294 Waleuska Lazo

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Welcome to the holiday edition of the Deep Wealth Podcast. I'm so excited to have you with us. What we do at Deep Wealth for the last episode of the year, we want to do something different and use the F word, have some fun. So what we thought we would do, we'd bring Waleuska Lazo on as our guest. And if you know myself, if you know the Embanet story, you know, it was me it was Waleuska Lazo. It was Steve Wells. Back in the day, we called ourselves the three musketeers as we were out there creating a market [00:02:00] disruption in our e learning company, Embanet. Post exit, Waleuska has done a number of amazing things. She's become an author, she's written a number of books. Her most recent book, A Pocket Full of Resilience, we thought, you know what, why don't we take some of the strategies from the book and share it with you right on the eve of the new year.

Now, if you're listening to this episode and it's no longer the new year, maybe it's a new month, a new day, a new week, whatever the case may be, you can still use these strategies to bring out the best version of you and to make this the best ever for you. In the interview, you'll hear Waleuska talk about how she came up with the idea, how it's made a difference in her community, and why it can make a difference for you. So with all that now said and out of the way, let's get on with the show. And once again, happy holiday season, happy new year. I wish you the very best of everything.

Thank you so much.

Waleuska Lazo is the author and the creator of FMTG, the 28 day, Five Minutes to Gratitude Transformational course. Her books include The Gratitude Blueprint, The Best [00:03:00] Worst Thing That Happened to Me, Confessions from a Mom to Her Child, and The Gift of Bravery. She enjoys helping people transform their pain into wisdom, traveling the world, and spending time with her daughters. Welcome to the Deep Wealth Podcast. Well, you heard it in the official introduction. One of my partners from Embanet, Waleuska, who you've heard me talk about, it was Waleuska, Steve Wells, and myself, the Three Musketeers, we're out there doing our things with Embanet and e learning while she's back on the Deep Wealth Podcast because we are celebrating one of her new books.

A Pocket Full of Resilience: Inspiration on How to Accept, overcome, and Grow From the Suffering in your Life. So Waleuska, Welcome back to the podcast and for our new listeners, because our community has been growing by leaps and bounds, why don't you share with them the story behind the story? What's your story, Waleuska?

What got you from where you were to where you are today?

Waleuska Lazo: Hi, Jeffrey. Thank you so much for having me. I was so excited to hear that you were going to be interviewing me again because my life has changed by leaps and [00:04:00] bounds since the last time that we spoke . But for those of you who don't know why I began to do the work that I did today, it all came out of inspiration or desperation.

It's the mother of all inventions, you always say. I got very sick a few years back. And the doctors couldn't diagnose what I had, so I had to go within and find a way to give my body the proper environment so that it could do what it does best, and that is to heal and to regenerate.

 I started to look at my entire life, but especially my past , through the lenses of gratitude. And what that did for me was miraculous. Within three months, I was cured. The doctors couldn't even explain it.

So what I've realized is that every disease in our bodies has an emotional component. And if that component isn't released or [00:05:00] healed, it's very difficult to heal the disease, because logically a disease is something that starts in the body, but we often are trained to look outside the body for the healing, and that's where most people go wrong.

So I started using gratitude to heal my own body, and then talking to people here and there, they were asking me, but how did you do it? And I would explain to them the process that I used for myself, and it dawned on me that although many people know what gratitude is, very few know how to live a grateful life.

So I embarked on a journey to write a step by step practical guide on how to transform your life from the inside out. And that took me to developing a program that is 28 days. And during those 28 days, what I've done is I take people through 28 layers of their life where they have to go and do some [00:06:00] childhood regression because everything that affects us as an adult started in our childhood.

Our limiting beliefs, our core values, it's all set in our childhood. So the course. It takes you even that far back and people begin to let go of their past and make amends and healing and forgiving. And so that took me on that journey and it's called the Gratitude Experiment and the book is called the Gratitude Blueprint.

And I now teach the course to people all over the world and that's how I began this work.

Jeffrey Feldberg: Wow, so there's a lot to unpack and for the benefit of our listeners, a couple of things. Firstly, in the show notes, it'll be a point and click, it doesn't get any easier Waleuska's other books that she's done, all this other information will be there. But Waleuska, for our listeners, they know about Embanet, they know about the journey that we all had, you, Steve, and myself in doing that.

And like myself, [00:07:00] Waleuska, after the Embanet deal, where it should have been a happily ever after, and there should have been gratitude. We all should have been grateful. I know in my case, I didn't find that happily ever after, and I made some of the biggest mistakes ever post exit as opposed to before that.

