What to Do When Productivity Becomes Toxic with Israa Nasir

most of us are trying to fill up our time by being productive because we're trying to avoid a difficult feeling. So we're running away from shame. We're trying to avoid fear. We feel like we're not good enough and it's so uncomfortable. It's like what do you do? You're like okay I'm going to get the certification. I want a bigger house. I want a family that looks a certain way and like you know it becomes the snowball. And so that's what I think fuels a lot of unhealthy productivity. Welcome to Envision 2.0, the new podcast from GirlBoss, where we explore what it really takes and costs to have it all in work, family, identity and self. I'm your host Amanda Gatz, the two-time founder, four-time CMO, mom of three, and author of the book, toxic grit, how to have it all and actually love what you have. Today's guest is one of my favorite experts on productivity, or should I say toxic productivity. She's a psychotherapist, founder of well-guide, author of toxic productivity reclaim your time and emotional energy in a world that always demands more. She has built a community of 350,000 people by sharing an honest evidence-based approach to mental health and productivity. Today we're going to be exploring what really drives us to toxic productivity, why contentment feels so threatening in hustle culture, and how reclaiming inconvenience, community and rest might be the most radical move you can do today. Please join me in welcoming Isra Nassir. We start every conversation with what is your definition of ambition and how do you feel like it's changed over the years? My original definition of ambition was to achieve everything that I wanted to achieve at the best possible capacity. It was never ending. I remember in one of my earlier journal entries, I think I want to say I was like 22. I wrote out instillness as death, which is so dramatic for our 22-year-old. For me, it was a constant movement, stagnant waters like, ew, no, I have to keep moving forward. That was ambition. There was no concept of value alignment, there was no concept of discernment, and there was no concept of the why. These are the things to do because these are the things that have to be done and you're going to do them at number one hundred percent capacity and anything you do has to be the best thing you do. There was just no flexibility to that definition. My definition right now of ambition is to pursue the things that are value aligned at a pace that matches the season you're in and really be rooted in why. The impact it has instead of the outcome. I was so outcome driven before. Where did that come from? Your original definition of ambition and what was it stillness equals death? Right. So dramatic. Where did that come from for you? What voice was speaking to you? I think it was like an amalgamation. For sure, my parents are very driven people. It's very much about hard work and work ethic. My dad will say, does it matter what you're doing? I used to work at a clothing store in the mall. It's like a job that you have when you're 16 years old. But he was like, that's not too small. If they're asking you to fold clothes, you do it the best and you do it with pride. So there's that for sure. My parents are immigrants. I'm an immigrant myself. There's a lot of immigrant hustle baked into the family. Then I grew up in the girl boss era and so they were telling me the internet was telling me. It was peak era of like millennial girl boss feminism. She eos and all that stuff. So I think like my young brain took the very concrete messaging there and just together I was like, oh my family is like this and the world outside is like this. So this must be the way. Yeah. Yeah. So let's talk about toxic productivity because I like to say I'm a pretty productive person. Yeah. So when does it grow toxic? I would say that I mean, I think sometimes people feel like the book might be saying that we shouldn't be productive. And I want to be super clear that the message is not that we have to not be productive. It's really be discerning about what you're being productive for and you know for whom are you being productive. And so healthy productivity becomes toxic when it is a it's not value aligned. So you're chasing things because you're competing with others you're comparing yourself. You're like feeling behind and that's fueling you. Not necessarily an actual desire to get the thing. Another way it becomes unhealthy is if there's just no rest in it. Like if you're slamming your calendar back to back which we all do and we have seasons of it. Yeah. But if that's your whole life where your calendar is back to back and you're doing something every evening and like there's just no breathing room. And you believe that rest is a reward, not a requirement. That's really when your productivity is unhealthy. It also becomes unhealthy when how good you feel about yourself is completely contingent on how many things you can achieve. Right. That's a hard place to be in. Yeah. Yeah. So I would go to three hallmarks. That one's real. So you you write about this and you argue that productivity isn't about actually time management. It's it's more about emotional management. Can you explain what that shift looks like? Well, I mean I think the first well first just kind of explain a little about like where this idea even came from is that you know if you ever like browse through self-help sections and this is like going back five years now. Most of the books that we're telling you how to be productive or very behavioral. It was all about habit change and systems and you know like what can you do so that you are more productive. Right. And the gap that I felt both from like my own internal experience but also from being a therapist with what was actually happening in the room with my clients is that most of us are trying to fill up our time by being productive because we're trying to avoid a difficult