mentioned, you have to come to terms with how you’re feeling. You have to name you have to sit with it, and you got to honor it. Yeah, I am scared. I am overwhelmed, like, get in touch with that, and then figure out how you can release it so that you could actually, you know, be much more generative. So you can’t, you can’t do unless you, you start with being.
Steve Chaparro
Yeah. What’s interesting is, as we’re talking, you know, one hand this experience of grief may be a new thing, at least in this time. For some people, there may be others who have are well versed in grief, maybe they’ve had a really, you know, a really big loss in their life. Maybe it’s the loss of a spouse the loss of a job in the past. So those Experience have somewhat tempered them to be ready for situations like this. I can think of one of my friends who became a young widow years ago when she lost her husband. And she says, I’ve gone through a lot. And I was able to deal with that grief in such a way that I am well equipped for COVID-19. And so Diana, you had mentioned in one of our conversations that some of your clients that you’re working with in terms of either grief, or anxiety, the ones that you’ve been working with, you know, prior to COVID-19 how are they doing? During COVID-19? You mentioned something before that I thought was very interesting.
Diana Chaparro-Clark
Yeah, I remember kind of gearing up for the week of of seeing clients. I had some clients that were, you know, having anxiety on a daily basis. And it was this kind of interesting thing that they were so calm, and they continuously kept on happening with my clients. And it was just this really counterintuitive thing, but after doing You know, some reading and research, it makes sense because it’s like they’ve been having boot camp for this for their lives. So they’re already in hyper arousal mode. So this is kind of like where they live. And there is a sense of survival on a daily basis. So it’s kind of like this is kind of a norm. And they do build up this kind of resilience towards difficult things, if you think about it, like COVID is is really challenging rd of safety. If you’re really battling with that on a daily basis, this is just like a regular day. So it was an interesting thing for me to realize into witness. And it’s been fairly consistent. It’s been sustained throughout this time. So I was very pleasantly surprised, actually.
Steve Chaparro
What about you, Maria, what have you experienced? Maybe the folks that you’ve been working with prior to this, then they were experiencing either one grief or anxiety? How are they doing now?
Maria Giudice
Well, I think that’s really an interesting insight, Diana, because I can relate to that a little bit. To because I’ve gone through a couple years shooting to become an executive coach, and saying goodbye to like my past persona and stepping into who I becoming, I do feel like I’ve like I understand, I understand where the emotions are coming from, I understand the state’s transition. So it’s a little bit hurting when you’ve gone through it. Because you can understand why you’re feeling why you’re feeling bad at this point in your life.
One of the things I wanted to kind of pivot towards was this, you know, this thing about sitting in the grief and being introspective. And in that moment of creativity, that part, this is where the positivity comes in. The gift that COVID is bringing us all the opportunity, presenting us that as creative leaders, any kind of leaders. There’s immense creative tivity is this amazing, creative resurgence that’s coming out of this crisis.
So you mentioned Steve, like, if you look at past crises, there’s the sparks of creativity. And you know, the chronic plague led to the Renaissance. So what I keep challenging people right now, the thing about this is a renaissance time. We’re all systems have broken down, we, we are all seeing how things that are at scale are collapsing. It’s forcing us to rethink everything. It’s an opportunity to really unlock things that you may have been afraid to do before. It’s just like realization of like, wow, the change. There’s like there’s an opportunity for change for the better. And so, incredible gifts and opportunities are coming out of this crisis. All of us. What are we going to To leave behind, what are we going to keep and iterate? And what are we going to invent that’s entirely new that we know no longer works for us. And that’s where I get incredibly excited. That’s the kind of coaching I’m giving clients to start to think about. What are the gifts right now for you? How is this going? What are you going to be stepping into? What are you going to become, after this crisis that is going to make you better at your job better at who you are, as a person, make your life better, but what are the things that this crisis is affording us all in a positive way?
Diana Chaparro-Clark
That’s awesome. You know, I just wanted to kind of just add to that, if somebody goes from straight from kind of sadness and grief into work, then it is this kind of suppression of emotion and that leads to burnout. But if you take advantage of the introspective stage that Maria mentioned, then it goes into expression instead of suppression, which goes into creativity. Which that’s the difference between, you know, working as a way to like, avoid your feelings and working as a way to express your feelings. And so there is that line between, you know, healthy and unhealthy kind of work experiences.
