014 | From Contender to Champion - Helping High Achieving Women Succeed on Their Own Terms with Dr Klara Gubacs-Collins
Jan 01, 2023
Episode Description:
In this reboot from my popular show, SuzPro Live, I speak with Dr. Klara Gubacs-Collins about steps high-achieving women can take to reach success.
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Summary:
In this reboot from my popular show, SuzPro Live, I speak with Dr. Klara Gubacs-Collins about steps high-achieving women can take to reach success.
She explains that without this knowledge, people can flounder and become overwhelmed by shiny objects, especially those in the sandwich generation who have children, a job, and an older parent to take care of. The speaker encourages listeners to set aside five to ten minutes each morning for two weeks to meditate on what they would do if they had no worries in order to discover their true talents.
They also discuss the importance of accepting help from mentors or coaches in order to move forward quickly instead of struggling alone for months at a time. Additionally, they point out the need for delegating responsibilities and overcoming perfectionism in order to be able to give love if one has a family.
Finally, they suggest that people should focus on which platform they feel strongest on (talking, writing or listening) when starting a business and decide if scaling is an option. In this podcast conversation, the two discuss the steps to take in order to find one's zone of genius. She emphasized the importance of deciding what one wants to do each morning and choosing a platform and direction that is true to oneself.
Additionally, she discussed shopping for a coach or program, as well as technology needed for success.
Finally, she shared a story of how her advice helped a colleague at school realize his genius within the department and encouraged listeners not to give up on their dreams even when times are tough.
The Imperfect Transcript:
Welcome to another episode of The Suzanne Show, where I talk a little online business, human resources, personal development, chronic illness, and whatever else I decide to chat about. I am so excited that you are here and I love to hear from my listeners. Please feel free to reach out to me on my website, suzanneproxa.com, or on all the socials where I'm also Suzanne Proxa.
And don't forget to put that K before the S. Let's move on with the episode. I can't wait for you guys to dive in. Hey beautiful human, just a quick note that the episode that you are about to listen to is from my former show, Suze Pro Live, but it is so good that I just wanted to make sure that it was still being shared. So enjoy.
I am here today with Dr.
Clara, very excited to talk to her today. We are going to talk about from contender to champion, helping high achieving women succeed on their own terms. So this is absolutely perfect for my audience, definitely a bunch of high achievers. So they are really going to dig this.
The interview is going to be centered around some of the biggest pitfalls and challenges of high achieving women, not knowing their zone of genius and how it affects their business and life. So welcome, welcome. I am going to let her introduce herself because as I always say, she can do a much better job than I can.
Well Suze, I am not 100% sure that I could do a better job because you have done just a fine job. And to talk about high achieving women, the fact that you are printing in the middle of Facebook live shows that you are a high achieving woman. Right. And you need to do everything now and immediately and all together at the same time possibly.
So yes, my full name is Dr. Clara Gubacz Collins and the Gubacz is the hard part there. I am Hungarian. I immigrated in 1991 to the United States on a scholarship to get my masters and then I got another scholarship to get my doctorate at UMass Amherst. So I have been an extremely lucky recipient of a bunch of really, really great gifts.
But partially that is also because I was taught a long time ago to really work hard on something that you set out for yourself to achieve. And it has its tremendous benefits, you know, i.e. a doctoral degree, but it also has its pitfalls and that affects you in your business, in your life, in your health and so forth.
So I spent the better part of the last five, six years just focusing on that part of women's lives. But I've been a high achieving woman since birth really. So it's been a great adventure. Awesome.
So what made you choose the development of the inner genius as your niche?
The biggest reason why I chose it is because when I decided to implement and change certain things in my life now as a grown up, basically not moving from academia because I love my job at the university. I didn't always love it, but that's one other thing. And one of the reasons I didn't always love it is because I didn't find my genius to be acknowledged in the university job.
And then I realized that there are plenty of people who acknowledge their genius, so I'm okay with it now.
But when I was trying to make the transition to say, okay, maybe I need to go on my own, I found that it is a tremendously difficult job for especially high achieving women who have been a good to do so many things, know so many things, achieve and excel in so many things to choose what really is their genius.
