#54 Mindset Matters: How to Change the Way You Think and Unlock Your Best Self with Jason Hartanov

Justine :
Hi. I’m Justine.

Sarah Lavonne:
And I’m Sarah Lavonne.

Justine :
And we are so glad you’re here.

Sarah Lavonne:
We believe that your life has the potential to make a deep, meaningful impact on the world around you. You as a nurse have the ability to add value to every single person and patient you touch.

Justine :
We want to inspire you with resources, education, and stories to support you to live your absolute best life, both in and outside of work.

Sarah Lavonne:
But don’t expect perfection over here. We’re just here to have some conversations about anything birth, work, and life. Trying to add some happy to your hour as we all grow together.

Justine :
By nurses, for nurses, this is Happy Hour with Bundle Birth Nurses.

Sarah Lavonne:
This episode is such a long time coming. I have been talking about it since we started our podcast of if we were going to have a guest, Jason has to come on. Many of you may have heard me mention him in various episodes. I have been working with Jason for almost two years, and finally he is here and we are going to learn from him. He is my mindset coach. And so I started working with him back … This is mid-mentorship days. I think we’d just launched and finished mentorship and I’d been introduced through my financial advisor and she was just like, “You have some mindset work to do basically.” And she was like, “I think you’d like this guy.” And so I went in open but confused to be honest. I’m looking at your face right now, but there’s such a thing as a life coach and I always used to roll my eyes like life coach, what kind of scammy business is that?

And so took a call and since then I would say that this has been one of the most valuable things that I have done in my business and for my personal life and many of the programs, many of the successes that you’ve seen through Bundle Birth and my own personal life I can attribute to Jason. And so without further ado, I would love to welcome you, Jason. I would love for you to introduce yourself to our audience of nurses, birthing people, the other people that sneak in listening, technically labor and delivery nurses. And then we’re just going to riff about mindset and wellness and look at what we can do to better ourselves as nurses. One of our taglines at Bundle Bird Nurses is we want to strengthen your clinical skills, but we also want you living your best life. And so this is a live your best life episode. Welcome Jason.

Jason Hartanov:
Love it. Love it. Thanks Sarah, so much for hosting me. I’m so excited to be here because I love serving people in the service-based industry, and I can’t wait to talk to these nurses, see how I can serve them today. And so my name is Jason Hartanov. I have been doing this work for over 35 years and it has changed my life profoundly and now I get to offer the gift of changing people’s lives and including Sarah. What a blessing it’s been to work with you. And so I’m excited to talk all things mindset, all things coaching.

Sarah Lavonne:
So for those listening and maybe they have heard of life coaching, it’s not life coaching. We call it mindset coaching. And I would say that I get a little bit of executive coaching in there. We sneak it in. But what is a mindset coach? What would you say you do for people? And how do you know what you’re doing? Because you know what you’re doing, but it’s so subtle.

Jason Hartanov:
The one thing I would encourage people to understand is that the way you see the world, your mindset is shaping everything about your reality. See, we don’t see the world as it is. We see the world as we are. So we’re going around in a frame like a lens. So you get to see what you want to see. Life becomes what you are believing. So your beliefs become your reality, your thoughts become things. And so we hear these kinds of concepts sometimes on Instagram, we double click, it’s all cool, but the reality is there’s a universal truth to this. So how I show up in the world … Life is a mirror. It’s not a window. So your life is reflecting back to you your belief set. If you believe life’s going to be hard, life will be hard. You believe that it’s hard to make money, you’re manifesting it’s hard to make money.

So mindset’s the most important thing you can shift because it literally shapes how you see everything. And so when you think about this, results we get are from actions we take. So what determines the actions we take? It’s our emotions. We emote our way into actions. So then you ask yourself, how do I experience emotions? You actually think your way into emotions. So if you’re feeling sad, you’re having sad thoughts. You can’t think happy thoughts and be sad and you can’t think sad thoughts and be happy. So I’m thinking my way into emotions. So then you ask yourself, where do my thoughts come from? They really stem from your beliefs. It’s these conditioned beliefs. Our beliefs are how we see the world. So the world just mirrors that back to you. So the number one thing to change is how you think, what your mindset is and how you show up in the world.

Sarah Lavonne:
How have you seen my beliefs shift? To give them an example of the work that we’ve done. Because you’ve been working with me for two years and I would say my transformation in the last two years, I remember doing the consult with you and you were like, “You will grow in the next three months times what you would do in three …” You made some sweeping statement. And I remember internally kind of rolling my eyes and be like, okay. But I will say that I’ve kind of seen it happen. And when you’re in the midst of the work, it’s hard to see the outcomes. But if any of you have been following the Bundle Birth journey, again, I will say that I attribute so much of Bundle Birth’s success through me to the work that I’ve been doing with you. And so I’m curious to give them an example of what you’ve seen in me in working with me over the last two years.

Jason Hartanov:
It’s been remarkable to see you upleveling. It’s like think about your mindset as software, and it’s like you have a phone, like an iPhone, and each time they come with a software upgrade, it gives you new features, new functionality, new things. You wouldn’t want to be on iOS 2.0 right now. And so what we’ve done with you, Sarah, is upleveled your mindset. Now, where does your mindset come from? I like to say that 80% of all your beliefs show up before you’re eight years old. So when I came in with you, much of the belief systems had been formed from your childhood and from your foreign experience and from the church experience and everything you came from. And so let’s talk about a few of those. One was just your own self-care. About you investing. You’re a giver. You love to give you to support other people, but the one person that you weren’t supporting and giving to was Sarah.

So we started to shift your mindset, mindset about this belief that if I focus on myself, I’m selfish. So we shifted that for you. The second thing we did was around you owning your power as a CEO, as a woman in the business and the work you’re doing, the purpose that you have, and you stepping more into your power. And that for you, it was like we had beliefs that were like, you need to be humble. You need to serve God and be humble and all this other stuff. And so we shifted all that notion of you stepping into being this leader to impact millions. And then we did money. You’ve really shifted your money beliefs.

Sarah Lavonne:
I said I’m trying. I’m still a work in progress on that one.

