Episode 282 Thandi Myeni Helping Others Find Joy & Bounce Back From Setbacks Transcript

This transcript is from episode 282 with guest Thandi Myeni.

Scott DeLuzio: [00:00:00] Thanks for tuning in to the Drive On Podcast where we are focused on giving hope and strength to the entire military community. Whether you’re a veteran, active duty, guard, reserve, or a family member, this podcast will share inspirational stories and resources that are useful to you. I’m your host, Scott DeLuzio, and now let’s get on with the show.

Hey everybody. Welcome back to the Drive. On Podcast. Today my guest is Thandi Myeni. Thandi is a major in the US Army and helps other people find joy in their lives and bounce back from setbacks through a variety of methods that we’re gonna be talking about in a little bit here.

So welcome to the show. I’m glad to have you here.

Thandi Myeni: I am so glad to be here with you, Scott. Oh. And hello to everybody who is listening. I hope that it, if even one thing that I say today makes a difference in your life, then it was totally worth it.

Scott DeLuzio: Oh, absolutely. And I think based on our conversation that we had before we hit [00:01:00] record here I think this conversation’s gonna be impactful.

I think it already has started to impact me just in the pre-conversation that we’ve had just kind of nudging me, encouraging me to do things and step maybe out of comfort zone a little bit. And I think that might help some of the listeners as well. So before we dive into all of that stuff, for the listeners who maybe might not be familiar with you, could you tell us a little bit about.

Thandi Myeni: Absolutely Scott. My name is Dr. Thandi, a k a, the bouncebackologist. I wear many hats and the one that I am the most proud of is being the mother of two fantastic girls, Lily and Mikayla . In addition to that, I am an eye surgeon and transformational speaker and coach. I help to improve eyesight and insight, and I serve proudly in the United States Army as a major, also as a eye surgeon.

Scott DeLuzio: And that’s awesome that you can find [00:02:00] that job, like something like that in the military as well. So you can, not only are you serving just people in general, like fellow humans, right, but you’re also serving in the military, you’re serving your country, and so that’s awesome. Finding a way to combine the two of those things into one.

In my opinion. Super awesome job that, that you have. Right. So before we started recording, you started telling me a little bit about your background as far as your career TRA trajectory and how it pivoted to say the least as time went on. Right. Tell us a little bit about your background and your career trajectory and how that those things changed and how you wound up where you are today.

Thandi Myeni: Absolutely. One of the things I want to say is that your past doesn’t determine your future. The decisions that you make today determine your future [00:03:00] and anything is possible. And I think when you really hold onto that and believe that, then your life can change in ways that you didn’t imagine. I met a woman the other day who barely graduated high school and now she’s a New York Times bestselling author of 21 Books,

My Step, my story, I, back in 2001, I was working for Eminem is a candy company. It was a great job and a great place to work, and when nine 11 happened, it was around 25. That was one of those moments that was, I guess they call it a quarter life crisis, where I started to think about what do I want my life to mean?

Is this really what I want to be doing with my life? And I had previously entertained the idea of going [00:04:00] to medical school, but I didn’t pursue it. But on that day when that happened, I decided that. My life was going to change. And by the next year, I was either going to be working in the medical industry or I was gonna be in medical school.

Thankfully I was able to go to medical school and through a number of challenges, I finished praise God. And I graduated. I thought, and interestingly, I thought I was gonna become a, an obs, obstetrician gynecologist and help people have babies cuz I, I still think life is ful. But things happened and as life often does, and I think it’s so important to be flexible.

Sometimes we think we’re going one way, but then life takes us a different way. I ended up going into eye surgery, which is an amazing field, and I helped to help people have better vision and. , which is one of it’s like when people, when I do [00:05:00] cataract surgery on someone who couldn’t see well, and then the next day they can see, and they have that aha, that wondrous moment.

It’s really so fulfilling, and I love that. But then I noticed that I wasn’t quite feeling as passionate as some of my colleagues were. Like when they, a new medicine would come out to treat glaucoma and they would start talking, they would start geeking out about the the mechanisms of action and

I was like, . So I asked myself, well, what am I passionate about? What, what makes me happy? What brings me joy when I do that? And I happen to be working for this woman? And probably the best thing that came out of that is that she had a knee surgery. And she had been invited to go speak to this group of people who were low vision, but since she couldn’t go, she said, can you go?

So I went and as I was talking to them, [00:06:00] and it’s really interesting when you’re getting a presentation to people who can’t see you can’t use visual aids, which I previously, right? I previously have been really dependent on PowerPoint presentations and videos. You can’t do that. It’s just you and them.

And when I was encouraging them and I could see that I was connecting with them, I just started to feel so excited and so much joy. And so I started going on that path of doing more public speaking, which led to writing and also coaching. And so, and then, and I’m still, obviously I’m still alive, so my journey is not over.

But one of the things that brings me the most joy is when I can Help somebody and encourage somebody and help them to believe in a possibility that they didn’t previously think existed.