And for yourself, you had some challenges as well. So looking back all these years later, when the, really the deal being done, the exit should have been some of the happiest days of your life. What do you think was missing? Because someone from the outside looking at you would say, Waleuska, you have it all, you have success, you now have the deal of a lifetime, financially, you're able to do all kinds of things now, and you can check all the boxes, what was missing for you?

Waleuska Lazo: Thank you, Jeffrey. And I think this is a massive point to make. Money doesn't buy happiness. While money is crucial for me, it was the perfect example that money without purpose takes you nowhere. I was missing purpose. I was missing being of service to others because when you just do things for yourself, you become very self centered, very selfish, and very quickly [00:08:00] you realize that you're leading a very empty life.

Nothing can fill you as much as when you go and do something for someone else. And that was the piece that was missing for me. And it took me Into a deep depression as you know, and it was not until I began this work in trying to improve one life at a time that I started to feel great about my own life. 

Jeffrey Feldberg: And as we look to A Pocket full Of Resilience, you took precious stories, you've put them out there, there's many lessons around that. How did you come up with the whole idea for A Pocket Full of Resilience, the format and all the information that's in it?

Waleuska Lazo: Thank you, Jeffrey. Well, it really came out of my own students. They were often asking me if, after taking the 28 day course, they would always ask me, do you have any magnets? Do you have any little messages that are short and brief that we can deliver? Look through just to give us hope and that gave me the idea and that's what gave birth to A [00:09:00] Pocket Full of Resilience.

I wanted to make a book that was small, light enough that you can put in your pocket and take it with you everywhere you go. So it's like taking your own best friend or your therapist, if you want to think of it that way and create a book that it will take people less than a minute to read, there is no sequential order to the book.

And it's meant to be read as if there were messages from the universe. So you take the book and you set an intention and you open to a random page and whatever page you land on, that's the message that is meant for you in the moment.

And it's the kind of book that if you download the Kindle or you take the hard copy with you, you could be in line at a Starbucks and you could be receiving messages of hope and trying to always remind people that life is not static, the pain that they're in, or the struggles they're encountering, they're temporary, but it seems that human beings have a tendency to drown in a glass of water, like they said, when we're [00:10:00] going through something we think is insurmountable, or that we're the only ones that go through that, and that's what the book is about, is to give you those, short inspiration and gems of wisdom to keep you going and to remind you that there is always light at the end of the tunnel and and teaches you how to look at your most difficult of times as lessons, as stepping stones to your ultimate destiny.

Jeffrey Feldberg: And for our listeners, as an example, I just happened to go to a particular page. In this case, it's page 48. And the title is to feel rich, count the blessings you have that money can't buy. And you go on to say, remember to do this the next time you catch yourself feeling deprived or limited. If you woke up this morning, if you can see, if you can hear, if you have health, if you can walk, if someone loves you, if you love someone.

If you have friends you can trust, if you have family to lean on, if you have purpose in your life, then you are richer than you realize. And some of the lessons are shorter, some are [00:11:00] longer, but they all go along those lines of things that are right there in front of us, that's so easy for us to take for granted.

And so Waleuska, let me ask you this, because I know you've done a deep dive into the science and all the research behind gratitude, and I know in earlier podcasts, you've shared with us how gratitude is one of the most powerful emotions. Why is it though, the human condition we tend to either forget or overlook some of the most important things that are right in front of us and we just take those for granted.

What's going on with that?

Waleuska Lazo: Well, I think that was done purposely because if we were always happy, if we were always grateful, we wouldn't Be here to learn the lessons that, we came to learn, you know, we learned through duality. So, I think it is good that we are constantly hit by unexpected things and sorrow and loss and struggle.

Because it is only through those things that we learn to be grateful, to be resilient, to look at life through different lenses. Like I said, if we [00:12:00] only had one way of seeing the world, it would be pretty boring.

Jeffrey Feldberg: And so from boring and mundane to really challenging ourselves and putting ourselves out there becoming the best that we can possibly be. When you're working, particularly with entrepreneurs, with business owners that are going through the Gratitude program, and I know you also have weekly inner circle webinars that you're giving and you're talking about all the science and people's own journeys.

Are there particular patterns or trends that you're seeing that 80 percent of the problems or challenges that people are having are coming from the same 20 percent of the root cause?

Waleuska Lazo: Absolutely. And, you know, 90 percent of our lives is working great for every person. 90 percent and only 10 percent isn't, but yet we focus 90 percent of our time on the 10%. That isn't going right. And yes, there is a pattern. Most people tend to hold grudges, to hold on to the past, because they [00:13:00] are afraid that if they let go, they're going to have to change.