feeling. We we feel like we're not good enough and it's so uncomfortable. So it's like what do you do? And so that's why I say like you could build the you could read atomic habits and become a pro at every single system because it's a great book. Right. But if you have unresolved shame and something triggers it your entire habit system will fall apart. It's just because we're driven by our emotions and we most often don't know how to regulate them. So if we want to kind of shift into a more emotional management based productivity. I think the first thing is emotional regulation. Yeah. What are the earliest red flags? Whether you're coaching someone or working with someone that you're realizing that they're shifting into some really unhealthy habits around productivity. I would say like if you work with somebody like week after week every week they're like overwhelmed. Yeah. Right. Every week they're like oh I just got to get through next week. Then that infamous phrase. Yeah. I just got to get through. Yeah. X. And so I think that's a really good early warning sign that you're like oh okay like things are kind of spiraling out of this person's control. And they're going to try to exercise more control by trying to control their time which is only going to lead to more disaster. So I would say that's the biggest one. Resentment is another one if internally like if let's say you're just not you're not in therapy or coaching and you're just somebody who's listening. Resentment is a really good early sign. We'd say more about that. Yeah. So resentment is the emotion we feel when our boundary is being crossed. Now whether we're doing it to ourselves or somebody. I was just going to say because I think that a lot of times it might be us. Oh gosh yeah. I mean for me like that was me. I was like constantly disrespecting my own boundaries. And so resentment is a really good sign for you to check in with yourself. So if you're feeling super resentful towards waking up and going to work. You're feeling resentful for the pick up and drop off for your kids. You're resentful that you have to make dinner. You're just feeling resentful that you booked yourself for like drinks with your friend even though you're looking forward to it but you're resentful. Like if there's this undercurrent then you definitely want to tap into that and look at where you could where it's like coming from. Yeah. You talk a lot about reparenting yourself and I think that that's become more and more common. I've heard shadow work reparenting. So let's let's maybe connect reparenting yourself to work. Like what does like how does the reparenting yourself actually show up in work or how might your how might something show up in work if you aren't doing this. Yeah. Like if you haven't actually done the work of reparenting yourself or healing some of those like corvoons. A really big way it shows up at work is the inability to take constructive feedback. And most people like think when I think that it's just like being aggressive but it's also being really critical towards yourself if you make a mistake. Like if somebody gives you feedback and you can't get over it for weeks and now you're like so stressed about it and like it's consuming you. Now you're scared in meetings so now you don't want to raise your hand. Like that is a really big sign that there is this unhealed wound around like criticism and rejection. Yeah. Because the reparenting work would be working on learning how to integrate criticism as one part of who you are. So when we have an open wound around this because maybe we had very critical parents or maybe the standards are very high in our house. It's very black and white. So if I give you feedback and let's say you come from that kind of family and that wound is open for you, you're going to think oh my gosh, I'm all bad. Everything I've done is worthless. Like I'm just not good. So everything is a very binary. And the reparenting is to operate in a gray space. Like I can be bad at presentations, but I am good at reports. And so therefore like all parts of me are working. Some need a little bit more help. And so in work, it's that in at work, it's also not taking up space. So if you came from a family that again was very critical about mistakes, you might be very afraid to raise your hand to participate in meetings, to take on a project. And you might wait until you are completely qualified to apply for a job. Right. And so all of that just limits your growth. Do you find this that women are more vulnerable to some of this? Women can be more vulnerable to it. I think people from marginalized identities can be more vulnerable to it. Like if you are BIPOC, if you are queer identifying, like anything that you know, has the potential of criticism. And the system is also right, you know, not very open to certain groups. So I think they're more vulnerable to it. Yeah. I think that it's this hard balance of needing to, for me, like I came from, I'm a first generation college grad, this chip on my shoulder that I need to prove myself so that I can earn the success. Yeah. But then realizing that it was a lot of these things that you're talking about, like on the open wounds, right? So I think that that fine balance of where you come from definitely gives you the fuel, but that fuel will run out. Yeah. You know, I actually share a story in the book in the shame chapter that's exactly about what the concept that you're sharing is that it's about this woman who you know, felt a lot of shame about her cultural identity growing up here in the US. And as a way, like the shame she felt she internalized it and as a way to kind of cope with it, created an incredible beauty brand that exists right now that you can find it everywhere that's rooted in her culture, right? But the shame fueled her to bring her to a certain point of bringing the brand to life and getting into stores, but the shame then kind of took her down because it was hard