Scott DeLuzio: And that is pretty cool how you know, you kind of make that jump and leave, like taking a great career at, in this corporation that [00:07:00] you were working for the m and m Mars candy Company, and then taking a leap to go do something that you’ve never done before and didn’t, I mean, you didn’t really know where it was gonna end up.

You didn’t know, you know, were you gonna become a doctor? Were you gonna be doing something else in the medical field? And, but you took that leap and you went and followed something that you were passionate about. And I was talking about this in a previous episode where sometimes we, we make these pivots in our lives and.

Like going to medical school. Like that’s not a small feat. Like that’s a pretty significant, not only is it a significant time commitment, it’s a financial commitment. There’s a big commitment in doing all of that. And I could see how someone might get to a point where there’s like, well, I have to finish out the rest of my career in this.

Cause I spent so much time and money and effort and everything into getting this degree to [00:08:00] be able to be a doctor. I have, I can’t do anything but this. And then you kind of feel stuck because if it doesn’t give you that fulfillment or that you don’t have a passion for it that you once had, you’re gonna be not really enjoying life for the ne the next however many years, whatever you have left in your, you know, until you retire or whatever.

Like that isn’t the best place to be. And so I think like in, in this case, you have to be okay with. Thinking about a pivot into something else. Right. And I think from what I’m hearing from you, it’s that service to other people being able to help people. You know, you love babies, you love, you know, the idea of bringing life into the world.

And then, you know, you got to the point where now you’re helping people see better and now you’re doing something completely different, but also helping people. And so like, at the end of the day, it’s like that’s your passion. It’s helping people. And it’s, the rest of it is just the [00:09:00] mode of doing it.

It’s, there’s just different ways of helping people and everybody needs help with something at some point. I mean, you could be doing anything in in finding ways to help people. It’s just a matter of what is it that you enjoy doing and are good at to be able to help those.

Thandi Myeni: Absolutely.

Yeah. One of my favorite quotes is from Dr. Martin Luther King, where he says that everybody can be great because everybody can serve. And really, I believe that is, people always wonder what is my purpose? What is my purpose? But our purpose is to serve, and we all have different gifts and talents. We have to use those gifts and talents to help make the world a better place.

Scott DeLuzio: Right. And I know a lot of us feel like we’re at the end of our rope. Like we, we’ve been doing the same thing. We’ve been, feel like we’re just on a treadmill or a hamster wheel or something. We are, we’re not making any progress. We’re not going any further. We’re not going anywhere. And we get to that point where we don’t know what else to do.[00:10:00]

What was the thought process for you, like when you made some of these transitions in your own life to get to the places where you are today?

Thandi Myeni: Well, the first step really was figuring out what do I want? What do I want? And one of the exercises that I give my coaching clients is write out a detailed vision of what your perfect day is.

What does it look like? If you had a magic wand and you could create anything, what would that look like? Are you going to work every day? Are you retired? Are you working from home? Are you just taking care of your kid? Like, what does that look like? So knowing what you want and knowing what you want, knowing what you like, , what makes you happy, what makes you feel good.

And the one of the challenges I see with a lot of people is that the areas where they are the most gifted and talented, they take it for granted. And they [00:11:00] don’t realize that. Is their area of genius in their area that they could be monetizing, right. So, so first one I real when I, so first I created a, this vision, really, it’s all about vision, haha, from the eye, doctor

But I created this vision of what did I want and what does that look like and what made me happy. And once I had that, it’s like, okay, well how do I get there? Because even going to, even doing something like going to medical school, it’s not a one day thing. There are many different steps.

So number like number one, what do I want? What does it look like? How do I get there? And another important thing is realizing where am I right now? Where am I right now? How far away am I from that? Because sometimes we’re actually really not that, not as far away as we think from living the life of our dreams.

And then the other, another important question is, who can help me get there? Because so [00:12:00] many times we wanna do things on our own, but there’s a African proper, but I’m gonna butcher it probably, but it says something, if I want to go fast, I go alone. If I want to go far, I go with others. And when you can create a team of whatever that looks like to help you get to wherever you’re trying to go, things will happen much faster.

For instance, if somebody wanted to, like, if somebody wanted to go to medical school, I could help them a lot. You know, get, I know stuff that they don’t know. So, Recognizing who can help you, whether it’s a coach, whether it’s a mentor, but getting help to get there. And then also, and just, and then creating a plan and then doing it step by step.

And then having a lot of grace for yourself because things don’t always work out the first time or the second time or the third time. And just, finding a way. That’s the other thing. Finding a way to [00:13:00] hold onto the belief and hold onto the vision. And I think that when you make, when your why is big enough, it helps you to get through the challenges because no matter what you do, there’s always going to be challenges.

This is always gonna be hard. There’s always gonna be times when you’re like, why am I doing this anyway, . But, and at that time you need something that’s going to pull you through that and your vision and your why is what’s going to do that.