Jason Hartanov:
Yes, you’re doing awesome. But people don’t know that they have a relationship with money. It’s around beliefs. If you think money is hard to make, it will be. If you think money, it’s not fun to spend, you won’t spend it. So we shift your money and how you look at it as energy because that’s all that money is. And then your leadership. How you show up in the world and how you lead and been talking recently about you owning more of your feminine energy, more your femininity. So I always say this is every level there’s a new devil. Meaning even as you uplevel your mindset, there’s a next level. We can always be working on growing and expanding. Because once you go to that next level, it’s like, oh, okay, what’s else holding me back? Because the real truth is we have these limiting beliefs that hold us back from the success we want. And so part of our spiritual journey on this planet is to evolve our belief systems and be able to do that. So those are some of the major changes I’ve seen with you.

Sarah Lavonne:
I mean, internally I would say that I look back and I don’t even know where the transformation happened. Obviously it’s like slow and steady wins the race because we do meet weekly. We’ve met weekly for almost two years. And when I think about this community, I’m so often … And we’ll go into the self-care thing in a second of we are people who give, give, give and rarely receive, especially as much as we give and we come home from a hard shift, from the work that we do, and what do we do to make up for it? How do we show up at the next shift feeling better, feeling like I’m recovered and then also show up so that I can give my best to my patients? And I’ll relate that to business for my own story with you is sort of like I look at two years ago I thought I was busy.

I thought I had a lot on my plate. I thought I was doing a lot. And holy moly, that is … Now I’m like, you talk about leveling up. I mean my team has grown, my responsibilities have grown, the money undertakings have grown, and all of that is just helping me be better in this growth mindset way of being … Even my health journey that many of you have heard about that over the last year, that’s been catalyzed by the work that I’ve done with Jason. And so as we move into discussing mindset, I’d love for us to go into the self-care component. Because for me that story was self-care is selfish, and my narrative is I’ll be fine. I will give so that everybody else around me is okay, I will work harder, I will do more. I will be the one to take it on because I know I can and I’ll be fine.

And so when we think about these nurses, what encouragement or what words of wisdom and what mindset hacks maybe do you have for these nurses when talking about self-care and knowing that everybody listening to this is a healer. They are a giver. They’re not just showing up. And not that anybody behind a computer is not doing good work, but there is an emotional, spiritual, physical giving in this profession that makes labor and delivery nurse work so much more demanding and also sets us up for burnout more than many other professions as well. And so what are your tips for helping us maybe even just move into the world of caring for self?

Jason Hartanov:
Yeah. Great. So two things about this. It’s so interesting. And usually I find when it’s service-based professionals, people that are healing or any kind of giving kind of work, that they struggle with this. And so beliefs are adopted. They’re given down generationally. So for a lot of us, our parents and a lot of women were told, if you focus on yourself, you’re selfish. And then if you start having kids, we’re told that we need to sacrifice for our kids. That we have to give ourselves all the time. So you’re in this healing profession, giving, giving, giving. You come home and you give and you give. And we kind of have this martyrdom syndrome of like, well, the more I give, the better off I am. And it doesn’t work. Basically it exhausts you and we don’t find that. And so for you especially, when we first started, you had a strong drive for productivity.

Your value came from I need to be doing, I need to be working, and so I need to be doing, doing, doing and giving, giving, giving, giving, and I’ll just do it and those kinds of things. And so one of the paradigms you have to shift is that it’s actually selfish not to focus on yourself. What I mean by that is one of the most selfless things I do is I become the man to gift to the world, to my kids, to my clients, to the world. So when I invest in myself … Thinking about it like this. When you pour into a cup, you can pour out, but if you have an empty cup, there’s nothing you can do. So for you to fill your own tank, it gives you the resources. So it’s actually selfish to exhaust yourself. It’s selfish not to show up as your best self.

So I say to people, one of the most best things that I do for the people around me is I work out. I feel good about who I’m being in my body. I do meditation and mindset work so that I show up as a better human. That’s my gift to my kids. That’s my gift to the world. And so it’s really selfish to just go out there and give, give, give all the time because most of the time what you find is the giving is self-serving. Ooh, I feel better about myself when I sacrifice for my kids. I feel better about my … So it’s a very selfish act actually, if you look at it that way, to not invest in yourself. Because then you’ll ask other people to do it for you. I gave all to my kids and now I need this back from my kids. It’s like this energetic umbilical cord.

So when you meet your own needs, it’s one of the most selfless things you can do. When I’m investing in myself, it’s one of the most selfless things that I can do because I give from that abundance. You cannot help someone financially if you’re broke. Think about this. Here’s an easy example is if you’re sick, who can you help as a nurse? Nobody. You stay home. So one of the best investments you can make is your health so that you stay healthy so that you stay so you can serve. Let me ask this. If you go into the hospital and you’re sad or you’re frustrated or you’re angry, how good are you at serving clients? No. So what you want to do is invest in shifting your emotional state. And what I like to say is your job every morning is to create this high vibrational state so you can give from the world, from your abundance, from your positive mental attitude, from all the things that you give people with, but that requires some time and investment.

Sarah Lavonne:
So when you say high vibrational state, that sounds very LA. For those of us that maybe aren’t in LA, could you dull that one down for us? Because high vibe, I think honestly going into this work, I’d be like okay. Kind of roll my eyes, kind of uncomfortable with that idea. And all of you that have followed my journey are like, oh, this girl, she talks like this. Because I’m talking because of Jason. But honestly, even going into this, I remember I had an ex-boyfriend that was like, “Don’t say that. Don’t speak it into existence.” And I would roll my eyes and be like, “Okay, I’m going to have a heart attack. I’m going to die of a heart attack right now. I’m going to die of have a heart attack right now.” And I’d kind of make fun of him, but now I’d sort of eat my words. And not that I wouldn’t say … Honestly, I wouldn’t say I’m going to die of a heart attack. I could be like, nah, no. I don’t want to say that. I don’t want to speak that out. How would you describe a high vibe state in layman’s terms? And then we’ll talk about raising your vibration. I don’t want to lose people with that concept, so maybe we can reframe around it a smidgen.