They're so used to, they've become so ingrained with the discomfort of the familiar that they have a hard time embracing the unknown, you know, the adventure of the unknown. So yeah, typical patterns are, you know, people holding grudges and a lot of pain through things from the past, really, the inability to forgive themselves, to forgive others, and eventually ends up giving them an illness. A lot of people are suffering from anxiety, from depression, from chronic illnesses. Well, they all come from their inability to release, trapped emotions that are stored in the cells of our bodies and our organs.

Jeffrey Feldberg: And I know offline, Waleuska, you're sharing some success stories with me. Some of them, it's almost as though you're watching a movie people who had all kinds of issues or illnesses or health challenges, where miraculously, literally and [00:14:00] figuratively through your process, through your system, they've made their lives better.

They've healed themselves. Is there any one that you can share with us, a particular story that stands out for you?

Waleuska Lazo: I mean, there are many, but one, since we're talking about, chronic illnesses I had a girl who had a rash constantly, over her body, but there was actually no physical rash, but the sensation of, wanting to rip her skin off and going to all kinds of doctors, they weren't able to really locate anything, allergist, you name it.

And then when doing the course and began to release every layer, you know, that was being stored, all the resentment, all the anger, the inability to speak up, in her case, it was the inability to speak up. So if you think about a rash, if something's blocking your epidermis and that's why it reacts, it becomes inflamed.

So there was something inside of her that she wanted to say and she couldn't. And when she learned to feel empowered and to find her voice again and [00:15:00] began to voice those things out, the sensation of her itchiness completely went away. So I find that, you know, really interesting,

Jeffrey Feldberg: And from the story that you just shared, I know to yourself, your whole journey that you shared earlier, and it's like that time and time again. So what do you think is going on? How is it through gratitude and through some of these, I'll call them exercises that you've created where we're going within, or these meditations that you've created, why is that making the difference and really helping people?

Waleuska Lazo: Because it allows people to come to terms with their own shadow. It allows people to slowly let go of the past. It makes them more empowered. They become more hopeful for the future. When you start to let go of all the stuff from your past that is painful, you now make room to start attracting the life that you actually want.

And you can attract. something good in your life if you're constantly holding to the past.

Jeffrey Feldberg: And so let me ask you this. [00:16:00] And I just randomly went to another page in the book, page 22, and it says, when you focus on trying to be what you're not, you miss out on seeing the gift you really are. And you go on to say, stop comparing yourself to others. Every person has a unique set of abilities and talents.

But if you spend your time wishing to be like others or have what they have, then you'll never feel you're enough. If you're constantly focusing on a quality or virtue you think you lack, you may fail to use the gifts at all and rob the world of them. So instead, look at what you have and who you are and build on it.

And so to me, as I read through that's really all about what resilience is. Oftentimes we can't write the check or even if we could write the check, perhaps we shouldn't. And I want to take you back. To our Embanet days, we were a scrappy startup, what I like to call a cockroach startup mindset. We had bigger dreams and we had zeros in the bank, really had no zeros in the bank.

It was a vision. It was a goal. It was a dream. And we're out there to change the world. And it was really us against the world to prove something. And for us, [00:17:00] resilience. That's what really made the difference for us at the end of the day. And as I like to say, resilience trumps resources all day, every day.

So when you think about resilience, when you think about your book, when you think about your journey as an entrepreneur, what can you share with the community of how resilience has really made a difference for you, both in your business life and your personal life and everything else in between? 

Waleuska Lazo: Resilience is important because without it you're gonna have a very miserable life. You won't be able to ride the waves of different challenges that come, and it's not just simple resilience, it's adaptive resilience. How do you take what is happening to you and think ahead and try to learn from what you're going through so that the next time, you know, you not get hit the same, you don't go through the same situation with the same emotions.

So you're adapting. to life. You are not trying to mold life to your own desires, because I think that's where a lot [00:18:00] of our pain comes from. We insist on seeing the world in a way that we want, but the world just is. So when you are resilient, you're able to ride the waves of whatever surprises come, knowing that you have within you all that you need to go through it.

So to me, to be a resilient person is not only essential, it's a necessary quality of all humans. If you hope to enjoy live your life, you can't get anywhere without it.

Jeffrey Feldberg: So you have resilience, then you put in the term adaptive resilience. So can you walk us through a little bit more what you mean by that?

