Emily Hickey

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0:31Side effects may include allergic reactions, neck and injection site pain, fatigue, and headache. Allergic reactions can include rash, welts, asthma symptoms, and dizziness. Don't receive Botox if there's a skin infection. Tell your doctor your medical history, muscle or nerve conditions, including ALS Lou Gehrig's disease, myasthenia gravis or Lambert-Eaton syndrome, and medications, including botulinum toxins, as these may increase the risk of serious side effects. Why wait? Ask your doctor. Visit BotoxChronicMigraine.com or call 1-800-44-BOTOX to learn more.

1:03When you are pioneering anything or introducing new ideas to the culture, you get criticized. You do? Yeah. Did you hear about that? I didn't find the one. I found someone I respected and we made it the one. In a sort of longing kind of view of love, people understand each other as if by magic. Nothing in itself is addictive on the one hand. On the other hand, everything could be addictive if there's an emptiness in that person that needs to be filled. I now know that nobody changes until they change their energy. And when you change your energy, you change your life. I'm Gwyneth Paltrow. This is the Goop Podcast, bringing together thought leaders, culture changers, creatives, founders and CEOs, scientists, doctors, healers and seekers.

1:51Here to start conversations, because simply asking questions and listening has the power to change the way we see the world. Here we go. Welcome to the Goop Podcast. I'm Gwyneth Paltrow and today I'm sitting down with someone who has helped me reconnect deeply with my own sense of purpose. A growth strategist, a very trusted advisor, and an invaluable collaborator in my life. We talk about the why behind our work and our lives, the glass ceilings we quietly build for ourselves, and the courage it takes to step fully into the arena. Thoughtful, expansive, and always inspiring, Emily Hickey.

2:37So we're back together, Emily Hickey. So I don't know that we ever, have we said, it's hard to define, but like you are helping me so much in my, like my journey as a CEO, like there's coaching, there's marketing stuff. Like it's, it's how do we define what, what our relationship is? What is our, I don't know. I know we have, it doesn't have a name. It doesn't have a name, but you are a coach and an inspiration, a teacher, a friend, an honest voice, like you bring things back to center. So, you know, you're a very important collaborator in my life. And the last time we spoke, we were sort of focused on the brand why, right?

3:26Like, I think we have a lot of entrepreneur listeners, and a lot of women who are in business and not necessarily in their own business, but are working at businesses where they also have to understand the brand why of why they're there. And then I think we started to talk of like the extrapolation of that out to, you know, us in our lives and our art and also, you know, it's like you reference somebody in your life, I don't want to necessarily call her out, but who, you know, made choices not to be a professional woman, and still very much in her nucleus is like, what is the why. And so I think we started to talk about the why, not only as it pertains to brand, but as it pertains to us in our lives, like a personal why and how that, of course, can dovetail into a brand why if you're working on a brand.

4:26And so and you you've been reading a lot about why don't you talk a little bit about your line of thinking on this and what you've been reading lately. Deep diving on that. Yeah, even deep diving on. So I think, you know, my point of view for people like us, you know, is that work and life is all one thing, you know, and that's why what you and I do together is hard to define because it goes across both. And what you're trying to accomplish in the context of your business is in a lot of ways trying to accomplish yourself, you know, and obviously that that's a core theme of Goop as a brand. It's a core theme of both of our lives and most people's lives, you know, that we're Americans and we're workaholics and a lot of the crucible for where we, you know, find and become ourselves is at work, you know, it's where we do, that's sort of where the wrestling matches.

5:21So my feeling, you know, I'm a Jungian. Is that the deep dive? There are many deep dives. Well, there are many deep dives. I was talking, you know, who's the president that you've been – Roosevelt. Yeah, Teddy Roosevelt. You're Teddy Roosevelt. I'm obsessed with Teddy Roosevelt. Yeah. Why are you obsessed with Teddy Roosevelt right now? Because he had a moral center. Because, you know, the first page of his autobiography talks about how, you know, his whole thing was the arena. He coined that phrase, right, and this concept of a strenuous life and that it's a life of effort and energy and intention and where you have a North Star and a point of view and where in the midst of everything coming at you, you are trying to do the right thing.

6:00And he always had kind of a foot in his family. He was a picture of wholeness. The people I really admire are whole. They've done something in their life to achieve wholeness. You do that. You're a good example of that. And I think that's what your brand is about. We've talked about that a lot. But I think that that is the journey of life. That is what the Jungian journey would be. It's why I love everything he says. I just think he got it so right. You know, that his fundamental premise about life is that your job is to externally manifest who you are, you know? And that was at the core of his why.