Scott DeLuzio: Yeah, absolutely. The why is something that you’re gonna have to fall back on because there’s gonna be times, if you’re doing anything worthwhile, there’s gonna be times where you end up having those just sucky days where nothing seems to be going right.

And you’ve want to just throw in the towel and say, you know what? I’m not cut out for this and I’m gonna move on to something else. And then you walk away from it when really you were on the path to greatness in whatever that field was that you were working towards. But [00:14:00] you threw in the towel too early and you never got to see that through.

And so, yeah, having that why is gonna be important because then you’ll want to stick it out. You know, I know there are people out there who are. Just totally motivated by, you know, like their family for an instance. And that’s their why. It’s like, I’m gonna do this because I want these great things for my family.

And, you know, they keep a picture of their family on their desk or in their wallet or somewhere, and it’s like, or on their phone screen shown, I guess shown my age with static photos, . But but you know, they have these things and it’s like, okay, that’s my why. And that now they have this constant reminder of this is why I’m doing these things and I’m gonna keep going.

I’m gonna keep doing these things. Because that’s my why. And maybe there’s a more internally focused thing that it’s like, I want this because I want to be in a certain place five years from now or I want to be doing a certain thing five [00:15:00] years from now and that’s why I’m doing this. That’s why I am suffering through Medi Medical School going through.

The late night studying and all the, everything else that goes along with it the hard work that goes with it. I’m sure there’s times, and you probably know some of these people who, where there are people who didn’t make it all the way through medical school and they started off with that goal, but they didn’t keep their why in mind.

Perhaps. I don’t, you know, obviously I don’t know every one of these people, but I bet some of them didn’t have their why. As a constant reminder for them which would’ve pushed them to keep going. It would’ve kept them in school as opposed to walking away from it. And so, yeah I think that’s an important aspect of it too is just keeping that why in the back of your mind.

Absolutely.

Thandi Myeni: 100%. Yeah.

Scott DeLuzio: And so when you get to that point though where you’re feeling like, like this is. This is too much. And that why is starting to kind of fade outta your mind because there’s there’s just this insurmountable task in front of you, or [00:16:00] it seems like things are just not going right or whatever it is.

How do you get yourself back to that point and change that perspective to really stay focused on that? Why?

Thandi Myeni: I can tell you the moment that I knew that I was gonna finish medical school, you know, I, I know the exact moment. The exact moment was after my first semester in medical school. And I got my student loan bills . And I realized that if I quit now, I am gonna owe these people all this money and I will be no better qualified than I was when I started.

So at that moment I decided, come what may I am going to finish. And it was tough. Like my I only had one grandparent, one living grandparent while I was alive. And my grandmother died in my first year of medical school. My mom, I grew up with a single mom. My mom died in my third year of medical school.

And I had to end up. Taking care of my 18 year old brother. [00:17:00] So it wasn’t easy and there were a lot of hard times, but I like it was that, I guess part of not quitting is that there’s, you get to this point where you decide that just not going back. I am not going back. No matter what happens, we are moving forward, right?

And when you make that commitment, then even if you have to take a break, even if it takes longer than what you think and you just keep taking steps, eventually you will get there.

Scott DeLuzio: Right? And I think any step towards that future that you’re envisioning for yourself or that goal or the dream that you have, any step that you’re taking towards that is a step in the right direction.

Yeah. Versus any step going in any other direction is the wrong direction. And you have to stop and think to yourself you know, is this thing that I’m about to do. Going to help me achieve that goal. And if the answer is no, then you have to ask yourself like, why am I even going to do this? Is [00:18:00] this achieving some other goal?

Would I rather be focusing on that other goal? You know, because you have more than one goal in your life. Like that, there’s no problem there. And so it’s not necessarily saying that’s the wrong thing to be doing, it’s just, you know, there are only so many hours in the day. You only have so many weeks in the month and months in the year.

The, there’s a finite amount of that and you can’t create more time. So you have to be pretty clear on what it is that you want to be focusing on where those goals are and how you can get to where you want to be. Right?

Thandi Myeni: Absolutely. One of the things that I learned is the power of focus light. When you scatter light it is, it’s very weak in power.

but when you focus light rays all in one specific place, you can blast through metal. That’s what lasers do. It’s that focused energy. And one of the things, one of the mistakes, or I don’t know [00:19:00] if it was a mistake, but one of the things I learned is that I was trying to do, I was trying to do too much all at the same time.

Grow my coaching business, write the book, do the speaking engagements. And I wasn’t doing, oh, and keep my full-time job and I wasn’t doing and be in the army, right. And ambi a mom, and I wasn’t doing any of those things very well. So I said, I’m just gonna drop all these other things and I’m just gonna focus on one thing at a time, and I’m gonna keep taking steps in that di in that direction until I have the momentum that I want.