Jason Hartanov:
Yeah. It’s a good distinction. Just so we’re clear, there’s scientific proofs, quantum physics that talks about everything’s vibration, that there’s a law of vibration, that everything’s vibrating and there’s a law of attraction. A lot of people have heard of it or watch The Secret and things like this. It’s a scientific fact, but it’s not culturally known and accepted, and it’s kind of pushed off as new agey. But the truth is we are emitting a vibration. We’re always emitting something. Now think about this. You’ve come into a room, into a party, into your hospital breakout room, and someone’s putting off bad vibes and you’re like … And your whole body’s like …

Sarah Lavonne:
You feel it. Or elephant in the room.

Jason Hartanov:
Yes. Right. And the opposite, someone that comes in the room that’s just super high vibe, and then you feel joy, you feel attracted to them. Not physically, but energetically you’re like, wow, this person makes me feel better. This person’s putting off something that I’m now … And it’s true that actually your vibration will shift other people’s vibrations. You feel it. We just don’t have conscious awareness of it until you start doing this work. So one of the first time I met you, you know how to be in a high vibe state. I remember telling you that. And one of the ways you got high vibe is your gratitude muscle is off the charts. And I’ve told you this many times, is gratitude is one of the highest vibrational emotions you can feel. And you’re always grateful. You’re always super grateful. And that just brings all this great energy out of you.

And so our job is in the morning, nobody is obligated or entitled to a high vibe state. It’s earned every morning. So when I talk about this, I say, I might wake up sad, I might wake up angry, I might wake up with lethargy. Whatever emotion I’m feeling at that time, my job is to transmute that energy into a high vibe state. Now, check this out. I learned this at the Hoffman Institute. There’s a thing called the quadrinity. So when we talk about ourselves, we’re actually one in four. There’s a physical self you have, which is different than … You’re not your body. We can talk a lot about this, but you’re not your body because there’s even what’s going on in the transgender community and other things. Realize I’m not identified with my body. There’s something else there. But we do have a body, and it’s what translates the ethereal into the practical.

So my thoughts become things through my body. So investing in your health and getting your body the right emotions and feelings and chemical reactions. So for example, in my morning routine, I’ll take a cold shower. People will be like, you’re stupid, you’re crazy. Except what the body does with that is it throws out a chemical, a concoction, including dopamine. So you can do your research on this, but it’s incredible. When I do an exercise, they call it the runner’s high, but when I go in and workout and have a hard workout, your body’s throwing out things like adrenaline, norepinephrine and all these other chemicals that are making me feel better. When I feel better, better things come at me. We know this. So one is physical self. The second is your emotional self. How are you transmuting and dealing with the emotional part of you?

That’s the creative part of you. That’s the feeling part of you. So for me to be able to invest in myself on transmuting these. So if I had a partner, let’s say, and that partner woke up and said, “I’m feeling sad.” The natural reaction is, “Oh, honey, tell me more about it.” Right? You’d want to have a conversation about it. You wouldn’t just quell down the feelings. You’d actually be able to process the emotions because emotions pass. So the sooner I can feel the feelings, the sooner they’ll pass. So in the mornings you want to have some sort of creativity, fun, music is that, art. Journaling is the way I do it. And then there’s the intellectual self. How are you investing in your intellectual self? And as I’m talking about this, you can know that some of these persons fight within themselves. So your emotional self and your physical self will battle.

That’s like, I want the ice cream. And your body’s like, no, I don’t want it and your emotional self’s like give it to me. So you can see that having harmony across your four selves is really important. Your intellectual self is one as well where it’s saying, we need to go to work and your emotional self’s like, no, I need self-care. I need to relax. And your intellectual self’s warring with it. And then the last part is your spiritual self. How are you investing in yourself for your own spirituality? That might be if you’re in some sort of religious context, a devotional or something that gets you closer to your God, or if you’re not, then something like meditation would be a way for you to start seeing and experiencing the spiritual self outside of your physical self. Because everybody knows that we’re spiritual beings having a physical experience.

So every morning I’m investing in those four dimensions of myself because then I become an integrated person. For you to make change, you have to get out of your comfort zone. The only way change happens. Now, one of the things you did, Sarah, is every time we adopted a new belief, you had to have the courage to take an action that was outside of your comfort zone. So for shifting your money beliefs, it was you investing more money than you wanted to. The old self freaked out. Oh my god, panic. Right? Or-

Sarah Lavonne:
Still kind of freaking out. Not going to lie.

Jason Hartanov:
I remember when we were-

Sarah Lavonne:
We’re working on it.

Jason Hartanov:
I remember when we were working on your health journey, and instead of beating yourself up, we talked about shifting into you need to love yourself into health, not beat yourself and bully yourself into health. And when you had to go the first time you went to Pilates and you were scared and you are anxious and you took the step anyway, then you get the result, and then that feeds a new belief system. That’s what we need. So you have to take action out of fear, which is courage. Courage is action in spite of fear. Fear is the way that we hold ourselves back. So there’s no growth inside your comfort zone. So that’s what we have to do. And so that’s part of the continuum of making change. And so one of the things is doing hard things every morning. So for me, the first thing I do when I wake up is I do a gratitude meditation.

I want to sit in the high vibe state of gratitude. I don’t leave my bed until I’m grateful, feeling a vibrational tone of grateful. And let me tell you, sometimes that takes five minutes and a guided meditation. Sometimes it’s 15. Depends. Then I go into a breathing protocol called Wim Hof breathing, but I breathe. And the reason I do is I want to activate my body and I want to activate it oxygenated. It’s the most important thing. People don’t understand this how important breathing is. You can live literally over a month without food. You can live a week without water. But you can live about two minutes without oxygen. So I breathe. Next step, I go into the cold shower. And let me say this. What you meet in these moments is what I call the inner saboteur. It’s the voice in your heads that says, oh my God, I don’t want to get in the cold shower. Oh, you know what? Let’s sleep in and hit the snooze. Or why don’t I just-

Sarah Lavonne:
That’s how I feel.

Jason Hartanov:
Or why don’t I check my email? Worst things you can do are any of those things. And what your body’s trying to do … The body is being the mind and what it’s trying to do is get you to be your familiar self, to get you to be back into what you feel normally. So if you’re normally feeling sad when you wake up, your body wants to check Instagram because you’ll feel sad about yourself or check your email because you’ll see how anxious you feel if you love anxious. So part of what doing is hard things in the morning, because if you do hard things in the morning, makes life a lot easier. So then I go into a cold shower, I go to the gym, do my workout, come back, I do my meditation, and then I do my journaling. Journaling and my set the day for the win the day strategy.