work being an entrepreneur and you're competing on a very competitive market. And so she eventually did have to do the work of unlearning that shame to be a better CEO and entrepreneur. And so same thing like where we come from and the wounds can kind of take us to a certain place, but they can't maintain us there. Yeah. So you've written a book, you obviously have a coaching, you've well-guide, you want to share a little bit more about what well-guide is? Yeah. So well-guide is a digital platform and I share a lot of evidence-backed mental health resources and techniques, information, which I believe that people should have access to outside of therapy. So you know, a lot of like up until 10 years ago, a lot of very simple emotional regulation, relational strategies, they were all kind of gate-kept behind therapy because of the way the system worked, right? And as a therapist myself, I would often sit and think and be like, damn, if you only knew this like four years ago, like we wouldn't be here, right? Because simple things can really shift the way you show up in your life outside of mental illness, right? So this is like my way of kind of like giving people access to mental health education. So as you're juggling, all that you're juggling, I'm curious, how do you define what's enough in a day? Oh my gosh. The season I'm in right now, this is a really important question for me, but I sometimes I just kind of take like a very, a very, what's the word? Like dramatic, you know, method and I'll just, I'll see the time and I'll just close every single tab. Like it's, it needs to happen right away because you can't think too much about it and it has to be gone. So sometimes you have to kind of take that tough love approach with yourself and really say to yourself, this was enough, like look at the time it's done. Other times, some days I kind of take that there are three things I can work on today. And if I, if I meet those three, everything else is like bonus. And other times I reach out to my friends, like I have like a really good support system who I can kind of talk through and like, you know, they can kind of help ground me and what's enough. I love that. I think boundary setting is hard for ourselves and for for us to set those boundaries with others. What's the emotional work behind setting healthy boundaries? What needs to happen so that you can actually say that's enough to yourself, say that's enough to somebody else. You know, like no one has ever asked this question phrasing this way and it's so lovely. Yeah, because everyone's always like, how do people do it? But I think what you're asking is so much more important is what are the foundational pieces that need to be in place for us to have successful boundaries? So thank you. I love this question. I think the first thing is to really be aware of your limits. A lot of times we struggle with boundaries because we actually don't know where the limit is and it's muddied by our family role, who we are, you know, and like the kind of self-perception we have. So having clarity on that is the first piece of work that we need to do. I think another really important piece is communication skills. If you are not able to communicate the boundaries well, it's going to be a fight. Someone's going to get mad. You might feel hurt. You know, and so like working on that piece is really helpful. And I always say start in safe areas. So a friend you already love and you know that they accept you for everything, start like and let them know, hey, I'm practicing boundaries. And so like you can start verbalizing to them in your different formulas until it becomes, you know, easier for you to say. So I think communication skills and the third really big one is emotional regulation, which I talked about earlier. But a lot of times we don't want to set boundaries because we are not okay with the difficult emotions that come up. Like I feel uncomfortable disappointing you. So I'm not going to set the boundary because I don't know how to tolerate that and discomfort, right? Or I don't know how to tolerate guilt or I don't know how to tolerate the fear of missing out. And because I don't have the skills, I'm just going to say yes. I'll go to the four parties. Like, you know, like I'll take on the project. And so emotional regulation is, is really, really important. That one is so key. And I think, I think a lot of people will relate to that. How do I sit with whatever I'm feeling after I set that boundary? Yeah, or before, or even before, like going in, right? Like people will know they have to say something. Like you know, you have to tell your parents that you're not going to comfort things giving and you get there and it's so overwhelming and you don't say it. Yeah. Or you delay a breakup. That happens a lot. Delight break up. Yeah. Oh, I was going to break up with them. And then I didn't. Yeah. And then like one month goes by. So, and emotional regulation is like a big term for a very simple thing, which is being able to identify the emotion you're having to be able to kind of like see as outside of you. So the difference between I am sad versus I am feeling sad. Yeah. I am angry versus I'm feeling angry. Like that small shift really changes your relationship. Yeah. To the feeling. And then allowing it to live and pass through. So I know that we resist emotions a lot and then they just become bigger. There's a children's book called Color Monster. It's literally a monster who has all of these colors mixed up inside of him. And the little kids like you see mom mixed up. Let's help. And they're like, you have green. That's calm. And it pulls out each color. And it helps to kind of like create an otherness with the emotion. So it's like, Oh, okay. This is that. And I I read it to my kids and I was like, this is so helpful. That is that. Every adult needs to read this. Yeah. And use it. Yeah. Okay. In the book, you tell a very relatable story about how you wanted