Because they are so used to since many of us since childhood, we are so used to excelling in so many parts of our lives. After a while, you don't really know which is really yours. And that was for me the biggest awakening. I spent really thousands of dollars trying to figure this out by choosing the wrong programs, the wrong coaches, not necessarily, not bad coaches, the wrong ones.
And also the hours that I spent trying to learn that. So that was for me.
I said, you know, I've been a teacher. I think I've been a teacher since I was in the womb. My parents, my grandparents, they were all accomplished teachers. I really want to teach women to learn early, as soon as possible, what their genius is and which way to go with that.
Yes, very important and very helpful. Because if you don't, you flounder big time. Yes. And everything, the shiny about the, exactly. You said that a year ago, you were in a completely different place in one of your interviews.
And that's exactly why is because I really wish we could have more to be, I don't mean to be too remember, but I could have more of me that can pick out people at the point when they need to be picked out and say, okay, Suzy, this is your genius. This is your platform. This is the way you got to go because this is where you truly excel.
That's when you feel home at. And instead we do all this shiny object syndrome. We go through from this, from that, oh, I got to do blogs. I got to do Facebook, got to go blah, blah, blah. And in the meantime, you are just really losing ground, losing time, losing energy and you give up.
And that was the worst part is when people give up who have a true genius that was never discovered. Yes. And that happens a lot. Yes. Definitely.
So what are some of the biggest pitfalls then in not knowing your zone of genius in business and in life?
Well, I sort of, I mentioned a little bit already, but let me add to that because especially those of us who are what I call in a sandwich generation, which is women that are having their children to still take care of maybe even in college, but still taking care of. And plus maybe they have a job, obviously, that they want to do their own business or they want to stay in corporate.
They want to do the job that they do well. And plus maybe they have to take care of an older parent. That sandwich generation that I found to be in a very vulnerable state, those people, especially, they don't have time to try to find and experiment and look around.
They really need to find and zone in on it because the next biggest pitfalls that are going to happen is that if they don't find the genius, there's either they give up or so many times they also get sick.
And when that woman who is holding the whole family together gets ill and you can, you just look at the statistics on breast cancer, on all the different issues, the chronic fatigue syndrome, all the different issues.
If you look at that, so many, I'm not saying that that can be solved by knowing what your genius is, but it surely is going to affect your health if you know that you're on the right track or if you are floundering and you can't find yourself. So that's another pitfall.
As far as the business is concerned, it is so clear to me after watching over five years, I've been watching and taking part on so many programs.
I mean, literally, I don't know how many hundreds of hours of programs, maybe even thousands. I've been watching and taking part and seeing the business women running these programs who thought they found their niche still not being on it. They are still going into directions that's really not them.
Let's say there's somebody who can't communicate properly and they are trying to do an online coaching program where they're supposed to be constantly in communication with people, but they're almost fearful of communication. That's not going to work. So these are all the things that somebody told her that she's supposed to do an online coaching program. It's not going to work.
So that's a lot of hours of false self-advertisement for the self and plus the health is tremendously important.
Yeah, so what are some of the biggest challenges then that women come across when they're trying to figure out what their inner genius is?
For high achieving women, I think the biggest challenge is that they have too many talents. That's their biggest challenge because I know you're right there. I've been watching you. Since we decided to do this together, I got to be honest with you.
You have a variety of talents and which one is really the one to go after?
Which one is really the one that... and this is what I say to my students regularly and anyone, clients or colleagues, anyone who is interested.
Just for the next two weeks, every morning when you wake up, literally just put the alarm clock and I know you had the kids running around and life happening, but just put it five minutes earlier or max 10 and do a very, very quiet meditation on what would I really, really, really, really mean?
What would I really want to do today?
If I would have nothing to worry about, what would I do today?
On what platform, to what audience?
If they could just, if you could just do it for two weeks, we need the two weeks.