So it sounds like it’s a lot, but it’s really not. It’s the best investment. When people say to me, one of the paradigms you have to shift in your life is what is work. So every concept, mental construct, you, you should question. So when we did this, we used to talk about this. In the old days for Sarah, that didn’t sound like work. Meaning I need to get to work, which for you is emails, making decisions, doing that. But the real work for me is the morning routine. People say, “What do you do for work?” I go, “Meditate, work out.” As a joke. Because we’re shifting the paradigm of what we think the work is. My first job as a human that wants to impact others is to pour into myself and create a high vibrational state so I’m a gift out in the world. So that’s why I consider it my work, which is a whole different paradigm for a lot of people.

Sarah Lavonne:
Definitely. I think about the four aspects of our bodies, and I’m thinking about those that are listening here. I always say when we’re on calls, I’m like, you just like to suffer. The things that you do to “uplevel your life” are very unusual and very hardcore, which I appreciate about you because I wouldn’t want to be coached by somebody who’s lazier than me. Even then I’m like, I’m so resistant to cold showers and listening to this I’m like, oh, fine, maybe I will just suffer through a cold shower, I guess, maybe. But I think about it sounds really hardcore, but also what’s it worth to us? We always say there’s nothing worth your mental health and I would say there’s nothing better than you being your best. We all want to live better, live fuller, be more able to show up in the world in that “high vibrational state”, which just means good.

And you’ll see it on calls, Jason, I’ll show up and you’ll be like, “You’re kind of low vibe. What’s going on?” I’m like … And then I get all huffy puffy about whatever. And by the end I’m like, okay. And one of the things I learned from you that’s been so foundational, and you’ve heard it on podcasts, is we create our own suffering. And so it’s sort of like every day we have a choice of how we show up in the world, whether that be a day off or whether that be a day on, before work, how you show up on your shift. And it takes a certain level of intentionality and purpose to push yourself forward into a place where you can show up in the world better than you would otherwise. But if we’re not doing that work, then we’re just going to be what we’ve been always. And unless that’s working for you, why would we want to do that? And even then I’m like, my life is working for me, but I want to show up better and better and better.

Jason Hartanov:
Right. Well, and that’s our offering. I mean, honestly, whether it’s in a religious context or not or whatever, my offering out to the world is my best self. My responsibility, I believe, is to become the man, the ultimate, my potential, the man I could become so I can give that out to my prospects, my clients, my kids, my friends, the world. Even on this podcast, my job this morning was to become my best self. That’s an offering. You are an offering from the divine, and it’s your responsibility to live your best life, to live in this high vibrational state and to do the work to get that. And I think most people don’t see it as that. That’s your greatest offering is become the woman you were meant to become so you could make the impact in the world that you could become. Become who you admire.

For me, I’m always trying to become the man I would admire. And it’s like, what a great journey that is. What a great experience we’re having on the earth. What else would you do if you’re not growing and expanding? And I think that’s our purpose is really to expand and to grow and our love and our consciousness and all these things so we can give to the world from who we’re being. Most people are like … They don’t understand. It’s like their life has a mirror to them. They ask me like, “Well, what do I need to do or how do I need to do it?” And I always say the same thing. It’s not about how or what. It’s about who you need to become. This is a journey of who you need to become because when you uplevel you, everything in your life changes.

How you do anything is how you do everything. So when you uplevel, it’s like a rising tide rise all ships. So when I become more, when I become a more patient man, I’m a better father. I’m a better coach. I’m a better person out in the world. So when I become more abundant in my thinking, I’m able to give from a place of abundance. And when I’m able to create more, because money is just an exchange of value, when I add more value in the world and I get more money, then I can give that out. It’s fun. It’s a game. It’s enjoyable. Now I’m this inspiring person in the world, and that’s by investing in ourselves and doing the work like this. And one of the things you said that’s so important is in this path, you have to learn how to manage your thoughts. You are not your thoughts. And all our suffering is our believing of our thoughts and our resistance to reality.

Sarah Lavonne:
Wait, wait. Slow that one down. I feel like Oprah right now. Is it Brene Brown that’s always like, “Repeat that again,” or something. I’m hearing somebody on a podcast doing that. But for real, wait, slow that one down because that one I think for me has been so important to internalize about our thoughts. So go again.

Jason Hartanov:
What it does is it disassociates you from your thoughts. And what I mean by that is most people aren’t even aware of what they’re thinking. Our subconscious mind is running this program and we’re running through our lives unconscious, not even thinking about it. So the first step in this is becoming aware of your thoughts. Most people don’t even know what they’re thinking in the moment. And the way I can get access to thoughts if I don’t have a practice is how I feel. Because if I’m feeling sad, I can ask the question, well, what thoughts am I thinking right now to feel sad? And so if I had a thought that said, I’m sucking on this podcast right now, that’s just a thought that’s showing up. It’s not me. And if I attach to the thought and I believe the thought, then I create the suffering of, oh my God, I’m sucking on this podcast and now I’m going to feel sad about it.

So now I’m going to pause and go. Is it true? The most important question you’ll ever ask yourself is the question of inquiry. Is that true? Is it true that I’m sucking on the podcast? Well, guess what? There’s no truth to that thought. Some people may be experienced on the podcast that they don’t like me. Some people think I’m great. Either way, that’s their truth, not the truth. And so I have to adopt my own truth. What do I believe? So one of the things you and I have worked on is really getting associated to what’s the story I’m telling right now? And this, by the way, not only helps us, but helps in relationships as you and I have worked on. Which is that, hey, the story I’m telling myself right now, Sarah, is that you’re not liking how I’m performing on this podcast. And you’re like, “Well, that’s not true.” But we all make assumptions and we’ll have all these expectations, but we never communicate them, right? So when I understand the stories I’m telling, because the stories I’m telling creates the emotion, which creates the action and then gets me the result.

Sarah Lavonne:
Not vice versa.

Jason Hartanov:
Yes. You want to change your-

Sarah Lavonne:
And I think we blame our thoughts on our emotions, and it’s actually thoughts to emotions.