And then I will move on to the next thing and then the next thing,

Scott DeLuzio: boom. Right. I, and I think that’s a good way to look at it too. It’s like you can have multiple goals, but. It’s like you know, a computer with your internet browser with a thousand tabs open. Like you, you start to lose focus on what it is that you’re actually trying to work on, and you end up on YouTube all day and you accomplish nothing.

Right? . So, yeah, unless you’re watching this show, and then that’s a totally different story. Just kidding. [00:20:00] But it, but if you’re doing that, then you are not focused on the big main goal that you’re trying to accomplish. And once you, you get to that point where you’ve achieved a goal or you’ve gotten enough momentum where that goal is now in sight and it’s easily attainable, then you can focus on that next thing.

But yeah, try to, trying to multitask and do too many things at once. Some, and maybe it works for some people, but I mean, I don’t know very many that are very successful when they’re scattered. Throughout many different areas, you know, may, maybe they’re successful for a short period of time, but in the long run, like, like you were saying, you have to have that kinda long-term focus in mind.

In the long run, you’re not gonna be as successful as you would be if you’re much more laser focused and like you were saying, lasers are able to cut through metal, and that’s just really intensely focused light. And when you really intensely focus on one particular thing, that’s the thing that in your life that’s going to improve or grow or get better.

I know when [00:21:00] I had a a business a few years ago I was doing several different things in this business. I was trying to serve several different types of clients and it was pulling my attention in several different places and I was not really focused on any one of those areas in my business.

And the area that I was most passionate about the area that I really wanted to work with was the area I was giving the least amount of attention to. And one day I decided I’m done with the rest of it, and I’m not going to be working with these other types of clients. I’m just gonna put it all aside.

I won’t accept any more of those clients. I’ll finish up the contracts and the obligations that I have right now, because that’s the right thing to do. You’re not gonna just leave people high and dry. But I wanted to finish up those. And then after that, I didn’t take any more of those other types of clients and I just focused on the type of work that I was interested in and passionate about.

And while when I made that decision that part of my business was I forget the exact numbers, but [00:22:00] I’m gonna kind of roughly make ’em up, it was probably about 20, 25% of my business. , which that income alone would not have been enough for me to maintain the lifestyle that I wanted or really pay the bills and keep the food on the table and all that stuff.

It was a decent enough amount of income, but it wasn’t quite enough for all of that. But I put away the other 75, 80% of the business and I kind of just tossed it aside and I focused only on that. And eventually within that first year, I was able to replace that other income by focusing just laser focus on just that stuff.

And that, I think is along the lines of what you’re talking about is if you have that focus and you’re really focused on this one aspect of whatever it is in your life, that’s where you’re gonna start to see some growth. But if you’re scattered all over the place you’re not gonna see it 100%.

Yeah, exactly. And I think that, you know, with other people that I’ve talked to as well, they’ve [00:23:00] shared similar stories, and I think it’s that focus that you need. And sometimes it’s hard to focus. It’s hard to focus on that one thing. Things like self-doubt start creeping in. Well what if this doesn’t work out?

Maybe I need to have something else on the back burner just in case. Right? Now how do you overcome those types of stumbling blocks? Like, like self-doubt and maybe even procrastination because it’s like, well, I’m not so sure if this is gonna work out, so why am I gonna spend all my time on this when I, you know, this, that may not be the best place to spend all my time.

How do we overcome this type of stuff.

Thandi Myeni: Actually, I have a little mini-series that is free for your viewers if anyone is interested. It’s called Embrace the Fear. So you embrace your fear and you do it anyway. And one of the, I mean, I think the thing, the way that you overcome, and I definitely, I definit for procrastination.

I suffer him self-doubt. And the other interesting thing that was fascinating to me is that so does everybody else ? So does everybody [00:24:00] else like, my boyfriend, he. He has been a pastor doing public speaking for 40 years, right? So certainly some oh and a politician, though, certainly someone who is comfortable behind a microphone.

And he share with me that every time he speaks at a different church, he gets nervous. And so that was so, such a relief to me because I get nervous when I have to speak publicly as well. But knowing that he is a professional and he even, he does that meant made me feel a lot better. And the truth is that everybody has self-doubts.

Like you’re not special for having self-doubts, you’re not special for procrastinating. Everybody does it to some point. So just accept that as part of your humanness and humanity, and then figure out strategies that will work for you to help you move forward. So if you’re [00:25:00] procrastinating look at what, like what is, what are the thoughts?

First of all, everything is in our minds, right? The they say that success is 80% mindset, 20% practice or doing, but the mindset that we have, that’s what will affect us the most, regardless of what it is in life. Whether we’re going through a tough situation or we’re trying to overcome procrastination, we have to take a moment to look at what are the thoughts that we are thinking right now and also understand that we are not our minds.

We are the possessors of our minds. So the thoughts that we think are not us and the thoughts that we think are not true. So a lot of times when people are going. Through especially hard times, especially things like depression. There are all these voices, I call them the gremlins that are telling you these things that, you know, you suck.