to start reading a fiction novel. And then you were like, why need to read X amount of fiction novels. And then when you weren't when you were falling behind, you were like shaming yourself. And this kind of like idea of hyper optimization of everything. Yeah. Can you share a little bit more about why what is causing us to do that? And what can we do to catch ourselves and and stop? Yeah. That's so real. I think I hear this from people all the time, by the way. It's like, oh, I don't have time to read fiction because I have to read this nonfiction and like improve myself. Or I this might resonate with people. It's I have to listen to the podcast that just came out about like personal whatever while I'm walking, while I'm doing dishes. And what ends up happening is we try to utilize every single minute that we have in purpose of some kind of growth or transformation instead of joy, right? And I think like balance, like if you're lacking balance either ways, it's not a good thing. So you don't want to never worry about personal growth and development. We all need some level of growth somewhere, but you also don't never want to have joy at all. And I think one of the biggest reasons that we feel so compelled to hyper optimize all of our like waking moments towards doing something productive is because we have access to a lot of information. We have access to more information than we ever, ever, ever, ever ever, ever did, right? So you're constantly feeling like I need to do more because a new book has come out like mine included, right? Like I talk about this all the time is you if you see the book and the cover feels enticing to you, but you're not struggling with toxic productivity, like maybe now is not the season for you to read, right? Maybe read one chapter and put it away for another time. I say this to everyone because that's the only way it'll be helpful. When we just are burning through books, even if it's fiction books like challenges, or I'm going to read 200 books a year or whatever, like you don't retain and you don't engage with the material. So my my ask for anybody is put a number, like a number limit on how much self-help you'll read and how much fiction you'll read and try to really hold yourself accountable to that. Yeah, we've we've really hit this point of quantity over quality in life in general. Everything can come faster, more is more is more. Now with like AI content, people can create so much content. And I'm like, we are missing depth and nuance and context. And I find that whenever I am speeding through so fast of life, it's like no wonder I can't take anything in because I'm going too fast and everything's a blur. Yeah, same with something as beautiful as reading a fiction book. Yeah. Or even like podcasts, like sometimes some people listen to it on like 2x speed, right. And I'm just like so stressed out by that. I'm like your nervous system is there's like literally listening. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm just like oh shit. No, but it's just like if you just listen to on 1.2, like you might actually retain something a little bit more. But even I'm like guilty of it. Like I'll I'll hold the tick-tock down. So it like runs on 2x speed if it's like a makeup tutorial. And it's so bad because I'm just like I just jump ahead. I'm like to show me what it looks like. So I think we're all like we're all struggling with that because the features and the tools are so readily available and the information is so accessible. Part of the reason why I chose to write a book is because I I wanted to sit with the material more sometimes like jumping in and becoming a a teacher of something is a great forcing function to sit and like research and dive into material because you have to shape it and mold it in your own way. And so I found that that was a great forcing function for me. I don't know if you felt that way with your process. I did. It took me back to reading like research journals. Like it took me back to undergrad like the J store like you know membership so you can read articles. Right. So it felt really good. And I think that's why I love sub-stack. Like I love writing on sub-stack. And I you know everyone's like why do you write on sub-stack so much. And I'm just like it's helping me understand myself better. It's like a it's like a it's like a public journal of the stuff that I'm thinking about. Yeah. And I also love reading them because people are taking their time on sub-stack. Yeah. Like it's so nuanced. Nothing is too binary you know. And so it's just like so refreshing. Right. Yeah. We need this. Okay. So you you had an Instagram post that I was obsessed with. I might have even reshared it and you said don't forget to live while you are healing. I think in a world that is so full of self-help and growth and you've got to grow. Tell us like tell me a little bit more about like what prompted that was that like a note to self was that a you know where did that come from and or do you just see that a lot. That came from like just a lot of conversations that I had had with like just people but predominantly like young women just like you know my sister my younger sister's friends like even my younger sister like just like a lot of girls talk about healing as being like central to their purpose. And I see them kind of I hear it too like struggle with like actually letting themselves be a little messy letting themselves make mistakes and learn from them right. So the idea of the post was like we have put healing on this like perfectionist pedestal as though it's like the end goal. But like we're supposed to be kind of doing it as life is happening. And it's okay if you use the wrong formula of an eye statement once you know like it's okay if you had a crash out on your birthday and you like ended up crying like I'm not necessarily advocating for like messiness but life is messy. Yeah. And we can't just like erase it you know from this mask of healing