Jason Hartanov:
Yes, yes. And everybody thinks that if I change the externals, then I’ll be happy. If I lose the weight, then I’ll be happy. Whatever. It’s actually the opposite. When you’re happy, then you’ll lose the weight. And you experience this. It’s like, well, when I lose the weight, I love myself. No, when you love yourself, you lose the weight. And look at you. You look amazing. You’ve done great in your health journey. And so it’s really the first step in this is really me being aware of myself. What was the old … At the temple, the old thing that says know thyself. The most important thing is for you to understand and witness yourself who you are and who you’re not. You are not your thoughts, you’re not your beliefs, you’re not your actions, you’re not any of those things. I’m the awareness of those.

I’m the space that’s behind all that. And this I know gets a little woo-woo and a little crazy, but just understand if I’m thinking about my thoughts, who’s the thinker? Who’s actually witnessing the thoughts if it’s not the thoughts. So one of the ways you change your life is change the stories you tell. So there is a notion of what your old boyfriend said or whatever. It’s like, I need to be speaking out. Says it even in the Bible. I need to be speaking out from the heart what I believe. So I want to change that. If I look in the mirror and I say, “God, I’m so fat.”, that’s going to create a negative emotion and going to make me probably want to eat something I shouldn’t be eating and it’s sure not going to get me to the gym.

But if I look at myself and I find something to compliment myself, I tell a new story. I don’t think going to the gym is hard. I don’t think waking up early is hard anymore to shift those beliefs. So you want to shift your life, shift the stories you tell. But I first have to become aware of what am I saying? What are my actual thoughts? That’s why having a friend, a coach, someone that can mirror back to you … Which is what I do for you a lot. Notice you just said this and you’re like, “Oh my God. Right.”

Sarah Lavonne:
Yep. I feel like there’s so much meat in that. I’m like, give me one … What would you say … I’m somebody who maybe is burnt out at work and I’m listening to this and I’m super inspired, and I’m like, I’m hearing morning routines. I’m hearing mindset. Don’t write their story I’m hearing in there, which actually happened pre Jason and has just been confirmed by everything we’ve done. Don’t write my own story. This idea of we create our own suffering and this victim mindset that I’m in where-

Jason Hartanov:
Well, I think-

Sarah Lavonne:
Yeah. Go ahead.

Jason Hartanov:
Let me jump in there because you just nailed it. The first thing people have to do is take 100% responsibility. You have agency over your life. You are not a victim to the world. You’re not a victim to anything. And nobody’s coming to save you, by the way. This is our job. And it’s said throughout the religious history and everyone else, and you hear it, is that we are divine, that we are created in the image of God. We are totally profoundly more incredible than you could ever imagine. We have more power. And so when you give away your power, you’re going to feel bad. If you’re a victim to your boss, if you’re a victim to your employer, if you’re a victim to your income, if you’re a victim to your health, if you’re a victim to any of that stuff versus taking … First step is to take 100% responsibility and say, if I want to change my life, it starts with me.

The most painful thing is 100% responsibility to start because you’re like I can’t blame anyone for my circumstances. But it’s also the most freeing on the other side of that because if I created it, I can change it. And so now I go back into the agency of if you want to make a change, I need to step into telling a new story. I don’t have time in the morning to work out. I say you don’t have time not to. Why? Because if you don’t invest in your health, there’s no wealth without health. You get sick, you can’t work. You die young, you can’t serve your kids. You investing in your health is the most important thing you can do. So I have to shift those beliefs and I have to take agency and say, no, I can do whatever I can do. I get up at 4:45, my mentor gets up at 2:45.

Sarah Lavonne:
Oh God.

Jason Hartanov:
So him and I don’t have any … He’s crazy. But I say this. It’s like when someone says, “Oh, I’m not a morning person.” That’s just a belief you carry. There’s no truth to that. There was nobody just … In the agricultural days, in the farming days when the sun went up, nobody was sleeping in saying, “Hey, I’m not going to care for the chickens or the cows because I’m not a morning person.” It’s just a mindset, right?

Sarah Lavonne:
Right. I think when you say … Or I even brought up the whole victim mindset thing. I think that that can be kind of triggering for people and “Well, I’m not a victim and I’m not that person.” And they can all picture somebody in their mind that feels very victimized in their life. How do you know from a less obvious perspective if you’ve adopted more of a victim mentality? And so this, I imagine is a very safe space for people because they’re at home, they’re in your car, you’re by yourself. And what we’re asking you to do is self-reflect. This is going to take some time set aside to really do some internal work and ask yourself some questions. And so in mentioning the victim piece, how would someone know if they’ve adopted a victim mentality and what does the opposite look like?

Jason Hartanov:
Yeah, it’s beautiful. So one is at a higher level, you’ll feel it in your body. When you’re having victim energy thoughts and you’re giving away your power, you’ll feel yourself feeling bad about it. You’ll feel your body shifting. But some people aren’t even so close or aware of their body, they can’t feel the vibrational tone. That’s fine. So one of the ways is anywhere you give away your power, when you witness your thoughts and you’re giving away your power, well, if my husband just this, then I’d be happy. If he would just clean up and do more around the house, then we’d have a better life. If my boss would just give me a raise and I had more money, my life would be better. That’s like if you watch the stories are giving your-

Sarah Lavonne:
If I had one patient instead of two.

Jason Hartanov:
Right. If I had one patient instead of two. Well, if I had blank, then I would’ve had a better job, or I could have whatever. It’s interesting. You’ll see that even in the most fundamental things like the weather, people victimize themselves of the weather. If it’s sunny, they’re happy. If it’s raining, they’re sad. I mean, how ridiculous does that sound? But that’s how we show up. Everyone has some portion of victim mentality in them. Even I as someone who teaches this, coaches on it, whatever, I can witness myself subtly, the old parts of me going into, well, if this, then this. If my daughter just had done this, then this would’ve been better. And then I’m like, oh, wait a minute. That’s not true. So I asked the question, is that true? No. Right? And so when you’re resourceful and you own it, it’s one of the biggest gifts because then I’m not dependent.