Your life is never gonna [00:26:00] get any better. What, who do you think you are to do this? You like, you are nobody. You’re not smart enough, you’re too old, you’re too fat, you’re too whatever. Like our mind is creative. There’s a thousand thoughts of why we can’t. And it is very important to be able to speak truth to that because at the time, especially when you’re in a dark place, those things, they feel very real and very true.

But you have to know what is true and you have to be able to speak truths to those lies that come in your mind. And and also show yourself grace. It’s o like, it’s okay if you have self-doubt. It’s okay if you Procrastinate. It’s okay. Come. One of my favorite quotes. I have a lot of favorite quotes,

One of my favorite quotes is, forgive yourself every night. Recommit every morning. Forgive yourself every night. Recommit every morning. So you procrastinated, you watched, you got you binge watched, whatever show. Tomorrow is a new a day for an [00:27:00] opportunity for a new beginning. Start again. Just start again, right?

Scott DeLuzio: Yeah. And every day this was something I just recently saw from Jocko Wilin k the, the Jocko podcast. He was saying every day, every morning you wake up, and I’m probably gonna butcher this. The way he phrased it, it was much better than probably what I’m gonna do here.

But every morning you wake up, you started zero. Doesn’t matter what you did yesterday. Doesn’t matter what you did the day before. It doesn’t matter that you just got that promotion yesterday. Every day starts at zero. And I think the thought process on that is if you’re taking that right in that wave of, let’s say that promotion that you got yesterday and you’re riding that wave and you’re kind of coasting a little bit and just letting that wave carry you for a little bit, well, guess what?

There’s somebody else out there who’s grinding 10 times harder than you who’s gonna get that next promotion Yes. And is gonna continue to advance. And so get out there and think [00:28:00] of every day as if you’re starting off at zero and go out there and work the way you would work. If you’re looking up, trying to climb your way out of whatever hole you might have been in at, you know, at one point in your life or to achieve whatever goal, keep working hard, and you’ll be amazed at how fast you start seeing results and how much that transforms what it is that you’re.

Trying to achieve. And you get to that goal where you can then set another goal and then set another goal, and then set another goal to the point where you’re just crushing it and you’re achieving all these goals and you’re making it look easy because you’re able to do all these different things that other people who let that self-doubt creep in and tell themselves, well, I can’t do this or I can’t do that.

It’s not true. Like, you can do these things. You can you can get out there and do these things. I know for myself, when I find myself procrastinating it’s usually when there’s something I’m about to do [00:29:00] that I think is either too hard, like I, I don’t think I can do this.

Like I don’t think I’m capable of it or some other thing that I feel like I’m gonna fail at. If I attempt it. And so I find myself procrastinating because the illogical part of my brain is telling myself, well, if you never do it, then you can never fail at it. But it’s like, at the same time, I’ve never done that thing then.

And so it’s just as good as failing. So if I don’t try it, at least I have in my mind I would’ve failed. Right. I mean, absolutely. It’s pretty much the same

Thandi Myeni: idea. Absolutely. And the thing is, when we’re afraid, so fear is not a bad thing. In fact, fear is there to protect us. Back when we were living in caves, you won’t, we have fear warned us about dangers, about approaching tigers, but [00:30:00] now we don’t have approaching tigers.

Right? Let’s say you start that business and you fail. There’s no tiger that’s going to attack you, but the. Chemical processes and feelings that happen in our brain are the similar to the ones that we had when there was tigers. But we have to realize that there’s no tigers , there are no tigers, , right?

Yeah.

Scott DeLuzio: Like nothing’s gonna come out. Like if you go out and try to start that business and you don’t succeed, you’re not making the income that you thought you were gonna make or helping the client that you were hoping that you’d be able to help. Yeah. Like to your point, there’s no tire coming out to snatch you up because you didn’t make it in that.

Like, and if you look at the statistics too, a lot of businesses do fail absolutely in the sense that they end up closing within, you know, a year, two, three years or so of opening. They end up shutting up the shop. But those people still took the risk. They still gave it a shot. And I. [00:31:00] I don’t see those things necessarily as failures.

The way you might see, the way people might traditionally think of failures. I see those things more as learning opportunities where you go out, you do this thing, it doesn’t work out the way you thought it would, but now you’ve learned why it doesn’t work out the way you thought it would. Or at least you should learn that from that situation.

Yeah. Learn that. And then the next thing that you try, you can now apply that to this next thing so that doesn’t happen again. And I think that’s the place that most people should try to achieve or strive to get to is that mindset that not everything’s gonna go. Okay. A hundred percent of the time, and we just need to learn and grow from those setbacks, right?

Thandi Myeni: Absolutely. 100%. Even the company that I worked for, [00:32:00] m and m Mars, which makes our beloved m and ms and Snickers bars and Twix, Mars, the person who started that company, he had a candy company that failed and then he started a second candy company that also failed, and then he started a third candy company that failed again.

And then finally the fourth time, which can you imagine his friends and brother, you’re doing a candy company again, . But then finally he did the fourth company, which you know now is one of the biggest privately owned companies in the world and has brought most of us, lots of joy and delight.