Waleuska Lazo: An example of adaptive resilience comes to mind when we would go to customers and they would tell us, no, thank you we, have in mind a different technology. So instead of coming home with our tails down, we improvise, we adapt it, we recognize the changes that the marketplace was, demanding, and we adopted those technologies that the marketplace [00:19:00] wanted, and we were able to go to our clients with a variety of solutions rather than offer a one size fits all, so that is an example of an adaptive resilient, where you're not just weathering life's storms, but you're thriving in the face of them. It's about being flexible, resourceful, and open to change when those challenges arise. So, in our case, instead of allowing adversity to define us, we used adaptive resilient to empower us to change how we were going to respond to the marketplace. Resilience is not merely about bouncing back, it's about learning so that you can evolve and move forward.

Jeffrey Feldberg: Absolutely love that. And so let me ask you this, as we're recording, by the time this episode is released, we're right on the cusp of the new year, but at the Deep Wealth Podcast, we don't like to tie things to be at a specific time.

So maybe it's right on the New Year. Maybe it's a summer's day. Who knows? Maybe it's halfway through the year, but I'm wondering, [00:20:00] as we think about resilience, how can we look to leverage that for a fresh start? So in this case, it is a new year that's going to be coming up. It's the holiday season. We timed this episode very specifically for that.

It's our gift to the community of, hey, as you think about the new year, as you close one chapter, you're opening up a new chapter. In this case, it happens to be the new year, but the new chapter could be a new month, a new quarter, a new day, a new week. What would be some of the advice of how we can take some of the wisdom and the advice that you have in the book, A Pocketful of Resilience, and we can begin to apply that to a fresh new start?

What would you say to our listeners of what they can start doing for that?

Waleuska Lazo: The one thing I would say is let go of the control that you think you have is an illusion, you don't control anything. So let life surprise you because a lot of times it's fear of the unknown. So just embrace the unknown. Your life will be a lot happier that way. Embrace gratitude, you know, focus on what you have, what is going well in your life, rather than always thinking about what you don't [00:21:00] have.

Because that will always make you feel empty and, when you are feeling grateful for what you have, it shifts your mindset, you're not longer in lack, you're in a place of abundance because you're constantly feeling that you have enough, that you have the people in your life that you need, that you have, the wisdom, the know how, the opportunity.

The tenacity to confront whatever life throws at you. So I would say those two things would be a great start, just let go of the control. And be grateful, focus on all the things that you have and it could be very simple things and start appreciating the life you actually have especially for entrepreneurs, we have this tendency to always look where we want to be and feeling that we're not enough or not capable enough or we're not doing it fast enough.

But if you look where you started and where you are, you will feel a lot of gratitude and pride that you have accomplished quite a lot. So always see where you are in the [00:22:00] present moment, where you came from, not so much as to where you want to go, because that will make you feel scared and feel empty.

Again, going back to just being grateful for where you are and what you have in your current life.

Jeffrey Feldberg: And so let's talk about that because I know speaking for myself and I don't feel I'm alone in this. I get the concept of gratitude. I even feel grateful at times, but going back to what you just said and go back to our days at Embanet, where perhaps we're starting a day, we have all kinds of gratitude and gratefulness, but then the day begins and all kinds of issues are coming up and challenges.

And I know for myself, it's so easy to not be in the moment. To be in my head, to not have that feeling of gratitude, particularly when there's a crisis or what appears to be or feels like a crisis for us or some kind of situation or something doesn't go our way. So at those times when we need gratitude the most, but we're not in it, what can we do?

What kind of rituals or habits can we create that we can catch ourselves in the process and get back to being in a [00:23:00] feeling and an emotion of gratitude?

Waleuska Lazo: A lot of times my strategy is to talk out loud to myself. I think a lot of people discount the power that is in our own voice and being able to hear ourselves. And when I'm going through a crisis, the first thing I ask myself, can I control this? Is worrying and freaking out about it going to change what I'm going through and if the answer is no, you have to let it go, because the moment that you are on a fight or flight, you cannot think to the same degree that if you are calm.

So that's the first thing I ask myself. Can I control this situation? Can I change it in any way? No. But I can control the way I'm going to react to the situation. The other strategy that I always try to hold on to, I have an enormous capacity for hope. So my style is always to look at a situation and say, what is the message that this is trying to teach me, to show me?

What is the lesson? What is the blessing and [00:24:00] the meaning that I can derive from this horrible thing? Because... We are always going to be thrown into situations that we don't like, and I think it's our duty to always try to find that silver lining. And if you can constantly train yourself every single time that you are confronted with something to look for that silver lining and to use grief and pain and disappointment as our tools for growth, then it's going to become an automatic.

The more we do things, we train our brain. To be resilient. That's what resilience is, when you can look at a situation and look for the meaning in it and learn from it. So that's my, I constantly talk to myself all day long.

Jeffrey Feldberg: So talking to yourself, I can't imagine what the people next to you when they hear this, you know, what they're saying. Let me ask you this because society, we've really gone to an instant gratification society and I can't get the [00:25:00] results right now and people have all kinds of issues with that.

