Raj Girn: Hey, guys, thanks for tuning in to another great episode of the `Transform Your Confidence Show.` We continue this week’s theme of Leadership and Advocacy with this week’s Part 2 of a two-part series entitled Why Conscious Economics Is the Leadership Style of the Future. My guest is the president, CEO and owner of the Economic Club of Canada, Rhiannon Rosalind.

Here is Part Two of our conversation:

I want to kind of switch gears a little bit, if I may, if I have your permission to do so. I want to touch base on a glaring example of where conscious economics isn’t at play. And you’ve touched upon it just now as you were speaking. And it’s kind of the devastating effects of the COVID-19 induced she-cession, right. A lot of talk around it, but in essence, the past 150 years, it’s interesting that that number comes up in numerology. I feel like there’s been a lot of kind of moving backwards.

And let me just kind of preface before I ask you to weigh in on this, Rhiannon. Women are being expected to be the primary in many cases of caregiving for their children, so much so that they’re also having to maybe cut back on work or even having to give up work because of the situation being what it is with the pandemic. Second of all, the system is also pushing job losses – I’m going to make that statement because I believe it – in this direction, where 100 per cent of all U.S. job losses reported at the beginning of this year were women, right. That cannot be by accident. I refuse to believe that. What I want to do is without putting any words in your mouth, I want your comments on this whole concept of what’s happening with women right now.

Rhiannon Rosalind: So there’s two ways that we can look at it. So I’m going to take you down two paths. The first path is absolutely this pandemic has had a disproportionate impact on women. Yes, we are seeing the lowest female participation in the labour force in the last 33 years. So it’s huge. But there is a very, very interesting thing that’s happening as well, where women are maybe losing their jobs, but they’re choosing not to go back. So they’re in particular age segments, too. And this particular age segment where women have young children in the home. Absolutely. So this goes into so many systemic issues. First of all, think about it. If we look at the gender pay equity issue. If I’m in a household, my partner is earning more than I am, which is traditional in most spaces still, then that job is more valuable. Is that job more valuable? So if the kids are at home, it’s going to fall on you or whatever else.

But I know a lot of women right now that I’m speaking to that are also saying, I’m sick of it, I’m done, I’m done, this does not resonate with me anymore and I need to find a new way to use my energy because this isn’t it. So it’s like we’ve been silently doing it all for so long because I think of all of the women that have made their advancements within the corporate system, and there has been some advancement. But at what cost? What are we expected to give up? And I come back to some of the most simple pleasures of being a human being that I feel that I’ve lost connection to because of the pace and because of the way I’m asked to show up and this idea of leaving my home life at the door and stepping in and just putting on this brave face and acting as though a sick child at home or a sick parent at home or whatever else isn’t impacting the way that you show up. I mean, it’s just crazy. So that in and of itself, there’s a lot to unpack. But I also believe that right now we are being called, those of us that carry the feminine frequency and energy, are being called to a much greater role. And it’s just so interesting that all of us would be impacted at this time and all of us would be in this precarious position where we’re having to rethink everything.

And I keep saying to women that find themselves outside of the labour force, perhaps because it’s their industries that have been most impacted as well, that it is time to social innovate, that it is time to start to come up with the solutions to the problems that we have. And I bring it back to the venture capital conversation. One of my favorite social innovators, disruptors, entrepreneurs, her name is Miki Agrawal. She started two companies. One is called Thinks, and it was reinventing how women deal with their periods. And she could not raise capital for her company, even though this area, it impacts women every month all around the world. It had not been innovated in. It was absolutely wild. And so she had come, but she could not raise capital for her company because every man she was trying to explain this to was like didn’t understand and was like, “I need to go ask my wife.” And it’s like, no, your wife’s not here to hear the pitch of the business model as to why this is going on. It’s not like a simple ask your wife.

So we need to see women at all positions. We need to see women in venture capital. We need to see women at the at the c-suite of our big banks. Like, we need to really, really start to infiltrate in. And if it’s not going to be the through the traditional ways, then I believe it’s through entrepreneurship. And whether you’re creating your own organization right now or you’re coming together with a few other like-minded people and doing that together as a collective, it is time to step into the arena. If you find yourself outside of the system for some reason and you don’t want to go back into it, you don’t have to. Create your own solution. And we need that now.