I'm sorry, one week is not enough. For two weeks every morning, get up and do that. And then the next hardest part is listen to it. Listen to it and see how you can put that, what just came up, how you can put that into that puzzle of your life.
And maybe eventually if you put that into your puzzle, that puzzle in so many, in this spot, okay, I can put it in here, I can put it in there. Eventually that becomes the puzzle. That's interesting because I had something pop into my head the minute you said to do that exercise. And that is the true you. That is the true you.
Very interesting because it was getting up on stage inspiring thousands and thousands of women. That's it. That's it. You and me both, by the way. But that's exactly it. And if you, another thing that I usually tell people that choose to listen, some of them have to because my students, they're required to listen. So I have a winning audience already.
But what you need to know is if you choose to go to this direction, you can't lose. Even if you don't go in your entire life.
Okay, let's say, obviously you're not going to make a 180 degree turn. Some people do. Interestingly, those who get gravely ill and they decide, you know what, there's nothing left. Let me do what I was meant to do. Somehow they do it and they become phenomenal at it.
And to be honest with you, my father's passing in this past year have helped me tremendously through our last set of conversations where he was sharing with me some of his regrets. And this is one of those, I never knew that he always wanted to be a published, he was a physician. He always wanted to be published. I never knew that.
And I just reacted to it in a weird way because when I got published, because I have to get published and by the way, my book launches tomorrow with my co-authors. I'm just saying, just saying. The thing is that it's all about following what you are meant to do.
And if this pops into your head and if it keeps popping into your head, it's never going to let you go until it hits you with a much bigger hammer. So don't do that. I will absolutely do the exercise and I encourage the ladies in my group to do the same. You can't lose because you can always, here is the other part that's very important.
And I know I'm not letting you ask your questions, but that's part of who I am. Sorry about that. Brevity is not my strength. When you get to that point and you figure out what you are, who you are and what platform to go on, you can go two ways.
One way is now when you know exactly who you are and what you are, now you can look for the right coach for you. And for example, you specifically, obviously fantastically just happened to be one of those people who help people figure out their genius and build that genius up with invisibility. So someone like me figures out the genius for these women and then they go and build it with you.
It's match made in heaven. But then that's one way.
So you go, you find the right program. We help them find the right platform.
We figure out are they visual learners, are they audible, audio learners, are they, what are their learning times?
What are their speaking types?
Then that's one way. But then the other way is I say, okay, I know who I am, but I am choosing not to do that now. And then it becomes your choice. You're not going into the world and hoping for, no, I know who I am. I know what I was meant to do, but my life situation right now doesn't allow me, which is okay. I accept it.
In the moment you accept it, that you know who you are, you're not going that way right now, you're going to go later. That immediately takes all of that overwhelm. And the greatest example for that was last year with my father getting ill because I was going to have the book done. I was going to have my business launched.
I was going to have a bunch of things done, but I had to choose.
I said, okay, this year my dad is the important part. And I made that decision. And once I made the decision, all that overwhelm and everybody has been so fantastic helping me because I have to travel back and forth to Hungary and back and forth.
I said, you know what, it wasn't as hard because I accepted the decision. It was my decision. That's all I would love women to get to that point that instead of always fulfilling everybody else's needs and helping with their responsibilities, just look in the mirror and say, okay, who I am, what I want to do, and it's my decision. Yes. Not always easy. Nope. Not always easy. But we are women.
We can do it. Okay.
So with that, then what are some of the basic shifts that high achieving women need to make to overcome this mistake?
One of the number one is, especially with high achieving women, and it's all of you out there, the ones that you should have a mentor, you should have a coach, you should have a leader. And I'm not talking about me. I have a fantastic full-time position. If I never make a penny on coaching, I'll be fine. But my message is that as an athlete, I was an athlete since birth, really.
And I always, now that I'm older, I am fighting the idea of a coach.
And I'm like, what the hell is wrong with you?
Now is when you really need a coach because now is when you really have to zoom in on what you need in life and where you need the help. So the number one issue I feel with high achieving women like myself, when I was going through my midlife crisis, which I'm hoping to be the tail end of it. Yeah. So that was not a fun couple of years, but that's okay.