Scott DeLuzio: Could you imagine Halloween if he had just given up?

Like what would Halloween look like if that didn’t exist? You know, . Right,

Thandi Myeni: right. And it’s all about learning and growing and it’s okay. And just kind of being able to embrace that it’s okay if it doesn’t work out the way that I had hoped. I’m not [00:33:00] gonna die. I was surprised to hear, I heard an interview with Elon Musk, the founder of Tesla, and he said, well, I thought there was about a 10% chance that company would succeed.

And I was fascinated cuz even with him itself, only thinking it was a 10% chance of success, he still proceeded. And and it’s good that he did

Scott DeLuzio: right. I mean, take someone like that and they are, you know, now one of the richest people in the world having. Basically gambled on a 10% chance on, you know, whether or not this is gonna work.

But I guarantee you along the way, and I don’t know the specifics of all this, but I guarantee you along the way, there were some failures even in, in a company like that, and things changed over time and you learn from those failures or those setbacks and made some pivots. And when we’re talking about those pivots, [00:34:00] before it was more like kind of wholesale, like, let’s change careers and start reinvent ourselves and start all over.

But in this case it’s more like, okay, well this market that we’re trying to tap into isn’t responding the way we thought we would, so let’s pivot to something else. And it’s still the same company, it’s just they’re maybe changing what they were doing. And you know, again, I don’t know the total history of the company and exactly how all of that worked, but I gotta imagine.

The company that we see today is not the company that he had envisioned with a 10% chance of success back when it started. It has probably changed to some degree over the years because of the lessons that were learned along the way.

Thandi Myeni: Absolutely. And I think one of the challenges is that we live in this culture of overnight success, that this microwave culture, that everybody wants the results, but nobody really wants to do the work.

And the fact is that no matter if you’re trying to achieve anything that’s worth achieving, there’s a [00:35:00] process. Yeah. And a lot of times the people that are experts, they make it seem like it was easy. Right. Like if you look at someone like Tony Robbins, he’s been doing this for I think 40 or 40 years.

It was, he’s 40 years in the making. Oprah, even Beyonce started when she was six years old. She’s been doing this for 35 years. She didn’t just start last week. And there’s a process. And that process is u is oftentimes not quick .

Scott DeLuzio: Right? And everyone sees the highlight reels. They see like, right.

What’s going on right now? They see the people at the top of their game just crushing it. They see the Michael Jordans and the elite people out there doing all of that stuff, but they don’t see all of the setbacks. And I use Michael Jordan as an example, just because like, he didn’t make his high school basketball team, right.

First time he tried out, he, he didn’t make it. And if he took that as a failure and just, you know, hung his head in shame and [00:36:00] just walked off and did something else. We might have, the world may never have known Michael Jordan the great basketball player. It might have been Michael Jordan. The, I don’t pick any other career that he could have possibly gone into the, you know, the mechanic or the could have been an incredible doctor, who knows.

He could’ve been an incredible something, but we probably never would’ve known the incredible basketball player. Right. It could have been just about anything. But he didn’t give up. It basically took that,

punch to the gut, if you will and picked himself back up and said, Hey, you know what? I gotta I’m just gonna get better. This is what I’m meant to do. This is my passion. This is what I want to do. I’m gonna get better. And he did. And I mean, I’m sure his. Change in his height status. Probably helped things out a little bit too over the years,

But but he, I mean, he kept practicing and practice until he got to the point where he was making the teams. And then now we have the person that, that we know today, right?

Thandi Myeni: Absolutely. And we didn’t, they, we didn’t see him on [00:37:00] Christmas Day shooting hoops, but there was like, there was so much stuff that happened in the background that we never got to witness.

It’s just all we see is him coming out on the court and shining. But there was a lot in the background, and I think it’s easy to take for granted that there was a lot in the background. And so it’s like when people try to do something and they’re not succeeding, they think, oh, well, what’s wrong with me?

What’s wrong with my process? Just because it’s not working out the way that you had hoped doesn’t mean that there’s something wrong with you. It just means that you have to keep going. And I think another thing that people get stuck on is the opinion of other people.

Scott DeLuzio: Yeah. That, that is true.

Thandi Myeni: Yeah. And being willing to put yourself out there despite what other people think. And when you have something, I think when your why is greater than you, when it’s more than about, more than just you and your own personal needs, when it’s about doing something for someone [00:38:00] outside yourself. I think that is some of the stuff that helps to propel you.

Beyond a lot of your, the hurdles that you will accom inevitably come.

Scott DeLuzio: Yeah, for sure. That why being bigger than yourself, I think is the biggest thing. And I think even for people who are they’re struggling maybe with their mental health you know, focus on the things that are around you that are bigger than you the people who depend on you and care about you and things like that.

And focus on those people and say, you know what maybe I’m not doing this for myself. Maybe I’m doing this for somebody else, but find something that’s bigger than you that you can focus on to, to help push you through that rough time, that rough patch that you might be going through.