Absolutely. Oh, my gosh. So much to unpack with this conversation Rhiannon. But at the very least, I hope it’s opening up people’s minds to look at alternative ways to create a lifestyle that is indicative of what feeds their soul. I hope that people are really, you know, taking heed of the fact that we have to give ourselves permission to lead the life that we feel suits who we are as a human. And that’s what we’re here to do on this planet. Our soul is here to to to accomplish what it came to do. And how can any two souls have the same accomplishment? Why are we all living the same type of existence, the same journey through life? It begs so many other questions. But here’s what I want to ask you, Rhiannon. How can conscious economics mitigate the growth of this consistently growing – is what we’re seeing right now – gender disparity in the workplace and at home right now, for those who don’t want to see that? Not for women who say I’m good with this. But for those who are saying that this is creating even more challenges for me, what do you feel can be incorporated from your ideology around conscious economics to maybe combat this on some level?

So, again, it’s this idea of when everything changes, we have to change everything and everything is changing right now. And so it is time to literally reimagine. So again, we cannot reimagine and come up with creative solutions if we’re looking at it through the exact same lens all the time. So my first piece of advice is that we have to actually start to open ourselves up and expand our consciousness through reading, through being in nature, through consuming new art and new ideas and ways of thinking. I come back to this idea of motherhood. And, you know, for me in becoming a mother – I’ve got two young boys and obviously I’ve been running national organizations for the last 10 years. Motherhood felt so lonely to me. I felt like, how is it that us women here in the West, we spend all this time and energy to be in these fancy houses that are isolated. We’re by ourselves. We’ve got no one around. There’s no sense of community. You know, there’s no intergenerational connection here. And it leaves us so depleted and so alone and so isolated.

“We cannot reimagine and come up with creative solutions if we’re looking at it through the exact same lens all the time. My first piece of advice is that we have to actually start to open ourselves up and expand our consciousness through reading, through being in nature, through consuming new art and new ideas and ways of thinking.” ~Rhiannon Rosalind

And so community is such a huge key part of this. And again, so many of us, when we’re feeling down and out or when we’re feeling like we don’t understand, we retreat in, we retract in, we don’t speak about it. And that’s why we created the Lunar Club as a space to build community around these conversations. Because the more I hear you, Raj, speaking about it, the more that I’m validated in what I am saying. So this idea of expanding our consciousness can come from all forms. It can come from this collective collaborative conversation that we start to have. It can come from actually investing in our own practices to go within. And I am a strong believer that if you set intention to receive an answer or a direction for something, you will receive it. You will receive it, but you have to be able to look at the signs and the signals and really tune into what’s around you. And that can’t happen if we are most of the time living in our forward or or past mind where we’re thinking about the past or future event and not in the present moment.

So practices of presence and being able to come into that are huge. And also now is is the time – it’s like we’re in this really interesting intersection when all of the powers that be cannot ignore this conversation anymore. So now’s the moment. Now’s the time. It won’t last forever that we have to actually come forward and start to say, you know, if you’re going to resign from your place of work because of what’s happening at home rather than just silently doing it, go out with a bang. Explain why and what’s going on and what’s happening. You know, let people know. Let people at the top know why you are feeling the way you’re feeling, why you’re making the choices that you’re making. When we come back to starting to think of the solutions to the issues. I’ll tell you, if school is shut down for the third time this year I can guarantee you that us women in our community are going to start to figure something out because this doesn’t work. And it never did work is really the truth. It never did. It’s not the pandemic. It’s the pandemic is only exposing what was already not working. So this is just what I think.

Yes, absolutely. So can I add another layer to this? Because I really would love your perspective on this. So the other layer is patriarchal dominance. So we all know that the power dynamic in North America, let’s talk about North America because that’s where we are, has the white male sitting at the top of the totem pole and the black female sits right at the bottom and the rest of us are kind of somewhere in between.

How can conscious economics be incorporated into this particular dynamic which is etched into the very fabric? Actually forget that it’s etched into the entire infrastructure of how we’ve created every layer of society. Your thoughts?