But I didn't reach out. I didn't reach out early enough. And even if it's not for a paid coach for business, it is to reach out to fellow human beings that are within that area.
That's the biggest, biggest shift is for people, for women to accept, understand that you, not only that you need help, and if you are not comfortable with the word need, okay, but you should get some help in the different directions because we say, oh, I can figure this out.
Yes, you can, but it takes you five to 10 years when it could be done in a year. Yes.
What could you do with that other, you know, four to nine years?
You could make that life change if you just kind of accept that it's okay to get help. Yes. And it's funny because I just mentioned that in the quickie impromptu live that I did, I talked about by now I'd probably be a millionaire if I hadn't waited and fought it for months, months, I fought it and it did me no favors whatsoever. But you are just like the rest of us.
I did the same thing. Yeah. Because it's ingrained in us that we cannot be vulnerable. It's ingrained in us that we are supposed to be the strength and it's ingrained in us that we can, because we are high achieving smart, intelligent women, we will figure it out.
Well, not always or yes, but long time. Yeah. That's exactly what I did. That was my exact mindset.
But what shifted in you?
What shifted in you when you finally saw the light quote unquote?
There was, I mean, I just talked about this. I did the whole freebie fest thing and there were holes and everything, you know, and like I said, it's by design, you know, because it's the start of a funnel and people want you to buy their stuff. So there's holes for a reason.
And I just realized, I'm like, I don't know what I'm doing and I'm never going to know what I'm doing if I don't get somebody to help me with this stuff. And you know, again, it's that sheer ambition and love for what I was doing that I'm like, I'm not going to give up.
I mean, I'm stubborn.
If you, you watched me, I'm stubborn as all get out. I'm not giving up. I refuse.
No, I know.
So yeah, that's what did it for me for sure. Failure's not an option. But the best part about this is that I'm coming from a very, very strongly minded family myself. Being stubborn about going forward, I get it, but I am finding the older I get, the less stubborn I am about asking for help to the point that now I am actually delegating certain responsibilities to people.
And guess what?
That's the other shift that you have to make as a high achieving woman is to delegate. Yeah. Because with high achievers comes also perfectionism most of the time. And if you stay to be a perfectionist, and thankfully I use many of my techniques and tools on myself through the years to overcome that perfectionism. If it doesn't, if that it's not dotted, it's okay.
We're going to get through it because then you can get help. If you are not overcoming that part, you're not going to be able to get help.
And I just really wish your viewers who are like I used to be and what you are coming out of, which is, I just call myself a recovering perfectionist is that you must accept that the world around you is going to help if you ask for it.
And if you trust them, they may not do it exactly your way, but you know what?
It may be a better way.
Yes, absolutely. I have a list of things that I look forward to handing off. So I'm getting there.
Because then what can you focus on if you hand that off?
Oh my gosh, creating awesome programs and packages and all kinds of stuff. Which is your genius. Yes. That is your genius. Yes. I need to give out the other responsibilities so I can focus on what I am made for. I'm not made for this backend stuff of, you know, of how to do the funnels and the this and the that. I get it. I understand.
And I'm not technologically that, you know, challenged, but I, that's not my thing. I don't want to spend my time on it. Yeah. Facebook ads too. Those can go.
Yes, they can go. I've done all the classes. I know how to do them, but no, thank you.
No, thank you. Exactly. How many of us are completely overwhelmed with wanting to know all these things and never ever going to, any programs that you have not finished by now, newsflash, any program you have not finished by now, you're not going to finish it. So don't even spend your time on that or anything like it. Don't spend your time. Don't spend your money.
Don't spend your energy on it because you're not going to finish it.
You know, by now, all those programs that you're never opened them books, you're never open and never read. Those are the topics that are to be delegated. They are not yours. They are not what you love. I love that because I have a pile of books and there are certain ones I'm grabbing and certain ones that I probably will never touch. That is true.
Yeah, grab the ones that you're grabbing and build your business around it and build your life around it, build your personal life.