I can give freely because I’m not expecting from you. I’m like an agency in my life. You want to be the captain of your own ship. It’s really powerful when you’re like, you know what? If I physically am not where I want to be, I’m not going to blame anyone else. I’m going to invest in making that change and taking responsibility for that. If I financially am not where I want to be, if my marriage is not where I want it to be, don’t blame your spouse. Say, who am I being? Because you’re creating it. It’s being mirrored back to you. Every relationship in your life is a relationship with yourself. So shift the relationship with yourself. That’s a key thing we’ve been doing with you. So that’s an important part. And so the shift then becomes, it sucks. There are times where I’m like, oh, but then I-

Sarah Lavonne:
Oh, this is brutal work. And even to admit that I play victim or I have adopted this mindset or I blame everyone else is really hard to get to.

Jason Hartanov:
And we live in a world that sells us this thing that when something changes, you’ll be better. If you just buy the new Mercedes, you’ll be happy. If you just take the trip to Bora Bora, you’ll be happy. We’re just being sold in the gap. So advertising, selling, capitalism is all selling you that you’re not enough. And then you look and you go, wait a minute. Happiness is an inside game. Joy is an inside game. High vibe is an inside game. And honestly, one of the things I love to say is all the best things in life are free. Put a price tag on a hug from another human. Put a price tag on a sunset. Put a price tag on breathing clean, fresh air or smelling a rose. What’s the price tag on that? All the best things in life are free. But we lie and do this thing. I need more. I need more money. I need more something to change outside of me. And so when you start just investing in yourself and you say, look, everything I need is within me, and you start to look and you start to invest in getting those for you and letting go of the story that something outside needs to change.

Sarah Lavonne:
So I’m listening to all this and I’m saying, this is really meaty. And for many of you, I’m like, if this was new to me, I’d probably have to listen to this episode four times and take notes and be like, okay. Which I would, because let me just tell you, he’s not cheap so you’re getting really high quality information here that typically costs a lot of money. So take some notes, write it down, process it for yourself, and begin to become more in tune with your body. I think that that’s something that for me, I’ve learned. And if you come from a therapy background, this is more like somatization or what an EMDR trauma work would have you do. So it may sound different, but it’s really some of the same packaged in a different way of really getting in tune with how does my body feel energetically is what he would say, but I would say internally, somatically in my vagus nerve, whatever you want to call it.

Now, as you start to do that work and start to assess and start to feel out how some of this feels, naturally, I think your thoughts may take you one direction. But since we have our wise coach on the call with us right now, what are some practical tips that you would have for this audience? Knowing what I’ve told you about these nurses and just that they are givers and that they work really hard and they give a lot, and I think burnout is just a common thing. At some point, everybody senses a little bit of burnout. How do we avoid that? Et cetera, et cetera. Drop some nuggets on us, Jason. How do I take this and go?

Jason Hartanov:
Yeah, one of the first things I do is take your energy back into … I call it the zone of controls or the business of me, which is that all this energy you’re putting to everything else, all the energy you’re spending on investing in worrying about who the president is or what the economy is or the weather or your kids are doing, whatever, get the energy back into what the one thing you control is just you. And another concept we haven’t really talked about is just being in the present moment. There is no future and there is no past. We only have now. And so one of the most powerful things you can do is start winning in the now. And the way I think about it is we frame everything within the day. So I can’t win tomorrow because by the time tomorrow comes, it’s today and I can’t win yesterday because yesterday’s in the past.

So the present, that’s why God calls it the present because it’s a gift. So every day I want to just win the day. That’s my mindset. Talk about a mindset that helps me is like I want to win the day. So to win the day, I have to win the morning. All of you have experienced when you wake up, you get a bad email, you see something that upsets you on Instagram, you go up to your husband or wife, you talk to them, and now we’re in a fight. Then you go to work. When you lose the morning, you’ll lose the day. The whole day is crap after that. So my primary job is to get up and win the day. It’s what I control. So I like to say we control the bookends. What I do the first thing in the morning and what I do the last thing at night is always in my control.

Even if you want to claim, well, if your kid gets injured, you have to go do that or whatever. Actually you don’t. You’re choosing that. But I understand the mindset’s hard to understand that. What I do control is the morning. So the first thing I would do is I would create a morning routine, and that would be a routine that’s investing in myself that makes me feel good. What makes you feel good? So I’d have some sort of movement in there. I’d get outside, breathe the fresh air. There’s scientific proof that before 10:00 AM if you get vitamin D and sunlight into your eyes, that actually raises your vibration. I would have gratitude work in the morning. I would have some mindset work that I would do and some spiritual work that I would do every morning. Just get up 30 minutes earlier. One of the things I say is to win the morning, you have to change the nighttime.
You have to win your nighttime the night before. So go to bed 30 minutes earlier. When people play victim, here’s two places that people play this victim mentality. It’s time and money. Oh, I don’t have time to get up. My kids get up. Well beat them up. Well, I’m not a morning person. You can have your excuses or you can have the change. You pick which one. So you can always get up 30 minutes earlier and spend 30 minutes. What would I do? I would get up. I would hydrate myself. I would move my body. Take your dog for a walk, take a brisk walk outside, get out and get movement. Then I’d have some inspirational that I would listen to or feed my mind, feed my emotions. I’d journal a little bit. I’d start to plan my day out a little bit.

So every morning, if I were you, is I’d start getting up a little bit earlier. You might have to coordinate with your husband or wife, might have to coordinate with your kids. Might not have to coordinate with anybody except yourself and say, I’m going to start investing in myself. The first place that I think, and I’ve found over 35 years of doing this, is that when you physically don’t feel well, nothing good shows up. It’s like this negative frame or this filter through which you see the world. So the first place to win, if I was someone listening to this, is winning your body. Meaning get yourself in the health and the shape that you want. Because wherever you go, there you are with your body. So if you’re feeling overweight and not good, or if you’re feeling low vibe or low energy and you’re over caffeinating or you’re drinking alcohol every night, that’s not self-care.

Self-care is you investing in your body itself. Hydrating, eating the right foods in the morning. Little adjustments can make a huge thing. And when I’m winning in my body, I’m winning in my life. It’s just true. Whenever you felt sick or you got COVID or you got flu or whatever, how’d you feel? What was your life like? It was crap. So I want to feel good every morning in my body, and that would be the first thing. I would start witnessing my thoughts. I’d start witnessing the stories that I tell, and I’d pick one belief I want to shift. And the way we would find that is, like I do with coaching my clients like you, Sarah, is I’d say, what’s one result in your life you don’t want? You’re not happy with it. You want to shift. And then we’d go back and go, what must I believe to have that result in my life?