Yeah, well, to be quite honest with you. I truly believe that, and there’s evidence to prove, that those that have been through suffering and trauma – and I speak to many of the women and especially the racialized women that have been and experiencing this trauma – it actually lends itself to an increased emotional attunement and awareness. And this emotional currency that is held and possessed by so many, especially women and racialized folks, is actually now what is needed in this society that we are evolving into. And so what we’re kind of seeing, if I use certain terms – and I don’t want to put a blanket statement over everybody – but what is happening is that there’s a saying: the first will be last and the last will be first. And it is that those of us that have been on the sidelines, that have been marginalized, that have been pushed over to the side, we have had to cultivate a different kind of resiliency, a different kind of knowing.

And now that is going to be something that is needed. And what we’re seeing is that there’s going to be this shift in dynamic and power. The powers that be will hold on for as long as they can. But as you said in the beginning, the power of the people is very strong when we collectively come together. But now is not the time to stay quiet and silent. And that doesn’t need to be an aggressive, you know, yelling on the street. It needs to be starting to build your network and your framework of where do I want to be and where do I want to go and what is my truth and am I ready to speak it? You know, I even think back to something like the Me Too movement, where all of a sudden, you know, we felt safe enough to speak about the experiences that almost all of us had , that we were silently… And it changed the culture. It changed the way that people felt when they were around, whether it was a joke or whether it was in a serious endeavor, it changed the way people showed up into spaces.

And so we are seeing this again through the various movements that are occurring, through not being able to turn a blind eye to the deep systemic racism that we see everywhere. And you’re absolutely right. You know, women, black women, women of color, Indigenous women, these are the groups now that actually are needed most in leadership positions that understand most how to solve. If you want to solve the issue, get the people who are experiencing it to solve it. Gone are the days of the talking head. If we’re talking about gun violence in a community, I want to hear from the young person that lives and breathes and experiences that gun violence every day, not the person with the facts and figures that’s going to speak at a ten mile away radius on it. This isn’t what we need right now. We need this integration. So I really, truly believe that these systems are coming undone. It will be slow. And it’s not about burn it all down. It’s about alchemizing. It’s about taking what is there and not saying that it’s all bad.

Because like I said in the beginning, we are all victims of this system. Whether you are right now seen as the perpetrator of that abuse or are you are someone who is experiencing it on the other side, we are all under the umbrella of this unconsciousness. And we really have not reinvented our systems since the time of colonization, slavery. I look right now at our prison industrial complex as a modern day slavery system. And these are things that we need to start to bring that consciousness, bring that awareness to. Only from that lens of consciousness can we actually start to create something that works. We can’t just from this point right now say, oh, here’s all the solutions. Let’s do X, Y, Z. No, no, we have to evolve and increase our frequency and our consciousness. And then when we get to that point, make the new ideas and systems. That’s how it works.

So what can women in positions of power do right now?

I have a huge call out to the white women right now. White women, you have to wake up and you have to now make way and make space to support other women, other racialized women who have not been able to even get to the places that white women have found themselves. There’s this whole conversation about white feminism and how that has excluded and ignored the experiences of so many. I think it’s, again, getting out of your own bubble. All of us need to be interacting with people that look different than each of us every day. You know, if your circle and surrounding is looking exactly like you and thinking exactly like you and speaking exactly like you, then that’s not a space where you are going to be able to cultivate a higher consciousness.

“If your circle and surrounding is looking exactly like you and thinking exactly like you and speaking exactly like you, then that’s not a space where you are going to be able to cultivate a higher consciousness.” ~Rhiannon Rosalind

It’s being able to actually go out and experience and empathetically hear stories and share and understand what other people are going through because we’re so, so quick to write these things off if they don’t apply to us. Oh, that’s all hearsay. Oh, here they go again. Know it’s all that that we have to eliminate. And this is the same thing that I said of actually standing and looking at the shadow of society right now and saying, I see it. I’m not going to ignore it away. Cognitive dissonance is a real thing. We never, ever want to feel that we ourselves are part of the problem. And I’ve had to really look at myself. I’m not off the hook at all. I’m not. I’m a human being and I will continuously make mistakes and I will continuously perpetuate in micro ways unless I am doing my act of work every day. And even still we will slip up. But that’s part of the experience, knowing that and being able to shift and evolve.