perfectionism. So that's what that is. Yeah. I want to invite people to come back into living like it's okay. And also as someone who has been in therapy for eight years now it's ongoing work. There's no real finish line. And when you go out and get a little messy it allows you to be like oh that's still there. Yes I love that. What a great point. Yeah. It's indicative. And also like every chapter of your life is going to demand newer versions of you. Yeah. And so you're going to have to do some work for that. Yeah. Like you move to a new city you get a new job you have a child you get a pet you have a partner like somebody passes away like every chapter will demand something new of you. So there's never like a oh I'm healed. Yeah. Like there's no person who's healed. Well I used to joke that I was really healed when I was single. And then I would start dating again and I would be like nope. Not healed because it does like just living allows you to see which parts of you. Yeah. Need a little more. And another thing I'll say I think that's so important that you said that is because growth happens in relation. So the predominant like vibe right now is I got to isolate myself to grow and heal. Like I need to cut people off. I need to never see the person who triggers me and I need to put myself in this like glass box. Yeah. Where I'm viewing the world but I'm not engaging with it and I'm doing the work. But the work actually is relational. It happens in relation. And that's why therapy works because sometimes your therapist will challenge you and bring up that part of you. But you have to be around the things that trigger you in a safe environment to be able to work through it and process it. I love that. Yeah. Let's talk about contentment and that word. It feels like a very elusive. So what does contentment mean with you and in your practice? How can we reframe contentment so it feels kind of courageous and not just complacent? Yeah. You know that's so interesting. Like I was when I was younger like in my 20s contentment was like a bad word. Right. It was like a dirty word. It's like it was almost like being like a quitter in like the bad way or giving up. For sure. Like there was no concept of contentment being a positive thing. But I think like now I see it more as like it's also not a permanent state of being. Like that's the difference I think between contentment and complacency. Like you like it's about appreciating the hard work you've done to receive something or achieve something and allowing that and being in its presence and then also then moving out of it to pursue something different at the right time. So like I see contentment as like the seasonal thing as well. Yeah. You know and then there's seasons where you're like you know what it's like this both and mindset like I'm happy where I'm at and I also now want to change this one thing or whatever. I kind of take this mindset to my like working out because I struggle with working out regularly and it's just like the biggest problem in my life is to get to the gym and and so like I like to say to myself look I'm content with my health and I'm content with where my body's at and I also want to shift into a more like strength training environment or you know eat something differently and or maybe not do certain things and so it allows me to have grace for myself. So I think we can utilize contentment as this way of self-compassion while we pursue different things as well. That's beautiful. Yeah. Let's talk about rest because obviously you we all know like rest is part of the process like we do need to rest but what kind of rest do you do you think about because I I've talked to my friends a lot about like they're like I sat on the couch and I you know was resting and I'm still so stressed and I'm like were you scrolling the whole time and reminding them of emotional rest like if you're looking at really traumatic things or intense things or even just watching murder shows it's like I don't know if that's emotional rest for you right now. So what's what is how do you talk about rest to people? I'm so glad you call that out because I think that people people tend to only rest when their body gives up and that's not the best time to only rest right you know when your inner crisis is not the time you'll be able to access the positive benefits of rest because you're just shut down and that's what we see I think a lot of people are in like a what is the word here like the active state of shut down they're kind of in freeze response. Yeah. So what happens is you plop yourself on the couch you are on your little screen scrolling with a big screen over there maybe a laptop screen over here you know and so you're in it in this like emotional free state so you're numb and you're not resting that's why that happens. So research shows that there's seven types of rest and sleep is only one type of rest like you can access creative rest which is more active and engaged so like doing something creative you can ask access social rest like actually just having like a low key hang with a friend not like a production hang where like you it's like a big to do like just genuine connection just sitting and having a chat or a FaceTime like that is also restful I think the thing we have to know about ourselves is am I in a state of active rest or passive rest and if I need active rest like then I can work out I can do something creative I can engage with a friend but if I need passive rest that's when I might need to nap maybe like do a yoga class stretching sauna cooking a meal like something like that right so like I think like that's kind of how we need to see rest and the biggest thing is it doesn't have to be like a 60 minute situation like it can be like a 10 minute situation where you do 10 minutes of like something very creative in between meetings to just decompress a little bit. Let's switch gears and talk about companies for a second okay and toxic