But you're saying that our best teacher for resilience comes from challenges, it comes from grief. And for a lot of people that represents pain and being uncomfortable. So how can a listener who's saying, okay, yeah, you know what, Waleuska, I hear you on that, but when I run into a difficult situation, I don't want to think about it.

I really want to put it off to the side and I'll just tell myself a positive mantra or everything's going to be okay. And not really deal with it because dealing with it is too painful or is too difficult. And sure, maybe in the short run, they can perhaps get a little bit ahead, but long run, we know they're not doing themselves any favors on that.

How can someone embrace the difficult and the uncomfortable to build up that resilience muscle, which ultimately over time will serve them very well, but in the short term, it may be difficult and challenging.

Waleuska Lazo: The only way to do it is by, like I said, digging. You gotta become a mind digger. You gotta dig for what it's trying to show you, for what it's trying to [00:26:00] teach you. That's the only way. And it takes work, takes effort, and that's what people don't like because yes, we used to, always taking the easy way out, but that's not where the work is.

So if you are the kind of person that wants to live a better life and feel more at peace and more joyful, you're going to have to do the work. And the work is, you know, those situations that come to us are. are beautiful, they're blessings, they're knocking on our doors, because that's your chance for growth.

Every time you get hit by something, that's education, that's a lesson for you, there's always something to be learned, and always something to be grateful for, at any point in your life. 

Jeffrey Feldberg: And so what I'm hearing you say is as difficult as it may be, go into it head first, deal with it. It'll get better over time. And the more you do it, the more of that resilience muscle you

Waleuska Lazo: exactly. It becomes easier. It's like you're building a muscle. The first time if you go to a gym and you're lifting weight, you're going to be sore for days and you may [00:27:00] not want to do it. But the more you do it, now your muscle grows and you become more resilient to whatever life throws at you.

It doesn't mean you have to like everything that happens to you. I'm not saying that, but it is your responsibility to choose how you're going to react To life, because if you're constantly reacting to all the random things that happens to you, you're never going to be happy, we have this tendency to want to be in control.

Well, the only way that we can have some illusion of that control is by controlling how we react to what life throws at us.

Jeffrey Feldberg: And it's interesting, as you're talking about that, Waleuska, I randomly went to another page in the book. Happens to be page 42, could have been any page, but it says, three powerful questions to ask yourself each morning are, number one, what am I grateful for? Number two, how can I be of service? And then number three, what do I choose to be when I leave this bed?

And so when I share that with you, [00:28:00] can you go back to when you first wrote that? I mean, what was going through your mind? Was there a particular experience? How'd you come up with this one? 

Waleuska Lazo: Being at the lowest points in my life, I was already starting to use gratitude as my lenses and I remember never leaving my bed without first spending five minutes in gratitude. And that's why the whole program is called Five Minutes to Gratefulness because that's all it takes is five minutes and part of the process is asking yourself those questions before your feet hit the ground.

Okay, what am I grateful for? I'm grateful that my eyes opened. I'm grateful to have a voice. I'm grateful that I have place of work. I get to go to work. I don't have to go to work. I get to drive my children to school. get to see a new day. So many people don't wake up. We have a choice, and ahead of time we make that choice.

So today I make the choice that no matter what life throws at me, I'm going to face it with grace and resilience. That's what I would tell myself every day.

Jeffrey Feldberg: And I know Waleuska, you're modest and we've shared [00:29:00] your story before, but it's worth repeating again. You wouldn't say this yourself, so I'll put this out there because resilience isn't just for what many people think, well, I got to be resilient during the tough times when things aren't going my way, when things are falling apart, I need to be resilient.

I would say resilience, you need it as much, maybe even more when success comes because here at Deep Wealth, we like to say incredible as it sounds. Your success today contains the seeds of failure tomorrow. And oftentimes when we become successful. We lose sight of where we came from and what we should be doing, we're not doing.

And that's when failure sets in. So I know for yourself, you've been on both sides. I mean, you came here as an immigrant, not speaking English. You taught yourself English. Your family were having to work all kinds of different jobs to support yourselves. 

You had to really work for everything. Yet, despite that, you put yourself through school. We met, we started at Embanet, got that out there. And then on the flip side, it wasn't easy. With the Cockroach Startup Mindset, [00:30:00] success came, and we went on with our journey and we had a terrific exit.

And on the flip side of that, with the exit came success, and I'll speak for myself, and you can chime in on your side. I wasn't resilient for my success. And some of the challenges that I had post exit, when I was the most successful, I was the biggest failure. So as crazy as it sounds, when I was starting out as an entrepreneur, I had no success.