Steve Chaparro
That’s great. And I think there’s so much to be learned about understanding, even as a leader, a creative leader, that you yourself may be going through this grief period. But to have the understanding that you’re not the only one as a leader, why would you think that you were the only one experiencing this in fact, the premise of kind of this whole conversation is just my sense, and feel free to push back on it because I want to unpack this to see if there’s anything to it. I had just the sense as you’re mentioning Maria, this is a time that we are, in a sense, breaking the foundations of a lot that we’ve just accepted. We’ve in many cases we’ve just tolerated, but I feel like this is one of those times in history because Everyone is connected technologically, that we’re aware of what everyone else is going through. I feel like this is one of the first times in human history where all of humanity is experiencing grief at the same time before it’s individuals or you’re experiencing, but we’re not attached. But here, we’ve got one major event that is binding us together in our grief. And I’d love to hear from both of you. What are your thoughts about that phenomenon or my my hypothesis, that we’re experiencing this together?
Maria Giudice
It’s incredibly powerful, isn’t it? The other thing that I’m like really holding on to is like on zoom call people all over the world who are going through same sheltered place that we’re going through, who are going through the same kind of life challenges that we’re all here. This is an amazing moment of kinship and connection in a weird way. COVID has brought us closer together as a humanity as a race, because we all share in these stages at the same time, and it’s beautiful. It’s really beautiful. I do feel like much more human center than ever before. And I just love how because we’re all on zoom. There’s a lot of inequity, but there’s also a lot of equalizing your own. I’m getting to see Diana’s like wall. All right, people ask me about the guitar or the book. We’re all like getting into a glimpse of people’s own tenacity. And I’m worried that the dog is going to come in and the kids are gonna yell at me and this is all it’s like. It’s bringing what our work life which is normally sort of disconnected from our humanity is blended and it’s bringing together in a way that I’m gonna like, that’s one of the things that I’m going to hopefully take with me as we get through this code with this, like, incredible sense of human connection.
Steve Chaparro
Yeah, I think I think what I’ve seen, you know, definitely conversations about one hand, it’s revealing a lot of the inequities, for sure, definitely understand that especially, you know, like, say, in the city of Long Beach where I live, the school district, obviously closed down, but then was going to go online with some of the classes, but then realized that not every student has access to computers, let alone Wi Fi. And so in order to mitigate that inequity, that’s just one example. But I completely agree with you, Maria, that I believe that this has also been an equalizing phenomenon, that it is equalize us in terms of our humanity, that we’re all like, hey, guess what, we’re all human. Go figure when we may not have wanted to reveal that as leaders. And I think even how leaders navigate this, I want to talk about that in a moment about how leaders can take this new understanding of this collective grief. But Diana, what are your thoughts about collective grief during this time?
Diana Chaparro-Clark
I totally agree with what Maria was saying about unity and kinship and connection and really opportunities to have deeper or connecting conversations more about meaning and purpose. On the flip side, the more negative if you don’t want to embrace that uncertainty, fear really does take over. And depending on how many resources you have, there is this temptation to create blame for whoever’s to blame, right. So then that’s what kind of is the flip side to it is to say, No, we are different. And this is something that I’m going through, you’re not going through and so that’s the other side, the unfortunate side, and I do think it is tied to resources and that includes emotional resources. How can I cope? And so you know, some people go inward, you know, into more of the substance use and things like that depression and some people go outward until the aggression and kind of lashing out to other people. So I think it just really does really show where, you know, everybody’s at as far as resources and ability to kind of sit in the uncertainty. And not everybody can.
Steve Chaparro
Yeah, I think the whole thing of on one hand, and we compare ourselves to people, so like, you know, there’s the whole thing of people have it better than me, or there is a one thing I experienced one time actually, at the beginning of this, and I had a friend Tell me because I was saying, Oh, you know, thank God, I’ve actually have it pretty good. I don’t have it as bad as someone else. And my friend said, Ah, don’t do that. Don’t compare your grief, your anxiety to anyone else. Own it. be okay with how bad you feel about it. I had someone describe it as that’s a product of survivor’s grief for survivors. I’m not sure what we would call it but why might that not be good as well of trying to dismiss the level of anxiety or grief that we might be feeling but to in fact, Embrace the reality of it.
Diana Chaparro-Clark
What I say to my clients is the head part of us and those the heart part of us the emotion. So we can have conflicting things. But the emotions are always something they’re not our guides, but they’re definitely show us what is important to us. And so I think sometimes logically, yeah, you can have it better, but it doesn’t take away from the sadness or the fear. And so allowing yourself like Maria was saying honoring that feeling and because it really isn’t comparable, you know, you are in your own body and your own experience. So I think the main thing is not to do the opposite is to diminish other people’s grief or experience.
Steve Chaparro
What about you Maria, what are your thoughts on that?