productivity if you could design a company that would never grow toxic and they're productive and their productivity like what what's maybe one thing that you would do first to be like okay this is a company that will never grow toxic never go toxic four day work week like immediately absolutely we see that it works in other places yeah other countries and similar economies perhaps not size but I would definitely explore that as an option and if it can't happen right away then we would probably do like biweekly Fridays off and then kind of move into because I think that there is a lot of life to be lived outside of work yeah and two days just doesn't cut it if you have families independence and also have to do laundry and like groceries and write all of the things and so I think like I would do that I always think about okay Fridays are for fun and then Saturdays I gotta do like all the administrative adulting and then maybe a little more rest on Sunday but you know you got to kind of space those things out okay let's talk about the connection between convenience and loss connection as you talk about this yeah how do you see the correlation between increased convenience in our society and then the decrease of connection well first I love this topic like I could just talk about this forever because I see it everywhere and the concept is the more convenient our lives have become the less we are actually able to tolerate being in community and not like the cute Instagram communities where everything is aesthetic like I mean like the real communities where you can rely on people to show up for you they can you can rely on them to support you and help you and you also do that for them yeah what's happened is like inherent to any relationship there is a certain level of discomfort right even between you and I like I just came here but I had to get into a car drive here and come here right there was a little bit of discomfort there I could have been like let's do it on zoom because it's more convenient right and so that's a thing inherent in any relationship there is discomfort so you have to show up for people and that makes you a little uncomfortable yeah but we have become so accustomed to convenience because everything is super easy now to access to receive to order to get to cut off to limit and also in the last 10 years our society has become increasingly personalized so everything is personalized to the individual your comments look very different from my comments for the same post because the algorithm will sift it out so that it's more either aligned with your for you page and the comments I see will be more aligned with my activity right the kind of ads you get like your phone your home like smart systems like everything is super personalized right and so we have become very entitled and and I just mean as a general like as a society entitlement is on the rise so in our our world is revolving around us exactly main character energy yeah which I have so many thoughts on so what happens is when your friend calls you in a crisis but you're in the middle of like let's say doing some journaling you're gonna be like you know what no I'm not gonna show up for this person because I'm doing me right now and I'm not gonna inconvenience myself like they have to figure it out like they need to emotionally regulate and that's the fracture of community because even before we can emotionally regulate we have to emotionally co-regulate like you and I have to be on the same emotional state right now for this to be a successful conversation if I'm like all over the place and you're super calm it's not going to be a good conversation right and so that's what I'm talking about is we have to be able to tolerate some inconvenience like my friend wants to show this happened to me last week like my neighbor he was like I had a birthday party I put up a photo of a cake it was a delicious like olive oil and fig cake that this amazing baker made if anybody wants like I'll share her Instagram anyway um so he saw the photo he was like oh my gosh I would love some cake and I was like if you're serious like come over and get it but then he texted back saying what if I come tomorrow morning we'll have coffee and cake for breakfast right and I was like damn like I gotta wake up like maybe 45 minutes earlier to accommodate this request like like blah but then I was like no this is my neighbor he lives upstairs like this could be so fun and then he I was like sure he came we had an hour and a half coffee cake breakfast I made him a granola bowl and it was this like wonderful moment of community but it required me to inconvenience myself a little bit and to not think about your day and the hyper optimized state because if you were like well no I have to you know meditate for 20 minutes and then I got to do this for 20 minutes and we're not creating the the terminology I like to use is like creating space for serendipity like allowing something to happen that I couldn't plan for that's also so beautiful exactly and I think that's why people are struggling with the friendship scheduling right now right like you I'm sure you've heard of this it's like you're trying to schedule a hang and like it's just because there's no space in calendars for I love the word serendipity yeah there's no space for people to just drop in anymore but I mean this wasn't even too long ago but when I was growing up like my neighbors were dropping all the time yeah like liars in the middle nowhere so they would have to drive there's a lot of friction there but yeah I mean I lived in a building yeah dropping in the house all the time did it just come in for tea and a leave or whatever like they come help me pack or I would go help them pack because they're going on a trip and that's how you hang out and then you just kind of go your own way that is missing right now because people are super hyper optimized and they're very much like boundaries have kind