Lezly Kaye Of Talentko and Grounded Leadership On How Authenticity and Vulnerability Pay Off and Help You Win Personally and Professionally

Being vulnerable and authentic are some of today’s popular buzzwords. It may seem counterintuitive to be vulnerable, as many of us have been taught to project an air of confidence, be a boss, and act like we know everything. In Brene Brown’s words, “vulnerability takes courage.” So is vulnerability a strength or a weakness? Can someone be authentic without being vulnerable? How can being authentic and vulnerable help someone grow both personally and professionally? In this interview series, we are talking to business leaders, mental health professionals and business and life coaches who can share stories and examples of “How Authenticity and Vulnerability Pay Off and Help You Win Personally and Professionally.” As a part of this series, I had the pleasure of interviewing Lezly Kaye.

Where Business Coaching meets full-life alignment is where you will find Lezly Kaye weaving worlds.

From multi million dollar businesses and emotionally bankrupt, to emotionally wealthy and and nearly bankrupt and back again. How The Self Responsibility Code ™ forged over years of business Growth, personal growth and insatiable curiosity with how we show up as humans has not only transformed Lezly life but her ability to be able to transform individuals and organisations.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we start, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a bit about your childhood backstory?

Born to drug addict parents and raised by emotionally unavailable grandparents in a small country town. I am the poster child for not being defined by our circumstances, simply the choices we make. Moving out of home when I was 14 to escape the circumstance of abusive family members, I tapped into this ever-present drive, this internal compass to free myself of the stories of poverty and crime that followed my family history. And step into a life of possibility.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

You are defined by your choices, not by your circumstances. I know plenty of private school ‘rich farm kids’ that wound up on drugs. Much like I know stories of successful entrepreneurs forged off the back of trauma. I have had a burning realisation through much of my life. We can truly have anything we desire; we just have to want it bad enough. Sure, I have made wrong turns, fell into ever enticing trap of playing victim to my own life. However, it would never be long until I called myself on my own BS, and started to redirect myself back to the bigness of the life I knew was waiting. And so, with the help of borrowed belief from peers, coaches and mentors, I continued to grow, evolve and back myself to create the life of my dreams.

Is there a particular book, podcast, or film that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?

There have been many, probably one of the most notable was Grant Cardone’s books and Podcasts. So much so I wrote a joint article on it! Grant Cardone told me to quit my job, although I have never met him. I have a theory of borrowed belief, that we should be in the frequency of those people that believe the big dreams, that help us reach for the previously thought unattainable goals and really go after the big lives we desire. Grant Cardone, or more his content, gave me the confidence to quit my job as the worlds best recruiter for one of the worlds largest recruiting firms, and pursue my dreams of being an entrepreneur. Launching my own business in 2020.

Let’s now shift to the main part of our discussion. Let’s begin with a definition of terms so that each of us and our readers are on the same page. What exactly does being authentic mean?

To me, it is the ability to be the most raw, expressed version of yourselves. The ability to be unmasked, and unfiltered. Void of fear of judgment, or shame. The ability to have the confidence to be truly you without the need to be the version of you that you anticipate the other person is expecting you to be. Where the need to people please has been integrated.

What does being vulnerable mean? Can you explain?

It is allowing your inner world to be seen, felt, heard and received by those in your life. It is showing those around you the truth of who you are, and the parts of ourselves we deem unlovable, unacceptable and therefore we hide them away from the world. And sometimes even from ourselves.

What are the positive aspects of being authentic and vulnerable? Can you give a story or example to explain what you mean?

People who have environments whereby all of them is welcome are shown to have less anxiety, more desire to engage and participate whether it be at work or in social settings.

It creates connection, and a sense of belonging. As the stories that are created in our minds around why we wont be accepted, why it is safer to live a half life out of fear of judgement or rejection start to dissolve and we can start to live more grounded integrated lives with connection at its core.