And get yourself to that point where you can not only do these things for somebody else, but also for yourself and then propel yourself even further forward that way.

Thandi Myeni: Absolutely. And I would just love to speak to people right now who are [00:39:00] really struggling. We’re coming through this pandemic.

People have had a lot of challenges. People have had a lot of loss, and life can be really tough sometimes life can be really tough. I know myself I had a point where I just felt like my life was blowing up. My career kind of was a mess. I was in, I had experienced financial loss. My money was funny, and then my marriage was falling apart.

And it was all happening at the same time. And it was one of the really low moments. And I had to figure out how to find joy in the midst of my struggles. And how to. Find my way out of that very dark place, and I would love to just share some of the lessons that I learned. Yeah, please. The first step, so it’s all a’s the five, a’s [00:40:00] the first step is to acknowledge the problem is to acknowledge the problem, acknowledge that you’re hurting.

And one of the problems, especially with bets, is that a lot of people are in denial. A lot of people are in denial that they’re not, that their life is not going well, that they are not doing well, that they are drinking too much or feeling depressed or feeling anxious or Having symptoms of PTSD.

And I know when I went to Alcoholics Anonymous meetings, the first step, first of the 12 steps is you have to admit that there is a problem. And perhaps you’re not the one with the problem, but you notice that somebody else has a problem. You wanna don’t ignore that either. Talk to them, address it with them.

And then number two is that I learned to accept the way that I’m feeling. If I’m feeling afraid, it’s okay. If I’m feeling angry, it’s okay. If I’m feeling [00:41:00] depressed, it’s okay. And just coming to a place of self-acceptance, because anything that you are experiencing means that you are human. You are human.

And then the next step, which goes Along with that is allowing yourself to feel whatever you’re feeling. Cuz so many times people are like, well, how can I not be? How can I not be afraid? How can I not be? Allow, one of the things I’ve noticed in life that the more that you resist, the more the feeling will persist.

So rather than trying to get rid of it, just float through it. Just be okay with it. Like, embrace it be okay with it. It’s almost like a wave because just like any wave in the ocean, every wave, even a biggest wave will go high. But then it’ll come back down eventually. And that’s true with any emotion.

If you think, if you ever felt happy, sad, angry, you felt it and then at one point it went away, the happiness unfortunately [00:42:00] went away. The sadness went away. So just ride it, and don’t fight it. And the third thing, which both doctors and veterans. Or horrible at it’s asking for help. They estimate that up to 50% of veterans that are suffering from P T S D never seek the help.

And sometimes I wonder with the people that have that end up committing suicide, if they had asked for help, would they be in a different place today? Right. And you can ask for help from anywhere. You can ask your friends from help. You can ask your preacher for help. You can ask a therapist for help.

And if you don’t have, if you don’t owe anyone and don’t have anything, you can always call 9 88, which is the suicide hotline. You don’t even have to be like suicidal. You could just be really down. And they w there are people there and the other resource that I like [00:43:00] for. Veterans is the military one source, and I have used that.

And they have a tremendous number of different kinds of resources, but one of the ways that I’ve used them is to connect to a therapist. They will provide, I think it was about 12 sessions with a therapist. So, and I can give you that number. It’s 1-800-342-9647. So military one source is 1-800-342-9647. And they are open 24 hours a day, seven days a week, every day of the year. And they can connect you to resources that will help.

Scott DeLuzio: And I will have links to all of this in the show notes as well for you know, the military One source and other 9 88 is the other number that you mentioned.

I think these are great resources to, to have and to have kind of at your fingertips. And if you’re listening to this episode and feels like that is something [00:44:00] that is what you might need in, in your life at the time yeah, just check out the show notes. It’s real easy. 9 88 is probably easier just to dial it on your phone cuz it’s three numbers.

But you know, for Military One Source, I’ll have, I have a link to the website where they have more information about what it is that they offer and that type of stuff. But also I’ll have the phone number as well and that way you can click on it from there and make the call through there.

So, this episode to me, I think really has highlighted the The point that it’s okay to be going a certain direction thinking that this is the right direction for you, but new information comes in and you collect that information and realize, this isn’t exactly the path I wanna be on. And it’s okay to use that new information.

I mean, it’s, think about anything in the military, you get intelligence that comes in and you go and you act on that intelligence. And it’s really the same idea. You get new intelligence that came in and that says, [00:45:00] Hey, that job that you’re working, that’s sucking the life out of you, that’s making you depressed and miserable and angry at home, and it’s wrecking your home life and it’s wrecking your fitness and your mental health and it’s just wrecking havoc on your entire life is a new piece of information.

You didn’t have that piece of information when you started the job, so you couldn’t possibly have known that this was not the right job for you. Or that if you’re in school and you’re studying for a major that you thought were, was really cool and you really saw yourself working in that field, and then you started learning more about it, and now you’re not so sure about that, well, it’s okay to change these things too.