6:37So meaning it's like, it's sui generis. Everybody has their own. We're as unique as our DNA, right? So our why's are as unique as we are. And if, so was Teddy Roosevelt, would you say that Teddy Roosevelt's why was to pursue the uniqueness of his own person? I think he had a why of service. He's a little bit, I'm not quite that way. You know, like he was obsessed with Abe Lincoln, actually. He wore his hair in a ring on his finger at his second inauguration, like he, because he saw him as somebody who was unspoiled by prosperity and who drove for purpose. He really was a president with purpose and a moral center, right?

7:20And I think that that's what Roosevelt was trying to do. I think he believed that every person's life mattered, which is the premise of the United States and the Declaration of Independence is the value of an individual life. And he really fought for that. So I think he just, he was like a service guy. You know, I don't think of myself that way. I'm not a politician. I have zero interest in that at all. But he had a purpose in his life and it was very balanced. Nature was a big part of it and his family and his duty to the country. But I think basically I believe in purpose. I believe in a soul.

7:59I think everybody has a soul. It's not that I have a specific idea of religion, but I do think everybody has a soul. And I think that's what screams at you when you're off track. You know, like I think that we're all born with a set of instincts and a concept of who we can be and what we should be doing. And it is the Jungian thing of like the soul or the unconscious can't talk, but it knows. Whereas your ego side of your life can talk, but it doesn't know. And so there's always this interplay of this thing inside you trying to steer you, you know, in the right direction. And it can do that through instinct and through dreams and depression and anxiety and all of the other sort of, you know, psychotic manifestations of not being aligned with what you're supposed to be doing in your life.

8:43You get spoken to. Yeah. When you're right. Which makes sense to me. So he talked about the arena that was like, to be the man in the arena, to be the man who makes the choice to do something publicly, to move the world publicly, right? And I think for him being of service was public service. And not only to serve the public, but to be in the public. Like that's a factor of service, right? And what comes along with being a man in the arena and how he talks about, you know, it's the man in the arena that is sort of gets the jeers and the claps and like is subject to the opinions of the people who are choosing to sit on the sidelines, right?

9:28And there's like this inherent bravery and almost foolhardy, right? Like bravery and to go into the arena and to plan a flag and say, I'm going to do this because I believe in my purpose. I believe that I have a purpose and I believe that I can move the world forward in some way. And I'm foolhardy enough to believe that. And I can withstand, you know, the jeers and the claps and all of the things. So like, is, do you feel like to, to have that, like that it, cause in a way it's like to be so wedded to your purpose, like that's what gives me bravery. You know what I mean? In those situations where I can keep being a man in the arena as ridiculous as it is and however foolhardy it is and like whatever gauntlet I go through, but I'm so wedded to my purpose.

10:24Like it's so in my cells that I just, there's no choice for me, right. But to live in the arena and like, that's my purpose. What, what, so how would you describe that? What do you, what is your purpose? I've been thinking a lot about this, you know, in anticipation of this conversation. And I find it so hard to articulate because it's like, like I could tell you a million things about what my purpose is. like there's, you know, and, but it's, it's, it's more of a feeling. It's so abstract, like it's so difficult to articulate, but it has something to do with like, this drive to pursue my full self.

11:11And like with this abject belief that if I do that, then the people who I'm around like might witness that and feel that ability to like you know it's sort of what what what you're saying about Teddy Roosevelt like this this like I just want everyone to sort of be able to join hands and feel what's possible within them yeah like how however weird and specific and unusual that might be and it doesn't have to look like how it looks for me or you right That we all have this incredible gift that does come from our soul. And that it's almost like a waste if we are sublimating. It's like a waste of your life.

12:05So it's like I have this drive, like don't waste your life. I think you do have that. No, I agree. I think that's it. I think that that urge is to create yourself and to become whole. and it takes self-awareness and struggle you know that's where so much of the meaning comes from a struggle and playing all your good cards and your bad cards and i think everybody you know people ask me that a lot you know in the course of just building friendships at work or you know like people who feel like they don't have their careers figured out or you know and i like that i think is the toughest thing is when they don't have the game board for executing that struggle within i I think yours is so clear.

12:48And I think everybody has a few. I guess I don't think that there's one distinct purpose. I think there are a few. And with you, that one is very clear, is that I think you have a drive to play a leadership role in the world. Where there's something about you that gets more gratification from growing yourself in a way that it brings other people along. And there's a group piece of that, which is so cool, that you've used your own pushing to find yourself as like a public act to bring other people along with you, which is so cool. and but there I mean I think you know we've talked about the concept of home like I think you have a big theme in your life of creating your your concept of home with all of everything settled and in place and ordered and hearth and cooking and creativity and kids and where I think there's always people always have a journey path like their their core narrative I think has lost you with how they grew up.