of become rigid walls which is what they are not meant to be right the only time a boundary is meant to be a rigid wall is if you are in an abusive environment if it's a relationship that's healthy and you're trying to coexist it kind of need to be windows that are flexible yeah that's beautiful I want to ask you about main character energy because you have thoughts on it give us give us the TLDR of like what what pings you about the thought of main character energy what is it doing to our society right now it is making us increasingly individualistic and self-absorbed and entitled so I think it was meant as a positive thing of like centering yourself in a way that you are a valued person so if you have somebody if you're like oh my opinions don't matter and you kind of tap into main character energy yes you can now speak in the meeting or share with your friends that hey actually don't like that restaurant or can we meet somewhere closer right it was meant to be this empowering thing but what it's become is this like sense of entitlement that everything it kind of revolves around me and I don't actually have to worry about other people's discomfort and so you see this with people like blaring their videos very loudly in public places you see this people getting upset because you're now in the background of their content but they're filming in a public place like I've seen this happen all the time where like you walk in the back or whatever and someone's like oh you're ruined my shot and I'm like this is not a film set my friend this is so whole right this is a public environment and so I think like that and then running up to people in the parks and being like what's your opinion and it's just like it's like we need to stop we need to stop and we need to realize that everybody exists and we are co-existing and you are not the only person who exists here but I'm still a fan of like the empowered definition is just that's not how people are using it any yeah yeah yeah the through line here of everything we're talking about is the path back to co-habitation and community and connection and that growth happens in relation to others so I think it's it's really beautiful um okay I'd love to end with a little rapid fire okay yeah feet on the ground yeah I'm ready first thing you do when you catch yourself overthinking I literally tell myself that I talk a lot to myself in third person so I'll just be like it's right you're overthinking it's not that deep okay yeah um what's more stressful to you an empty inbox or a full one a full one yeah yeah I find that sometimes I'm like where's the emails oh yeah um I have faith they'll come love that uh rest day are you active or passive for a rest day I usually appreciate active rest yeah yeah yeah what's your go-to active rest I love seasonal cooking so I'll do a lot of that okay um I the last thing you cooked right oh I made like a really great like winter lentil and chicken one pots too yeah okay yeah worst productivity hack you've ever tried for me personally five am waking up that doesn't work for you nonsense for me I just my body does not work that way and I pushed it and it was dumb yeah so I have to listen to your body exactly if it works for you please do it I it works for me but I also have to go to bed at 9 p.m. oh you see that I'm also not doing that so it was a disaster for me it's all what's harder do you think for most people saying no to your boss or saying no to yourself saying no to your boss okay yeah one boundary you'll never compromise on my physical sense like whether that's my space or my body like that's always like pretty hard I love that yeah where do you love to replace busy with when you ask people how they're doing oh um like if I ask them yeah and if they say I'm busy yeah like what's another work so it's just like oh I see I say I'm busy oh yeah oh gosh I used to do that too so alarming um but I'll say you know I'll often just kind of go into a feeling or a story from the yeah like the the week like I find that to be like so much more of like a connection builder yeah you know the copy band I'll be like oh you know like yesterday on the train I love that or on the way here or I love sharing new discoveries so I'll be like oh I was like walking by the store and I discovered like a store in the East Village or I just thrifted something or a new product because I'm a big like makeup girly like I'll just go into a story that reflects my life yeah I'm gonna steal that I think that we we're so everything is just so quick and optimized and we're just like I'm good I'm busy yeah good I love that go to activity that actually makes you feel restored is that cooking for yeah yeah um if you had to delete one productivity app forever what would it be uh I actually don't have any productivity apps yeah that's amazing yeah okay yeah so where can people find you where can people learn more about wild guide where can they learn more it's about you yeah my website is a great hub for everything so it's ishtronaster.com book Instagram substock resources digital downloads events coming up like everything is on the website well I am huge fan thank you so much for being here it was so fun chatting with you I think I'm gonna really look at the world through this new lens of coexisting and connection and how can we foster true community more so thank you so much thank you for having me and I I love that you brought up the concepts of community I think that I love talking about it it doesn't come up as much so I appreciate it yeah all right well that's it for another episode of Envision 2.0 huge thanks um for isra for showing us what productivity can look like in a healthy manner and how it's about caring for ourselves in smarter more intentional ways if this conversation sparked something for you please leave a comment below subscribe all of the things follow at girlboss at the Amanda Gats and we'll see you next week for another episode of Envision 2.0