Maria Giudice
Well, I mean, I love what you said Diana about like also the opposite, right? This the optimism but then it’s like a lot of people and a lot of blame on really going below the line. And it’s their emotion. And you know, I try to be compassionate like I’m more and more now compassionate with understanding why certain people are angry and they’re blaming, like, I’m not like, oh, you’re bad, it’s like.. “no, you’re in pain…”
Steve Chaparro
You’re in pain, yeah, that’s so good.
Maria Giudice
You are in pain and scared. You’re blaming your parent. Right? So I’m trying to, like get to Okay, the why behind that emotion. And then, okay, that’s, I have to honor that’s the perspective that you are sitting in. And I might need the perspective. I might not agree with the blame, but I could understand and have compassion for the emotion behind that response.
Steve Chaparro
Yeah. There’s so many life lessons, hopefully that we can take out of this whole time period of you know, be compassionate towards others. And when we see someone that is lashing out and that we could definitely blame them. I love that Maria about seeing people as others that are experiencing pain just as we are experiencing pain, and also the idea that yes, there are five stages to grief, and they’re not linear. And so people may bounce from what we think of as the first third to the second to the fifth, and then back all over the place. Like for many of us that are linear thinking, we look okay, you’re going to be in this stage, and then you’re going to move into that one. It doesn’t work that way.
But also, we can’t necessarily pull or push people through whatever stage they’re in. And I think even as a, as a spouse, as a parent, as a sibling, as the son or daughter of someone who is experiencing that, how can we help our loved ones who are going through grief? What is something and I think Maria I think even for you, the perspective could possibly be, whether it’s a family or friend that we love, but also an employee, you know, that is part of our team. Now that we understand that there is somewhat of collective grief. How can we help those ones that we love the ones that we care for the ones that we lead, to create that space for them to go through that.
Maria Giudice
Yeah, great question. Well, first of all, when, you know, with my clients, you know, who are leaders in companies, they have to respond to potentially what they perceive as irrational behavior from other people, right? Because there’s so much uncertainty in companies right now, mass layoffs, right? And they’re high earner at the top. You are really afraid of losing your job because you are adding expensive headcount. Right.
And also, when you’re loving me, everybody’s got their own edge that here is, first of all, I try to like help them understand the perspective of others. So they might have a boss who’s becoming irrational or micromanaging or doing behavior that doesn’t feel consistent with the way it was before and Try to give them the perspective of step into their shoes. What is their life? What are they experiencing in their home right now? Mm hmm. What making them afraid? Like, how can you be in service to that person? Right? So this is where leadership comes in. How can you be in service to that person versus being defensive or shutting down in punitive? So how do you want to show up as a leader in times of crisis, and then coming back is like, we have to honor our emotions, but as a leader, we can’t let our emotions impact the people that we’re leading. Hmm. So we, you know, and this is you talking about leaders.
This is an incredible time to really ask yourself who are the leaders that are showing up today? And what are the qualities that are they embody because it is amazing to see Doctors and FedEx drivers and bus drivers, and like the Prime Minister of New Zealand, and your Cuomo like these are the people that are stepping up, either in they have the position to do so or they’re just they’re stepping up because they can and help. What are the qualities that they’re showing and demonstrating? How can you learn from my qualities? How can spired by these new leaders, Authenticity, transparency, like leaders are saying, I don’t know. Like they’re having? I don’t know. Hmm incredible lessons for us all to take in as leaders for ourselves and how we embodied those for others.
Diana Chaparro-Clark
Right.
Steve Chaparro
How about you, Dana?
Diana Chaparro-Clark
I think that it is so so key to feel trust and to feel safe to even to be safe with the unknown. Instead of being told something that isn’t necessarily completely factual or true, one of the things I do want to mention more in a practical level is sleep, having good sleep. I know a lot of people right now are not having the same kind of sleep cycles. If you don’t have good sleep, you can’t be empathic, you can’t be functional, the same and also your immune system needs that, you know, kind of recharge. So having good sleep, you know, eating and having, you know, water and as much as that seems like a basic foundational thing, I’ve noticed that a lot of clients are struggling with with sleep and learning how to really take care of your physical body before you can take care of others. And then I think just in a practical way with with family members is listening and then asking them, how can I support you instead of assuming how you can support them. So some people just want to vent some people want some feedback, it just kind of depends on the day, and so it’s really kind of checking In, because sometimes we really respond to people the way that we like to be supported. And not everybody likes to be supported in the same way.
Steve Chaparro
Yeah, we’re constantly asking questions or trying to give affirmation and someone doesn’t want that. So get out of my face, like just a space.
Diana Chaparro-Clark
Yeah.