I was more successful in the resilience side. The success was catching up, it just didn't show up yet. But when I had the quote unquote success, I lost that resilience and that's when the failure stepped in. So would love to hear your thoughts on that, of what that was like for you. Do you agree with what I'm saying?

Do you disagree? Where are you on that?

Waleuska Lazo: I completely agree, Jeffrey. I think, you know, when we had all the financial means that we always dreamed of, we became lazy. At least I did. There's a tendency when you have money to say, oh, it doesn't matter. Someone else can do it. I'll just pay for it.

And you become extremely lazy and you stop dreaming, you stop growing you stop [00:31:00] stretching yourself because you think you don't longer have to. I would tell people that are coming onto big success is to be aware of that, to not become lazy and comfortable and to always have a purpose.

 You don't have to go and start a new business if you don't want, but do something. Have new dreams. If you stop dreaming, you stop living. And for me, that was the case. I was too comfortable, very lazy. I didn't have any new dreams. And a life without purpose is a very sad life, no matter how successful financially you are.

Jeffrey Feldberg: So where's that Goldilocks situation where it's not too much, not too little. It's just enough on the resilient side that we can have really a ritual and attitude, a mindset of resilience, both in the challenging times, what some people would call failure, also in the successful times, what does that look like and how do we get there? 

Waleuska Lazo: If you reach a lot of success, use that success to help others, to lift others. I think if you make [00:32:00] that your guiding star, you will never go wrong. Because you're using your wisdom, your experiences, your wealth to always be of service. And when you are of service to others, you don't become lazy.

You don't become selfish, if I was so blessed in my life, how do I now go and help others? How do I lift someone do special things for people? It doesn't have to cost you money, but it's just giving your time to someone else.

For a lot of entrepreneurs, it's become a mentor to someone who is going through the ladders of success and teach them and share with them your wisdom that will keep you grounded. 

Jeffrey Feldberg: Let me ask you this. In the book, I'm going to quote, you say, your mind is a garden and you are its landscaper. You can harvest beauty or weeds, seed it carefully. So what were you thinking with that? And what insights and advice can you share with the community? 

Waleuska Lazo: Well, the mind is so powerful. This is, where we create our prisons, or we [00:33:00] create our castles. It's all in the mind and if you're constantly negative, that's what you're going to attract. More negativity in your life. We attract what resonates with our energy field. So most people don't realize, but you are like a walking antenna.

You're like a little mini radio station or a TV station sending waves through your thoughts and based on what's out there in the world that resonates with that thought is what you're going to attract. So. All you have to do is take a look at the life you have now, and that has been a consequence of your thoughts and your habits and your actions over time.

So if you're constantly... In charge of what you allow in your mind and you're constantly weeding through those limiting beliefs and engaging more in gratitude and positivity and, doing something that's bigger than yourselves, chances are that the life you're going to be creating is going to be wonderful. Because, your thoughts [00:34:00] become your reality. So be very mindful of what you allow in there.

Jeffrey Feldberg: As you're saying that absolutely, your thoughts really become things, your inner thoughts become your outer world. And tell me if you think I'm on base or off base with this, what I would add to that. Not only your thoughts. But the people that you surround yourself with, and there's an old quote that take the average of the five people that you spend the most amount of time with you are the average of those people.

So when it comes to resilience, when it comes to really finding that best path where you can optimize your life for both happiness and success, that leads to fulfillment. What's your take on the people that you surround yourself with in your daily kinds of interactions and people who you call friends or your associates or colleagues?

What's going on there for that? 

Waleuska Lazo: Absolutely. And I think, you know, I share the same views. You become a reflection of the people that you deal with the most in your life. So yeah, you have to choose carefully. It also goes to your mindset, to your thoughts, and you have to decide ahead of time, okay, who is the kind of person that I want to [00:35:00] be?

What do you want people to say about you? And then go backwards and start living your life in such a way that all those amazing things that you want people to know and say about you, you actually are leaving them so that it can become a reality.

I believe that when you take care of your mind and you decide who you want to be and you have purpose and you have a clear plan of all your dreams, the people that you're going to surround yourself with Also change automatically when your mind changes, you attract complete different set of people.

When I went through my transformation, there were a lot of people in my life that slowly began to wither because we were not longer resonating energetically., as I elevated my way of looking at the world, the way I thought of myself, and the things that I wanted to accomplish, all of the sudden, new people arrived into my life.

People that were resonating [00:36:00] at that high level. So, 100%, it is crucial to choose the right partner, to choose the right friends, and to choose your thoughts carefully.