Absolutely. And I think that to touch upon what you just said, Rhiannon. Even in terms of our own cultural silos, that I can give an example of the South Asian community, because that’s that’s the community that I was born into. Even take a look there. There are so many examples of disparity within our system that we created in our culture that, it’s not just about I am white and I am not white. So therefore, if I’m not white, I’m not getting what someone who is white is getting. Therefore, I am being degraded upon. It’s not just that discussion that I think people need to look at. I think people need to look also within the cultures that they’ve created within their own ecosystems because casteism, shadeism, these are huge in my community. And they still exist extremely strongly. So I feel that this whole idea of equality or lack thereof, or I get this and you don’t get this isn’t predicated on just these big silos of I am white and I am not white. I am male. I am female. It goes down the entire fabric to the minutia level of infrastructure. And this is why it becomes so much of a bigger problem. Obviously, it’s one that’s going to take… And this is something that you said really resonates with me, Rhiannon.

You said that this whole kind of intergenerational, communal, the need for that in our personal and professional lives so that we’re all sitting at that table and leaders aren’t predicated on their age. Wisdom isn’t predicated on the amount of years you’ve been on the planet. It’s predicated on experience and many other things. And what you’ve been exposed to, what have been your resources. What have you had the access to in your life also aligns with this whole idea of what wisdom is and all of that. So let me ask you, because we’re getting ready to close off now. I wanted to also kind of bring in that male allyship into the conversation.

“Wisdom isn’t predicated on the amount of years you’ve been on the planet. It’s predicated on experience and many other things. And what you’ve been exposed to, what have been your resources.” ~Raj Girn

How can men out there? Because I feel that getting a bad rap, right? I feel a lot of men out there are, you know, a true feminist. They believe in equality. They support the women in their lives, but they’re scared to support in case they say or do something wrong. Are there any thoughts that you can kind of lend to that discussion in terms of how can men support what they already believe in, which is the equality of all humans?

Yeah, I feel so much for men right now, especially the younger men that are coming up right now that feel like the world is set out against them in some ways. And that’s not what it’s about. When I think about the archetypal mother, I think of the archetypal mother loves all her children. It’s not about she only loves her daughters or this and that. Not at all. It’s like we all deserve love, compassion, humility, respect, and again, when I think of a new system, I don’t think about replacing all the men with women. I think about alchemizing what we have in actually creating this balanced place where we are all actually at the table. And I come back to what I was saying earlier. People who are destroying the very thing that gives them life, their planet, well, they’re not well. And I also think of how we treat our elder and old and aging people. And it’s another reflection of how we’re not well.

There is so much wisdom and wisdom and knowledge are two different things. Wisdom is innate. It comes from living our lives and experiencing and knowledge we can accumulate through reading and books and interactions and study. But that wisdom is what we are being called on for right now. And I keep saying that so many of us, because of the society we live in – social media and political correctness – are so scared to even ask the question that we go about having this surface level interaction when we actually crave to know if I say this to you, would this be offensive or could I as a man do this or show up this way? I mean, that we need safe places to have conversations that are not in our own echo chamber. And this is some of the stuff that we are trying to do through conscious economics. And again, I would say that I’m raising two little young men myself, and I want them to be able to grow up into a world where they understand and respect and value women, men and all beings. And I think it’s starting to understand that there’s this space of fluidity between race and culture and class and everything else.

This one thing that unites us all as humans, that as we evolve in our consciousness, those different things that separate us, they start to become less meaningful. And we start to understand that we are all beings on this beautiful planet. And there’s no way that we came here all to fight with each other, pile up a bunch of junk and then die. It just doesn’t make sense. So there’s obviously something more. I believe Earth is a school. We’re here to learn. We’re here to evolve. We’re here to grow, and we’re here to do the healing that our past generations and our ancestors were not able to. There is so much suffering, so much pain, so much that our ancestors went through. It is our gift now back to all that they went through to actually come forward and to live in peace and harmony and to ask these bigger questions and to enjoy the beautiful abundance that’s all around us.

Absolutely. And we really can collectively create a world that serves us all. We just need to work harder at what the intention is of why we’re here, and that’s the best the big missing part. Rhiannon, it’s been such an absolute pleasure talking to you. I want to ask you, are there any final words that you want to leave everyone with? Anything to kind of bring us back full circle?