Maria Giudice
Yeah. I love that. And what Diana said is like, What do you need? versus here’s what, huh? Being curious. And in service, rather than being dictating This is the way it should be. Because who knows what it should be at this point. Right? Right. So what do you need right now? Right, and how can I help you?
Diana Chaparro-Clark
Right. And it’s interesting because it’s as basic as that sounds, when you’re in it, I do it even in my personal relationships. I’m like, giving advice and then I’m like, wait a minute, I don’t even know if this is what they’re they’re needing. And so when people feel seen, that’s the biggest thing is when people feel seen and there’s no judgement and You know, there’s a lot of different now as we’ve been in this situation for a while, there’s a lot of conflicting views on how we should be in public how we should be with others, how we should socialize, and really just allowing people to have their own experience.
Maria Giudice
And if I wouldn’t want to add getting out, like, get some fresh air and clean the noises in your head. So Diana talked about the head and the heart is the head, the heart and the spirit. Right? You nourish the whole person, right? And in the process prices we get stuck in our head. There’s so much thinking going on. There’s so much second guessing, but so you have to figure out Oh my God, my head is about to explode. How am I feeling? And what is my spirit telling me and out really important as well?
Diana Chaparro-Clark
Yeah, I love that.
Steve Chaparro
There are three things that I’ve come to realize, at least for myself, the things that I needed to do in order to not just survive during this time period, but even find some degree of thriving and I think for me, those three things have been one is to breathe. And I think obviously physically breathing, you know, taking that time to, you know whether it’s those cleansing breaths, but I think so many times when we’re anxious, I believe just as just in my own experience, when I’m anxious, I’m holding my breath, as if I’m holding my breath for whatever may come next. And it’s even an expression that we have, don’t hold your breath. Like don’t hold for it. Yeah, but I think part of the breath thing is the breathing not only requires the inhale but it also requires the exhale. And I think in this case, for me, the exhale has been exhaling control, the desire to control over the situation. So breathing for me has been a really powerful thing.
And I think, to your point, Diana, the second thing for me has been rest. And I think I go back to a time where I had a major surgery about two or three years ago, and I was still Hold Steve, this is a major surgery. No matter how you feel at any given moment during the day after you, you know, when you’re in recovery, make sure you rest because your body is healing itself. And I must feel that all of humanity is undergoing some degree of emotional, mental and even physical healing that requires us to rest because our bodies, our minds, and our hearts are working over time. And we need to give our times you know that that time duress and even if that means to have an A new nap that you never had before, like, dude, like, wow, I’m such a wimp. Now I need a nap. Yeah, you maybe you need a nap. Like my mom and dad always tell me if I crash at the end of the day. Listen to your body, they will tell me so it’s either listen to our bodies or to our minds our hearts.
Maria Giudice
Well, I think in addition to that you went you sparked for me, speed is not just the breathing but it it’s like paying attention to all the senses in your body. For me when you were talking about that is everybody is really obsessed with cooking right now. And cooking because they’re making, they’re doing things. They’re getting enjoyment out of the physicality of something that’s happening. And like, what about smelling? What about music? What about listening, like in times like this? How do you get out of your head is by activating all the senses in your body and appreciating them, isolating them and appreciating them? It’ll get in touch with your spirit at this time.
Diana Chaparro-Clark
Yeah, I like that. That’s good.
Steve Chaparro
Well, that leads me to think all those things. Are you talking about being present? Or I rather about those senses for me is that that was the third thing it was about being present. It’s about enjoying the moment that you know, sometimes Yeah, maybe sometimes being with our kids in our family members for extended period of time is a little much but also this is a blessing but to be present. But I wonder Maria, I want to ask you this and then Diana as well. So knowing that, like, let’s just say we use just those three thoughts of breathing, being present. And also resting that requires some intentionality around those things. So what can we as leaders do to acknowledge the need for those things, not just in ourselves, but in our teams? Then how can we in should we lead differently? Knowing that we need these things?
Maria Giudice
Well, I have a little trick for being present, because I’m also one of the doers. And I’m working so hard as I get older anymore. So I have to remind myself to be in the moment all the time. I’m always like, check the box. What am I doing? I’m one of those people who’s always feeling like I haven’t done enough. So I always ask my clients that I do this myself is, is there an object in the house that can remind you to be present? So the minute is my dog Yeah, so Mike, Charlie, I look at my dog, Charlie, my dog is so happy and grateful. And constantly in the moment, the dog isn’t doesn’t have a to do list. dog doesn’t, hasn’t woken up and said, What’s my plan for the day? The dog is just happy to be in a moment in that second. So I don’t know if people have heads, but it’s a great reminder. Yeah, too. It’s like I hold the dog and like, be in the moment. So what is the object that can kind of keep you grounded in the moment and being present? So that’s, that’s one of the tips that I give my clients and my team so that they can be there in the moment, then they can help the people that reports them to be in the moment
Steve Chaparro
What about you, Diana. What are some things that you can think about whether it’s, again, high performing leaders in their places of work, or even just in our homes, in our relationships in our family’s house? Can we either one help ourselves to breathe to rest or to be present?