So if I don’t like where I am financially, I’m going to go find the belief, which is that, well, I can’t leave this job. I can’t ask for more money. I’m not worthy of it. Blah, blah, blah. Or if it’s I don’t like my health, and it’s like, well, I don’t like going to the gym. I don’t like working out, I don’t like whatever, I’m going to start to evaluate and shift those stories. So I win the morning. I win the day. Then here’s the key is celebrating myself. So when I do what I say … The confidence comes from the root of the etymology is trust within oneself. So when I do what I say I’m going to do, and I actually get up when I say I’m going to get up … This is why hitting the snooze is the worst thing you can do, by the way. Don’t hit the snooze ever.

Sarah Lavonne:
Guilty.

Jason Hartanov:
So when I get up, when I say and I do the things, then I show up and I celebrate myself. Think about this. If your partner, husband, wife, whatever, doesn’t do what they say, you don’t have trust in them, you don’t have confidence in them. Well, so many people violate this within themselves. So I want to get up, do what I say I’m going to do, win the day, celebrate myself for doing what I said I was going to do, and this becomes a virtuous cycle. I plan my day, I win my day, I celebrate my day. Ooh, next day I’m fired up. Let’s go. And I just-

Sarah Lavonne:
It makes you excited to get up. Oh, how many of us feel like, oh my God, what do I have today? Versus like, oh my God, I have another day. That’s a very different energy to pull into the world, and I want to show up like, oh, it’s a new day. Woo-hoo. Let’s do it.

Jason Hartanov:
Yeah. And remember, we’ve worked on this because sometimes I’ll mirror back to you and you were talking about the victim language of like I have to. And then once you do that … And you don’t really do that anymore. You’re like, I get to, I want to, whatever, but you don’t have to do anything. You really don’t. Everybody thinks they have … Well, I have to take my kids to school. No, you don’t. You could stay home. You could Uber them. You could have another person take them. You don’t have to do anything. And so when we get out this victim language out of ourselves, and we just know that I’m an agency here, I’m controlling my life. I get to do things. And that changes the vibration. You do a really good job of that. And every once in a while I’ll mirror back to you and I’m like, “Do you have to?” And you’re like, “No, I don’t.”

Sarah Lavonne:
But it’s easy. How our calls typically go as I roll my eyes and then I’m like … And then I’m like, oh, okay. I’m thinking about it. And then I write it down, and then I take it to heart and then I move forward. I want people to also hear that this is all lovely, but also I’ve experienced resistance to many concepts of leveling up. And this work is extremely painful. It has cost me money. It has cost me time, which is money. And I’m about to reframe based on the work that we’ve done, but it’s cost me potentially some relationships of people that just aren’t good for me. But even notice I’m saying it’s cost me, which has a negative connotation and so how I would reframe this … And all of you, you are hearing me do this clinically all the time, whether you know it or not.

And I would say I have had the benefit of the time, or I have made the investment of clearing out that relationship and just that shift in it’s cost me so much or I’ve invested so much, totally shifts the approach to whatever you’re talking about. Some would call this toxic positivity, but I would very much call it a reframe because we have the choice of how we see things. We have the choice of how we frame, how we speak, how we choose to see things. Even the lesson … Remember this one, Jason, from a while ago where I was like, it’s all happening for me. Some that mantra has come to me. I still use it of when something hard happens instead of like, oh, this is hard and this is so terrible. I can still say that. And then I can also end up at, I have to believe that this is all happening for me.

And how that just kind of bookends it into a light that just creates a little bit of less heaviness on the hard. It doesn’t mean the hard isn’t hard. It doesn’t mean we’re not acknowledging our emotions or our feelings or the negative things or the hard things that are happening in our lives. But it’s then how do we begin to move in the world in a way that is not quite so dark and heavy and oh, woe is me and oh, this and that. We all know those people and we all don’t want to be around them, to be honest. And so ask yourself, am I one of those people? And be honest with yourself in a way that it might even be painful, but this is a safe space to say, yeah, I think I have some of this. And then what’s the next step for me?

What’s my next movement forward to start shifting into a better place? I will say for me, I live such a lighter life. And you met me and you said I was very high vibe, but I would say even now, I feel like I mostly move through the world in a way that is much brighter, lighter, reframed. It doesn’t mean I don’t have emotions. It doesn’t mean that I’m in more therapy than I’ve ever been in my life. It means that now I’m open to doing the work in a new way and I don’t see the work as bad. I see it as an opportunity. And even that is a reframe.

Jason Hartanov:
Yeah. And you mentioned two things I want to say is pain. You can either have the pain of change or the pain of regret. Either way you’re going to get it.

Sarah Lavonne:
Snaps!

Jason Hartanov:
Yeah. And it’s like, had you not done this work, just think of the regret who you would’ve been that you stayed place.

Sarah Lavonne:
We would not be doing any of the things that we’re doing in Bundle Birth if … Cancun. We would’ve never pulled off Cancun in a way that helped cause life transformation on top of clinical transformation if I wouldn’t have been doing the internal work to actually put into practice everything that I was teaching.

Jason Hartanov:
And I like this term that a mentor told me. It says purpose over pleasure. We chase pleasure. And you’ve seen this in all kinds of spiritual contexts or whatever. It’s like embrace the suck and the pain. Why are we such comfortable beings that we just want to be so comfortable? Pain’s a great teacher. Pain’s great for presence. I take a cold shower, it’s painful. But on the other side of it is pleasure, man. Let me tell you something. So one is that the other is you talked about investments and one of the saddest things I see, and I guarantee you a lot of listeners that are listening to this, they don’t feel worthy of an investment in themselves. And it’s so sad. We will do anything for our kids. If we have to write a check for $10,000 to fix something for our kids, for medical, we’ll do it.

If we need to invest in college for them or their wedding or anyone, our best friends, we’ll give money to everybody. But there’s this investment we have to make in ourselves. And so whenever I say I want to make a change in an area of my life, I say, okay, what are the investments I’m going to make? One of them is time. You cannot make a change without investing some time in it. So I’ve got to give something up. So give up the damn Netflix or whatever you do in the morning or scrolling your Instagram. Get up and spend that time moving your body. The other is money. Money is just energy. Hire a trainer. Go join the Pilates gym. Go do something for yourself. Well, I don’t have the money for it. No, that’s not true. You don’t have the money not to do it because being sick is the most costly thing for you.