We started up the conversation prefacing the fact that this was going to be a discussion where we’re going to delve into maybe helping people open their minds to maybe alternative leadership styles. Your organization is doing that in many different ways. Can we maybe hone in on regrouping on the discussion of why conscious economics is the leadership style of the future? Because I truly believe it is. And anyone who is just coming into the conversation at the end here, please rewind this back. Go and listen to this and sit with it and maybe listen to it a few times because there are so many concepts that were hit upon and touched upon and delved into. That I feel that is going to help people really open their own minds into what life truly could be if they allow themselves to have the courage to feel the fear that the unknown brings with it.

So here’s what I’ll leave everyone with, because we’ve talked about a lot of things. And I thank you so much for giving me this platform to speak so openly and honestly about these things. And I will say that everyone listening will have a different reaction to what they hear. And some of their reaction may be resistance. There may be a feeling of wanting to write some of this off. And I would say that that resistance is a gift. It’s showing you where you can still go and explore. If you didn’t feel that resistance, if there wasn’t any meaningful truth to what we were saying here, you wouldn’t take it in at all, but if you’re feeling this conflict that’s coming up with some of these ideas, I challenge you to actually observe that resistance and sit with it, because I too, have experienced that.

And again, I remind everyone that I am the CEO and president of the Economic Club of Canada, which is very much within the system of it all. And me coming out and speaking very authentically and truthfully and honestly doesn’t always win me all the fans. But it’s time to actually be more honest. And I think that if there’s anything I can leave the listeners with, it’s time to show up in our spaces and be more authentic and ask the questions that we want to ask and communicate. And if you want the world to feel differently, then work on showing up differently, because when you show up differently, you invite others to be able to be in a different way. And the frequency kind of draws that experience to you. So it’s starts within. Our collective transformation will start with the personal transformation through our own evolution and consciousness, and that will evolve our systems, our economy and everything else. So thank you so much.

“If you want the world to feel differently, then work on showing up differently, because when you show up differently, you invite others to be able to be in a different way.” ~Rhiannon Rosalind

Thank you so much, Rhiannon. And how can people get a hold of you and tap into learning more about what this is and how they can actually implement it and learn more?

I would say go to consciouseconomics.ca. You can also find me on all social media. So Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn. I’m Rhiannon Roseland and I will get back to you. I’m so open to speaking to people and gathering more people than anyone is invited to come to our Lunar Club. And we’re also starting our Sun Club for men. So we’re very, very open for people to come out and have fun and just start thinking about this new economy and the future of work in a new way.

Yeah, absolutely. Thank you so much. You are such a blessing. I have so much fun with you and I feel like I need to have so many more conversations with you. And I’m honoured that you came on and you were so open. You were so authentic to truly what conscious economics is all about. Thank you. Thank you so much for coming on.

Thank you. I want to be your new best friend. So we’ll have to connect.

You’ve already got that title, girlfriend.

I love it. Thank you.

Thank you so much.

Thank you so much for staying till the end, guys. I really hope you enjoyed this show and will action the many insights that were shared. This topic is quite revolutionary in that it questions and brings to task all the failing infrastructures within the work environment that have piled up over the past 150 years since the advent of the Industrial Revolution that has cattled us into a limiting beliefs, mindset where we have been led to believe that there is only one way to work and live, a one size fits all mentality that empowers a few by slaving the masses.

An aggressive opinion, I know, but one that if you were to be truly honest with yourself, you would agree holds some truths, such as if you were brought up to believe that you could do anything, would you have done what you chose to do? And is that the right thing that you should be doing to take you to the truth of the journey that you should be living? This is the most important question you can ask yourself, because the answer will take you on the journey towards your singular truth, because you’re on your journey to live your truth and not someone else’s. Or perhaps you are, but I hope not.

If you found this episode helpful and it opened your mind to an alternative way of looking at leadership, I’m glad. I ask that you subscribe to this podcast. On your Apple and Android platform, search The Transform Your Confidence Show. On Youtube channel at the Open Chest Confidence Academy. And if you’re an avid reader like I am, we’ve also transcribed every podcast into a blog which can be accessed at TheOpenChestConfidenceAcademy.com/media/our-media. And also please hop over to our private Facebook group at Transform Your Confidence, whether on networking opportunities as well as knowledge and resources about mindset, media, communications, branding, marketing, leadership and advocacy for busy executives and entrepreneurs like you who are seeking to elevate the quality of their life. You know, you’ve got to be there. And as always, thanks for tuning in and until next episode, take care of yourself.

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