When our fight or flight responses in our nervous system are activated, we cannot relax, we are always on high alert, often, unconsciously. By creating connection and a sense of community through venerable sharing, we start to create more space for connection and trust to form naturally within organisations, teams and relationships.

Are there negative aspects to authenticity and vulnerability? Can you give a story or example to explain what you mean?

I believe if leaders haven’t reached the ability to hold themselves in their own authenticity and venerability they will lack the capacity to create a safe space for others. Becoming Trauma informed as a leader, the more we open these spaces for connection and the ability to be accepted unmasked is pivotal in creating thriving environments. We need to be able to allow our peers, our employees and those in our lives to be able to trust our leadership and ability and desire to connect deeper.

Should the space be created for someone to share themselves in a more venerable and authentic way, and that truth not be met with love, nonjudgement, and acceptance then we are in fear of creating further disconnect and divide.

When I first spoke into the truth of my childhood and the trauma that shaped my beliefs and strategies to not only my success, but my ever-relentless self-sabotage patterns, I wasn’t received in a way that made me feel not judged and accepted. That experience nearly cost me the progress I had made with my ability to continue to do the work to heal those patterns and behaviors. And if it wasn’t for my ability to identify the practitioner’s inability to hold me in my truth vs making me even more wrong for those experiences, I am not sure where I would be today on my journey. Likely not as self-loving and accepting.

From your experience or perspective, what are some of the common barriers that hold someone back from being authentic and vulnerable?

Our core human desire is to be loved and accepted. If we aren’t in an environment where we feel that showing our authentic selves will support that, then we aren’t going to be able to open up and share.

Not having a safe space to share, to be held and received in our full expression is at the core of people not feeling comfortable enough to share their true selves.

Here is the central question of our discussion. What are five ways that being authentic and vulnerable pay off, and help you win, both personally and professionally?

Relationships is the largest pay off authenticity and venerability has the ability to impact. The relationship at the core of every relationship and every interaction we have with the outside world. And it starts with the relationship with self. When we can truly show up for ourselves. When we can truly say, I love me, I have got me, and I am able to speak my truth no matter the forum, no matter the audience, no matter the perceived risk. Then our life begins to change in ways we have likely only ever dreamed of. Once we come into an honest relationship with ourselves, who we are, and our most expressed version of ourselves, our whole world and the relationships in it begin to shift. This shows up in our lives through our ability to communicate. When we communicate well with ourselves, we can communicate well with others. Better conversations with our partners, our peers, and our customers. We truly start to relate with the world in deeper more connected ways.

We become more confident, this ability to hold ourselves in our truth, and not have the engrained need to be accepted by everyone in our world, because the only person we truly need acceptance from is ourselves. That level of confidence, that level of belief makes the foundation to our lives unshakable. And I don’t mean the kind of confidence you find in affirmation cards, in pretending we are less afraid and more confident then we truly believe. I don’t mean the type of confidence that is masked by our egos, and is shallow, masked and unfounded by the voices in our heads reminding us we are less than, and that our pasts with catch up with us eventually. I mean the type of confidence that radiates from someone who knows who they are at their core, good and bad. That loves and accepts those parts and doesn’t have to hide from themselves or the world anymore. There is no doubt this helps us with relationships both inside and outside the boardroom. For those of us with our ungrounded ego running the show, this shows up in closing bigger deals, working with more aligned clients, or asking that desired person on a date. We stop expecting the world to reject us, when we stop rejecting ourselves.

Resilience, you know that thing that everyone wishes they could have more, that they could build in their teams, and bottle up to sell to the highest bidder? Well, when you become the storm, when you are so unequivocally grounded in self-belief and self-love. You have this new found ability to face the world, to hold onto faith that everything is working for you. That the whole world is conspiring with you for better days, better experiences and big fulfilling lives. So, you become the storm, and have the capacity to ride the waves to better days. To meet yourself in murky waters and do what it takes to continue to move in the direction of your most aligned life. We embody this in our lives by not giving up on that training we have been putting off, that project we have been delaying or that career we had checked out of. We can truly start to show up for ourselves and our lives.