You lose sick days, you lose your income. So then there’s also the attention and focus that I have to put time. So now I have to create that. And the last investment is shifting my belief set. Because I need to become someone different to get that result. I have to uplevel who I’m being. And most people are just human doings. Got to do, do, do. Busy, busy, busy. But they’re not human beings. And we’ve worked on it. We’re just upleveling. This whole conversation’s about upleveling your mindset, a.k.a., who you’re being. And so yes, there’s an investment, but you’re worthy of it.

So if you’re one of those people sitting there saying, “Well, this sounds all great, but I don’t have the time, I don’t have the money, I don’t have the energy, I don’t have any of that stuff,” then that’s your first belief you need to look at. Which is why do you believe you’re not worthy of it? If your kid needed it or your coworker or someone else needed something, you’d be there for time. You’d give your time away or you’d give your money away for other people. So then you ask yourself, why do I not feel worthy of my own investment? It’s crazy because the more I invest in myself, the more I can give out to the world. You got to look at it that frame of me being the best of me is the offering I have for people. And so do the investments in yourself.

Sarah Lavonne:
I think for me, that mindset or mantra or whatever the heck you want to call it, has been really helpful because for me, if it feel, it’s selfish. I don’t want to be selfish. I want to be humble. I want to give. And yet, honestly it was Justine who helped me hire you where she was like, “Sarah, by you making this investment in yourself, there’s no possible way that those around you, meaning us … From you learning. Because you turn out everything into products, into classes, into services, into how you speak to others. You embody your learning into your everyday life. And so really by you doing it and investing in ‘yourself’, you’re actually investing in us.” And that for me, I was like, “You are so right. Okay.” And then all of a sudden that investment didn’t quite feel so painful. So if you need a hack, now I’m doing the work of like, is it enough for it to just benefit me?

Is that okay? I would say that I don’t know that anything just benefits me because I am the type of person that just gives to the world and I want to help grow those around me, and I share what I’m learning. I don’t house it internally for myself. But that may be a way in to help with a mindset. For me, that was my mindset hack of a lot of times I’m like, I’m doing this work for others and that feels additionally motivating. Of course, why don’t I want to do it for myself? I’m going to do that work. But also, I really know, and I believe in my core that every session that we have, every meditation, every journal, every processing, every book, every walk I take, every workout is so that I can show up better to the world and others are getting a better version of me, therefore amplifying the world based on the work that I’m “selfishly” doing for myself. So that has been fully reframed for me and has been really helpful.

Jason Hartanov:
That’s a mic drop right there. Just riff that. It was so good. It’s true. I mean, every day I get up at 4 45, I think I’m doing it for my kids. I have four daughters and it’s like I want them to experience the best dad. I want to be healthy so I’m here for their weddings and my grandkids. I’m doing this for others. For my purpose. It’s not for me. It doesn’t feel selfish because it’s not selfish. I’m not sitting here getting fit so I look good for myself. No, that’s a byproduct is if I work out, I’m going to feel better and look better, but it’s really about the offering I have to my kids.

When I started meditating about 10 years ago, it started to change who I was being. And I remember one of my daughters came to me and I was impatient or I was frustrated. She goes, “Dad, you need to go meditate.” And I was like, they see it. They know a meditated dad is better. A worked out dad. A more high vibrational dad is a better dad or a better spouse or a better employee. Each one of these people that nurses are working with are in some way in an affliction or sick. Be the gift to them of a high vibe. If you’re in a low vibrational state, you’re sad, you’re depressed, you don’t serve them. Serve them by being your best self. Happy, vibrant, excited, gratitude.

Sarah Lavonne:
All right. Final words of wisdom. Any last little tip that you want to leave with this audience as we close?

Jason Hartanov:
Yeah. What I would say is we don’t have a knowledge issue in this world. We have an application issue. I would take one or two things. I get a little snap.

Sarah Lavonne:
Yes. I’m snapping away.

Jason Hartanov:
If you know and don’t do, you don’t know. So don’t say you know. Well, I know I should be eating healthy, but you don’t know you should be eating healthy anyway. So my point is, we have an application issue. People run around sedating themselves with more knowledge. You got a lot of knowledge here. I would say take one or two things Sarah and I have said that have impacted you and implement them starting tomorrow. Because you can either it be someday or day one, one day or day one as I like to say. So make tomorrow day one. When you hear this, say, what’s one thing I’m going to do? Maybe it’s getting up early, maybe it’s taking a walk. Maybe it’s getting out. Maybe it’s me starting a journaling practice or a meditation or devotional practice. Maybe it’s me doing something for myself so I can help others and be a high vibrational tone. We’ve given you a lot of ideas. Take one of them, implement it, then celebrate it and go in this virtuous cycle of make a commitment, do it, celebrate it, boom. And then we’ll keep adding on top. It’s like snowball effect. Start with one and then just create some momentum and we keep going. So apply something. That would be my tip for everybody.

Sarah Lavonne:
And if you’re looking for something professional to do, I’m going to suggest our Bundle Birth nurse mentorship program because you’re not only getting the professional education, but you’re honestly getting a ton of this mindset work that has been incorporated into the program. And then you’re also getting that additional support through your mentorship calls and the community aspect of that. And so I would be remiss to plug that in the four quadrants of who we are on professional because that professional process was created literally to help support you in your practice and not leave you quite so alone and feeling quite so overwhelmed. That is something you can take into your control and apply and begin tomorrow.

Thanks for spending your time with us during this episode of Happy Hour with Bundle Birth Nurses. If you liked what you heard, it helps us both if you subscribe, rate, leave a raving review and share this episode with a friend. If you want more from us, head to bundlebirthnurses.com or follow us on Instagram. Now it’s your turn to go and just be for a second. Set aside some time to get by yourself. Take the investment of time to pay attention to what’s going on in your body, grab a journal, write down one thing that you can apply from this episode tomorrow to not only level up your practice, but level up your life. We’ll see you next time.