And the thing is the other issue with this is, and also it's part of the pitfalls, is that especially if you're a woman who has a family, I don't happen to be lucky enough to have children, but I take care of a bunch of things around me with my sisters, of course.
If I'm not happy, how am I going to give the love that I want to give?
And I know it's a tremendous cliche.
I get it, but it's true.
If I'm not coming home happy, if I am not fulfilled with what I'm doing, that if I'm not living the majority of my day within my genius, how am I going to give love?
I agree 100%. Absolutely. So you've already given away a ton today. You have a couple of practical steps that the people watching can do to begin to shift defining that inner genius, especially for those of us who have so many things. Well the hard part will be for all of us that are interested in many areas is really to focus in.
So the number one step, and I give this every single time and please follow it to the T.
Yes, I'm a golfer, so I like to use that term. The next two weeks, no joke, next two weeks, I need you to spend that five, 10 minutes just with you. And even if something comes up and say, oh, that's never going to happen, that cannot happen, I can blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, write it down. Write it down. I'm not huge on journals, but I use my phone for all the notes.
I have notes and recordings. I'm a talk. So one of the things I discovered through this process is I am obviously a talker. I love to write, but just sometimes when it comes, but I love to express myself through this medium of talking.
So number one for the next two weeks, what would it be that would get you out of bed at any time in the morning?
Five, six, seven, doesn't matter, get you out of bed and you would say, all right, I'm going to do this.
Yeah, I get to do this. That is the area that you have to focus on. That's number one. Okay. I'm writing this down. I hope so. Although you are recording it, but write it down because it's always powerful. It's very powerful.
That's by the way, an extremely powerful exercise if you still handwrite, because once you write those words down and those things down that you really, really want to do, they take a different shape. They take a life to themselves. It's a really interesting exercise. So that's number one.
Number two, I want you to then think about in what platform do I feel the strongest?
Do I feel the strongest when I talk?
Do I feel the strongest when I write?
Do I feel the strongest when I listen?
Let's say I feel the strongest when I talk.
Do I feel the strongest when I talk in front of an audience live?
Or do I feel the strongest when I am on a podcast where I can talk but nobody's really watching?
I know they hear me, but they're not watching because some of us are not made for that. And I don't want people to have to make me to do that when I'm not made for that. Okay. Then the other ones are the ones that are writing.
In the writing, what are you made for within the writing?
Are you made for writing motivational posts, short things, things like that, that you have your presence and visibility, which you are teaching, which I don't even want to go into that because you are professional at it, that part, or are you more into writing longer blog posts?
You need to decide which one is the one that really captures you.
And then the next one is if you are a listener, in what form do you want to listen?
You want to listen on a way that you listen to somebody's writing so you become kind of like someone. I used to love to just look through Facebook posts in the morning and if somebody is in a moment of need, I write back to them. I still do that. I love doing that. And I don't ask for anything back. I just want to make your day better.
And so you have to figure out who you are, what you really, really want to do. Then you have to figure out the platform or where you want to do it with.
Then your next step is to figure out what type or form, if you want to start a business, of course, we're talking about business, is it going to be tailoring itself towards a speaking business?
Is it going towards more of a coaching business?
Is it going towards more a content development type of coaching business where you don't have to be in there but your brain is, your material is?
And let's say if you want to scale that business, can I find somebody that can be the face of the program and I am the brain of the program?
It's all possible. You don't have to be all. So you figure out what you want to do every morning, five, six o'clock that would get you out of bed.
How and what platform?
And then you need to figure out the direction where you're going to go to. Those are the major steps and that's going to take you a while, but those are the major steps that I would take you through. And of course, we would be talking through it, discussing it.
And in the moment we get to the point when we figure out these steps, that's when you have to go shop for the coach. That's when you have to go to shop for the program. That's when you figure out, okay, this is the technology you need.
Okay, let's try that technology and work with that. This is the type of coaching you need. So I'm sorry I could go on and on, but that's how we should build it. And everybody is building it from, oh, I'm buying this program, that program, another program.
No, no, no.