Jeffrey Feldberg: So, I'm putting myself now in the position of a listener, and I can imagine a listener saying, okay, great, I'm going to create a new chapter for myself. It's a new year, or it's a new month, a new quarter, whatever the time may be. I'm now looking at my thoughts, and look at this, I was monitoring my thoughts, I was jotting them down, I'm going to stop these negative stories, I'm going to stop that, I'm going to be creating more positive narratives.

Okay, check. I can do that. But for the person who's saying, okay, I also realize that of all the people that I associate these five people, these seven people really aren't good for me. They bring me down. They hold me back. They put me into a negative place. They're energy vampires. I never saw that before, but I see that now.

How did you go through that, Waleuska, in terms of not being mean spirited, but respectfully having those friendships or those associations at one point ultimately stop? Any strategies or tips of what you [00:37:00] did that you can share with others?

Waleuska Lazo: You know, it just happens organically, Jeffrey. It's not that you have to go and suddenly tell the person, I don't longer want to be your friend. You're not good for me. No. I think if you just worry about yourself. Elevating your energy field and you're, cultivating great thoughts, learning, developing yourself, somehow, energetically, those people will start to, to wither out.

You don't even have to go through the process of letting them go, because when you value yourself and you value the life and where you want to go, you're not going to be spending a lot of time with these people. You're not going to be investing the same amount of time. So they will eventually get the point and wither out.

And then when new people start to come in, I mean, you'll be surprised. It's like a miracle. I can't even explain it. The minute you change your energy, you change your world, you change your life, and you're going to have a whole new set of people come that are again, [00:38:00] resonating with your energy.

Jeffrey Feldberg: Terrific. Change your energy, change your life. It's a terrific takeaway for the community. So let me ask you this. Before we go into wrap up mode, out of every episode, wherever possible, we like for our listeners to have one action item. So when they finish listening to us talk, before they go to the next meeting, the phone call, email, whatever it's going to be, if they could take one action, one action only that could really make a difference for them, it can move the dial, maybe in their personal life, in their business life.

What would be that one action that you could recommend? 

Waleuska Lazo: I'm assuming that a lot of the people that listen to a podcast are type A's like you and I, so the one strategy that I would have that worked amazing for me is to take every single day and challenge yourself for a month, if you can, or even for a week, and you'll be surprised at what happens.

Every day, play a game with yourself and say, today I will try to control nothing. Just for a day. Because what happens in the entrepreneurship mind is that we don't like that. We need to be in control and to think 30 days ahead [00:39:00] that you're not going to control anything is scary. But if you just tell yourself for one day, I'm not going to have expectations of anyone or myself, and I'm just going to be in the flow of life and I'm not going to control anything.

And whatever happens to me, whatever things I face in the day, I'm going to face them with gratitude, with resilience. And then, see what happens, and then at the end of the day, do the same the following day. Just for one day, try to control nothing and see what starts to happen in your life. The accumulative effect of letting go is going to be transformational.

Jeffrey Feldberg: As you're saying that, you remind me of a passage in the book, which I'll read in just a moment. I'll get to it. Because with social media, it's so easy to get caught up with, wow, look at this picture I'm seeing. Everyone's so happy and they're so lavish, all this success, all these material things around them.

I've got to become like that. But in the book, you say, it's not those who have the most that are happy. It's those who enjoy what they [00:40:00] have. That are happiest. And you go on to say, it's difficult to define happiness because happiness is subjective. What makes someone happy may not be what makes another happy, but it's safe to say that those who live with contentment and gratitude in their hearts are the happiest.

And so let Waleuska, before we wrap up, is there a question I haven't asked? Is there a topic that we haven't covered? Is there a message that you'd like to share with the community?

Waleuska Lazo: I Say that every person should know their why to live for. that's very important because that becomes your lighthouse, your guiding star. What's my why to live for? And once you find that, do that every day. Most people walk through life without knowing. Most people go through life without even finding out their true gifts and they go to their graves.

With those dreams inside, so I'd say find out what is your why to live for.

Jeffrey Feldberg: Terrific takeaway and insight for that and you're giving us a lot to [00:41:00] think about today. So with that said, although we can go down so many different rabbit holes, like resilience and the cockroach startup mindset or our journey, pre exit, post exit, all those other things, we are bumping up against time.

You've actually answered this question before, but maybe you'll come with a different answer. Maybe your answer will be the same. We'll see where it goes. Let me remind you of it. When you think of the movie Back to the Future, you have that magical DeLorean car that can take you to any point in time.