Compassion and understanding become second nature when we come into alignment with who we are through the gifts of authentic venerability and authenticity. When we have had an opportunity to share ourselves in ways that perhaps we have not experienced before in our lives, there is a desire to create safe spaces for others to do the same. When we have freed ourselves from the self imposed prison of our minds, and the stories we have told ourselves about not being accepted. Then we start to view the world in the lenses of how can I share this gift with more people, so they may experience the same freedom that I have by loving and accepting myself in these ways. This shows up in our ability to be able to hold deeper more meaningful conversations and create environments, teams and leaders that share the same ability to be able to be true with one another and accept others for who they are.

Inner peace, this is a huge claim. But here is a sense of calm, a serenity that is found when you truly know yourself, your soul and your lifes purpose. How can being authentic and venerable unlock this you ask? Because are no longer conforming to societies request fro perfectly manicured perfectionism. We get to come home to ourselves, we get to build a relationship with the one person that we need a relationship with the most. Ourselves. When we master the ability to be able to love ourselves no matter what is in front of us, or behind us. We are able to step fully into our life path, call in the relationships that fulfill us, and truly listen to the inner compass directing us to the big vision of life we know is possible. It is not just about the success, the money, the connection. It is about full life alignment, and giving ourself permission to have it all.

You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be?

The Self Responsibility Code ™ the work I am already bringing to the world. The view that we are the common denominator in everything good and everything bad in our lives. And give people the awareness, tools, and teachings to be able to create lasting change to take ownership of all areas of their lives.

To reach fulfillment, grounded spirituality (a belief in something outside of themselves that is here for the betterment of humanity) and a deep feeling of belonging. Not only in the world, but in our own lives.

There are too many stories of wildly wealthy and deeply unfulfilled unhappy people in the world. And I am here to instill the belief that we can truly have it all. Wealth, health, freedom. We can unshackle the chains that shame and guilt for to keep us bound to living half-lives. And we can have everything we desire, fulfilling relationships, fulfilling careers, and connection to community that helps us be better versions of ourselves.

We don’t have to pick and chose what areas of our life we are happy in, we don’t have to have great careers and failing relationships. Or great relationships and unsatisfying careers. Through authenticy, venerability and a deep sense of knowing who we are and where we are going, we truly can create a life with it all!

Wealth, health and freedom awaits.

Is there a person in the world whom you would love to have lunch with, and why? Maybe we can tag them and see what happens!

Regan Hillyer, a multimillionaire whom has built an empire on the grounded mission of allowing others to reach their potential and build their own legacy grounded in helping others do the same.

How can our readers follow you online?

www.instagram.com/groundedleadership.co

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for the time you spent on this. We wish you only continued success.

About The Interviewer: Maria Angelova, MBA is a disruptor, author, motivational speaker, body-mind expert, Pilates teacher and founder and CEO of Rebellious Intl. As a disruptor, Maria is on a mission to change the face of the wellness industry by shifting the self-care mindset for consumers and providers alike. As a mind-body coach, Maria’s superpower is alignment which helps clients create a strong body and a calm mind so they can live a life of freedom, happiness and fulfillment. Prior to founding Rebellious Intl, Maria was a Finance Director and a professional with 17+ years of progressive corporate experience in the Telecommunications, Finance, and Insurance industries. Born in Bulgaria, Maria moved to the United States in 1992. She graduated summa cum laude from both Georgia State University (MBA, Finance) and the University of Georgia (BBA, Finance). Maria’s favorite job is being a mom. Maria enjoys learning, coaching, creating authentic connections, working out, Latin dancing, traveling, and spending time with her tribe. To contact Maria, email her at angelova@rebellious-intl.com. To schedule a free consultation, click here.