Diana Chaparro-Clark
Well, I would say compartmentalizing your time in blocks so that people know like, if you’re working from home, there’s an expectation of yourself and your family members of you that when you’re available, and when you’re not available, instead of going kind of going back and forth, then you kind of feel like you’re kind of failing at both sides. I think getting bigger blocks of time. Help. also like to get motivated. I really encourage clients in certain parts of their houses where they do this certain routine where they’re going into work mode, and then when they’re leaving work mode, there’s a signal to your body about Association and about routine so you’re turning off you’re turning on and so even if it’s like a three step thing like for me, I have like this makeshift desk in my in my bedroom, and I do this whole thing where I bring out the chair, I do this thing, I make coffee and I do the same and so there’s this kind of signal to my body into myself, and then you know, and then I think when I shut off I can announce to my family, Okay, I’m ready to be present, but then staying present and not kind of going back and forth. And not everybody’s schedule allows that. But I think that really is helpful.
I remember even before this whole thing came to be about in terms of COVID-19, there was a lot of conversation about people who work from home anyways as part of their job. And they transition from a job where they had say, an hour commute. And that commute as tiring as it as it was, many times actually was a really powerful thing. And then when they didn’t have it that hour, even if it’s 15 minute commute, and actually really disrupted the way they worked. And so I’ve even seen examples during this time period of people actually manufacturing a commute even if it means leaving out the front door going down the pathway to the sidewalk, going up the driveway, going out the back and then coming in through a different door, to symbolize that transition in that commute to just you know, put them in a different frame of mind you The idea of just getting dressed is putting yourself into that work mode for the day. Yeah, and implement breaks, like I saw a video where a guy would go to, to a different part of his house to take a break, and then to come back and say, taking a break in the same place. And this has a different impact on your body in your mind.
Steve Chaparro
Yeah, there was this one funny video that I saw. It was about an Italian dad who just he was missing going to the cafe every day, and to meet with his friends and he just missed it miss playing, you know, ordering coffee, it just a ritual, right? That becomes part of your rhythm. So one day, he got up and he said, You know what, this is it. I’m done. Like, I’m going out and his daughter was fearful for him. He gets dressed, he goes out the front door. And then he goes to the window outside his own kitchen and ask his wife for a cup of coffee and it was that satisfied. You know, the little essence of the day. And it was it was…
Maria Giudice
That’s creativity. Yeah, that’s great. Those are the things that give you joy, like those little stories that you will said, you know, like people are figuring out how you’re leveraging their creativity by adapting and creating new norms they need in order to get through the day. It’s beautiful to see that it’s like it’s like a new thing that they may that ritual might continue, even when the cafe
Steve Chaparro
Yeah, absolutely.
Diana Chaparro-Clark
Save some money.
Steve Chaparro
Well, folks, we’ve been talking to Maria Giudice of Hot Studio and Diana Chaparro-Clark of Hope Culture Counseling. Maria, if people want to learn more about your work, where can people learn about it?
Maria Giudice
Yeah, so you can contact me through LinkedIn. I am coaching, I coached individuals, I coach teams, I coach emerging leaders, I conduct workshops. And so I do all of that stuff. So if people are really interested in learning more about my coaching practice and have questions, they can reach out to me message through LinkedIn, or Twitter, I’m available on all the social media channels.
Steve Chaparro
Alright, Diana, how can people find you?
Diana Chaparro-Clark
I am on hope culturecounseling.com. And then I’m also on Instagram and Facebook, or you can just email me at [email protected].
Steve Chaparro
Well, thank you very much, both of you for being on the show. It’s been a pleasure for me.
Diana Chaparro-Clark
Thank you for having us.
Maria Giudice
Yeah, it was really fun.
Steve Chaparro
And if those of you that are watching, if you have please reach out to Maria and Diana on their respective channels on social media, but if you have any comments or thoughts about what we’ve talked about, I haven’t been able to actually check the live feed, but I’d love for you to just share some thoughts, any insights that you got out of today’s conversation? And just I’d love to hear about because this was some topic that I felt was really appropriate for our conversation, not just as collective humanity, but also within the creative sector itself. So thank you all for watching.
Diana Chaparro-Clark
Thank you.
Maria Giudice
Thank you.
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