What are you buying it for?
You don't know who you are. And not because you are not a good, amazing human being. It's just because you had so many roles put on you that you just lost. You are really, you is lost. Yep. Been there. Fantastic advice.
So you mentioned a book launch and then I think that you also have a free gift for the audience, correct?
Well here is, here is, here is what I could do. I have my own free gift that I could most definitely send to you. So I would put that in the link somewhere.
I can, if you go on my website, but that's specifically related to my zone of genius, which by the way, again, originally I was say, okay, I'm going to help people find their own genius. But then you look around and you see that so many people are doing that on the blah, blah, blah.
And I'm like, within that niche, who am I really?
What is really my strength?
And I took myself through exactly these proven steps. And I came to the fact, you know, I really am a master communicator and I can help those people who may have anxiety about it or they really can't find the right words. They don't feel comfortable. They don't know exactly how to create the report. I can help them make that shift and become great communicators.
So the free gift is about communication and basically the top three mistakes that you make in your business conversations that could cost you not only the sale, but maybe the business itself. So that's the one that I have as a free gift.
But if tomorrow, not today, tomorrow, because we are trying to make this book a best seller and you know how that goes with Amazon's algorithm that tomorrow at 10 AM we are launching our book. If I send you tomorrow, I post it on your site tomorrow, that particular link, then you guys can go to get the book, which is amazing.
It's 25 of us sharing our life stories slash our amazing tips of how we went from breakdown to breakthrough. So it's really one of those books that I know it's going to sound weird, but I could see it's something that it's like one of those bathroom readings that you just want to feel good.
You know, I take a bath every night and have some solid bath and I just want to feel good at the end of my day. And I just read that kind of stuff and I just hang out and I just, you know, those are the things that are stories that are so important.
So I could leave that link and if you get that book, then as a gift from us, 19 of us have created a free gift for all of you. So not only you get mine, but you get 18 others. Very nice.
Well, yeah, you have to play by the rules. You can only click on it tomorrow at 10 AM. So then when we get done and the video post, definitely put a link to each of those.
Okay, both of them. Thank you. I appreciate that.
Yeah, because we want to, we want to wait until 10 tomorrow to post the book. I think I am going to do that tomorrow and then you can do just a little bit of wink wink on it.
I just, I just want to make sure.
I mean, you understand the rules, but you know, everybody's trying to be helpful. And the problem is that actually, which is a great problem to have, we got a bunch of pre-orders already and our rank actually like skyrocketed and I was like, no, no, no, we don't want that today. Oh no.
Yeah, we want it tomorrow.
So, wow, that's good and bad.
Right?
I know, I know, I know, but you know, it's one of those things.
So do you have anything else that you want to share?
You know, the most important message that I have is something that I'm sure you have heard many times, but let me say it again. It is not whether you're going to do something in life.
The question is always, is it your decision, whether you've done it or not?
And this was my biggest and just today I had a colleague of mine at school. I was very, very surprised in a very positive way.
He came to me and he said, you know, something that you said to me not long ago about acceptance helped me tremendously because I helped him see that his genius within the department was exactly what he was already doing, but he was fighting it because he was trying to measure up to the system. And I said, don't measure up to the system, measure up to you.
So if I can get all of you to measure up to you, find who you are and only measure up to that person, then you're going to be a much, much happier human being. And it's going to be so much easier for you to accept everything in life. I love that. That's a great closing.
Well, thank you so much for being on the live show. I know my audience is going to love it. I can post to you on my website, which is you have the Veining Mann Institute, but I am gently going towards the issue or communication.com is your communication. That's going to be my thing.
So I'm just going to, you can pop, you know, I can just post that or give it to you and that you can already go to if you want to get my free gift.
Okay, cool. All right. Just have you posted on the video and from there. Okay.
I really, I really appreciate the opportunity. What you're doing is amazing. And it is obviously part of your genius, so don't give up. Even if there are hard times, don't give up.
Oh no, it's you stubborn. All right. Thank you so much. I really appreciate it. Thank you so much. Have a good night. You too.