You know, there’s a concept in accounting. It’s called a sunk cost, which is basically, it’s a cost. It’s already spent. You can’t get the money back no matter what it is that you do. It doesn’t make sense to throw more money at the problem just to, just because you had already spent money at, on, on that problem.

So, for example, if you’re in school and [00:46:00] you’ve gone through two, three years of school and you’re working towards a degree that doesn’t make sense. It doesn’t make sense to throw more money at that degree just to get the degree and finish. If it’s not something that you ultimately are gonna ever use, you know, take some time and go pivot in into some other field, and maybe it’s gonna take you an extra year.

Yes, there’s gonna be a little more cost, but but if you’re throwing money at something that you’re never gonna use, that’s just strong money away. Whereas if you put some money towards something that you’re going to be using, then that’s an investment into your future. And it’s really just taking that new information and making a change, making a smart decision based on that information.

And I think that’s what this, to me, this is what this episode is kind of highlighted, is that it’s okay to give yourself permission to make that pivot. Change things in your life if you need to shake things up. I think important aspect of it is confidence in yourself knowing that [00:47:00] I am really good at this one thing or I.

Am really passionate about this thing and maybe I’m not really good at it yet, but I’m gonna get really good at it cuz there’s nothing stopping me and having that confidence. But also having the support out there as well, I think would be important too. I don’t, we didn’t really touch on this, but I think you know, having family support, you know, if you’re married or you have a significant other, or you have you know, other people in your life people who are in your corner who are gonna support you through this, knowing that maybe it’s gonna be a tough time, maybe financially to finish school or to make that career change and possibly step into something that maybe at first isn’t making quite as much money as what you used to do.

But you get to that point where now not only are you making, replacing that, that income, but you’re happier, you’re healthier, things in your life are just going better. That’s the place that you want to be. I think having the support network in place is [00:48:00] super important as well. So, those are my takeaways from this episode.

You know, I’m not sure if you had anything else, like a different take or, you know, anything else that you might add to that, but I’d love to hear that if you do.

Thandi Myeni: Yeah, absolutely. I think pivoting focus and really having a why. Yeah. Knowing your why. I think those are my takeaways and on, on support.

Sometimes when, whenever change is scary and it’s not only scary for us, it’s scary for the people around us. And so sometimes because the people that love us, they don’t want to see us hurting. They want to keep us safe. So you might not always get some support from the people around you that you are hoping to, Hey, I am a doctor, I want to.

Do a podcast. Well, why would you wanna do that? You already have a good job. And that’s all because they love you and they’re concerned. But, so you might not always get the [00:49:00] support from where you hope it’s going to come from, but there is support there right from you. And find that support, whether it’s in a community, a Facebook group, a coaching group, find the support where it is and go with it.

But of course, the more support that you can get, the better. And just, I think the biggest thing is just keeping the belief. The belief and the. As George Michael said, you gotta have faith to say , but just continuing to believe and doing things that will help you to keep that belief. Listening to people’s success stories, because there’s a lot of people that are very successful that are actually not that good but yet they’re very successful.

And kind of when you hear like the best-selling author. To wrap back around to that, she said she barely finished high school, so if she can do it, That gives me, that lets me know that, okay, well [00:50:00] then I can do it too. So just getting stories that will inspire you. Finding material that will help to keep the belief because it’s possible and it’s easy to, to succumb to self-doubt and get discouraged by failures.

But if you can hold onto the belief and keep going, keep the focus, you will inevitably achieve some degree of success.

Scott DeLuzio: Excellent. And I think with that I think that’s a great place to wrap up the episode here. But it’s been an, a pleasure speaking with you today. I really do appreciate you taking the time to share your journey and your story.

I think other people can learn a lot from the pivots and the different changes that you’ve made in your life. Where can people go before we end this? Where can people go to get in touch with you to learn out learn more about the coaching and the things that you do. Well,

Thandi Myeni: anyone can email me.

My email is [email protected]. Happy spelled out. [00:51:00] H-A-P-P-Y, Dr. D-O-C-T-O-R mom M-O-M at gmail.com. You can also find me on Instagram. HappyDoctorMom. And if anybody’s interested in listening to the Embrace the Fear series that is at bit.ly/ eyedocembracefear.

Scott DeLuzio: I’ll have a link to that in the show notes. So we’re the listeners we’ll have that in the show notes, so you can click on that to find the, embrace the fear link there. And again, thank you for taking the time to join me. I do appreciate you sharing your story and helping out the listeners.

Thandi Myeni: Thank you so much for having me Scott, it was a pleasure.

Scott DeLuzio: Thanks for listening to the Drive On Podcast. If you want to support the show, please check out Scott’s book, Surviving Son on Amazon. All of the sales from that book go directly back into this podcast and work to help veterans in need. You can also follow the Drive On Podcast on Instagram, Facebook, [00:52:00] Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, and wherever you listen to podcasts.