So imagine now it's tomorrow morning, you look outside your window and here's the fun part. Not only is the DeLorean car curbside, the door is open, it's waiting for you to hop on in, which you do, and you're now going to go to any point in your life. Waleuska, as a young child, a teenager, whatever point in time that would be, what would you tell your younger self in terms of life wisdom or life lessons, or hey, Waleuska, do this, but don't do that.

What would that sound like?

Waleuska Lazo: I would definitely travel back in time and see my little Waleuska because, you know, in our childhood is where we developed who we are as [00:42:00] adults, and I would tell her that it's okay to be scared, but that she has to do it anyways. It's okay to feel fear, and it's okay to still leap into the unknown, that's what I would tell her.

Jeffrey Feldberg: Wow. It's okay to feel fear. It's okay to leap into the unknown. It sounds, from the outside looking in, it sounds scary, but it feels like it's the absolute right thing to do. And I know we've shared our journey together, and there are times where that's exactly what we did, and somehow, some way, miraculously, everything turned out to be okay. Waleuska, before we call this an official wrap, if someone has a question, if they want to reach out to you, if they want to go through your Five Minutes to gratefulness course or just put some questions out there of what they can do to take their game to the next level, where's the best place online someone can find you?

Waleuska Lazo: Just on my website, you can reach me there, all my information's there, it's waleskalazo. com, you can find information on all my books, and how to sign up for free to [00:43:00] the. Five minutes to gratefulness experience. Sign up and all you need to do is buy the book because that becomes the actual textbook for the course.

The Gratitude Blueprint.

Jeffrey Feldberg: We talk about paying it forward. I know you and I have had conversations about this and you're absolute resolute because for the Five Minutes of Gratefulness, that's really a program that you can be charging thousands if not tens of thousands of dollars, but you're saying, Hey, invest in the book, which is just.

Really a rounding error. Purchase the book. That's the price of admission to go through the program. And I know it's been a game changer for people around the world. You really made a difference for them. Well, Waleuska, thank you so much.

And as we love to say here at Deep Wealth, it's official, it's a wrap. May you continue to thrive and prosper while remaining healthy and safe. Thank you so much.

Waleuska Lazo: Thank you. Thank you for having me. 

Sharon S.: The Deep Wealth Experience was definitely a game-changer for me. 

Lyn M.: This course is one of the best investments you will ever make because you will get an ROI of a hundred times that. Anybody who doesn't go through [00:44:00] it will lose millions. 

Kam H.: If you don't have time for this program, you'll never have time for a successful liquidity 

Sharon S.: It was the best value of any business course I've ever taken. The money was very well spent.

Lyn M.: Compared to when we first began, today I feel better prepared, but in some respects, may be less prepared, not because of the course, but because the course brought to light so many things that I thought we were on top of that we need to fix. 

Kam H.: I 100% believe there's never a great time for a business owner to allocate extra hours into his or her week or day. So it's an investment that will yield results today. I thought I will reap the benefit of this program in three to five years down the road. But as soon as I stepped forward into the program, my mind changed immediately. 

Sharon S.: There was so much value in the experience that the time I invested paid back so much for the energy [00:45:00] that was expended. 

Lyn M.: The Deep Wealth Experience compared to other programs is the top. What we learned is very practical. Sometimes you learn stuff that it's great to learn, but you never use it. The stuff we learned from Deep Wealth Experience, I believe it's going to benefit us a boatload.

Kam H.: I've done an executive MBA. I've worked for billion-dollar companies before. I've worked for smaller companies before I started my business. I've been running my business successfully now for getting close to a decade. We're on a growth trajectory. Reflecting back on the Deep Wealth, I knew less than 10% what I know now, maybe close to 1% even. 

Sharon S.: Hands down the best program in which I've ever participated. And we've done a lot of different things over the years. We've been in other mastermind groups, gone to many seminars, workshops, conferences, retreats, read books. This was so different. I haven't had an experience that's anything close to this in all the years that we've been at this.

It's five-star, A-plus.

Kam H.: I would [00:46:00] highly recommend it to any super busy business owner out there.

Deep Wealth is an accurate name for it. This program leads to deeper wealth and happier wealth, not just deeper wealth. I don't think there's a dollar value that could be associated with such an experience and knowledge that could be applied today and forever. 

Jeffrey Feldberg: Are you leaving millions on the table? 

Please visit www.deepwealth.com/success to learn more.

If you're not on my email list, you'll want to be. Sign up at www.deepwealth.com/podcast. And if you enjoyed this episode, if it added value, if you walked away with some new insights and strategies, please leave a review on your favorite podcast channel. Reviews help us reach new listeners, grow the show. And continue to create content that you'll enjoy and as we wrap up this episode as always please stay healthy and safe.