13:55Have you, do you think about your why like this? Yeah. And what is yours? I mean, I think, I think I have a few. I think, so the, I would say the main hero's journey, I think everyone needs to have some clarity around what they're coming from and what they're going towards, you know, and there's a narrative. And I think a lot of that for me has to do with changing my concept of family, you know, that we had circumstances growing up that I really am determined to correct in my own family. And that pretty much is what I'm after, you know. Interesting. So yours is more of a, like it's a reflection back?

14:43Well, I think it's just, my picture of what I wanted in my life was a reaction to what I was coming from and i think also like it's self-growth driven the way yours is a hundred percent but like so i have you know sides of my personality i've just been really determined to break through and not like shyness i was a paralyzingly shy child and i think if you are shy that's a lifelong battle. It just is. And also, you know, confidence and I think fear, you know, things that you don't have. But like for me, those were - Things that who doesn't have? You. I, what? I don't think, I think you're so brave.

15:32Do you think you have fear?

15:36Well, that's a good question. I mean, I have anxiety. Yeah. but I actually don't maybe I don't have a lot of fear I mean sometimes like I'll have I do have fear around speaking in front of groups but I'm not driven by fear yeah I'm I sometimes I get anxious yeah yeah but I think in the more that I the the more that I you know when I've tried a lot of things in my life and the more that I am vulnerable, vulnerable about the things that I'm learning, then the more confident I can be. Right. So I think that's, that's been an important part of like finding confidence. Yeah. Is that, but I feel like you're super confident.

16:24And when you, I don't know, when you talk about leading your team and that kind of thing, and you, you You know, is that how all your preparation comes in? Like you seem so well prepared. Is that to bolster or find confidence? Yeah. I mean, you know that I over prepare and overthink everything. Yeah. I mean, that is a core weapon for me is being so prepared. But no, I mean, I'm confident in business. I'm confident. But we're also meeting each other in our 50s. You know what I mean? It took me a long time to find my footing in terms of self-esteem. I had a huge fear of failure. That was probably one of the biggest things holding me back.

17:10And doing things I shouldn't have been doing in my 30s, when I look at how I was spending my time, it was so off. And when I turned 40, I changed pretty much everything. And I really did. And that really put me on my track. That's why I think this is so important. I think if you don't understand, if one doesn't understand like their own, you know, some sense of meaning and purpose and what they're good at and what their shadow self is and the stuff that they need to work on. And if they don't understand that with a lot of self-awareness, I think they're really disadvantaged in figuring out, getting the pieces in place that are really going to make them successful and happy.

17:49And so when you see people struggling and defining their career, I think a lot of times they don't have a lot of self-awareness. Like, I don't think they know what they're good at, you know, and I don't think they know what they're bad at.

18:19It's the number one prescribed branded chronic migraine preventive treatment. Prescription Botox is injected by your doctor. Effects of Botox may spread hours to weeks after injection causing serious symptoms. Alert your doctor right away as difficulty swallowing, speaking, breathing, eye problems, or muscle weakness can be signs of a life-threatening condition. Patients with these conditions before injection are at highest risk. Side effects may include allergic reactions, neck and injection site pain, fatigue, and headache. Allergic reactions can include rash, welts, asthma symptoms, and dizziness.

18:46Don't receive Botox if there's a skin infection. Tell your doctor your medical history, muscle or nerve conditions, including ALS Lou Gehrig's disease, myasthenia gravis or Lambert-Eaton syndrome, and medications, including botulinum toxins, as these may increase the risk of serious side effects. Why wait? Ask your doctor, visit BotoxChronicMigraine.com, or call 1-800-44-BOTOX to learn more. so is there an exercise that you suggest like how how could somebody currently like who's currently sort of rudderless around this topic like how could they is do you sit down and kind of make a list and like make a pact with yourself that you're going to be incredibly honest and and sort of take inventory of what you can do and i i think you have to have some kind of structure for doing that.

19:35I mean, I think I did a combination. I'm not like a therapy person, so I didn't talk to anybody. Like I don't, it's just never, you know what I did? I did, I think that the power of the visual imagination is unparalleled. I really do. It's how we've talked about this, how Einstein solved like the theory of relativity as he pictured it, you know? And I think if you can't picture your life in a really complete way that would make you happy. I mean, I think a lot of people can't picture that actually, or they've never tried. What is the way to do that? I wonder. Well, I think you can, like I randomly, when I was like in the throes of existential crisis in my thirties, I randomly bought this book about visualization.

20:18I thought it was a meditation book and it was a manifestation book. As a total side note, one of the things I was envisioning, it was great. It was like, do this exercise where you picture where you you think of something in your past when you were really happy you know and i kept picturing i had like after my first.com i had bought a house in tahoe and i like was doing my music and trying to get that out of my system i love it and i like it was a very important part you know time of my life but but i used to hike i used to go on this hike behind the house and had this little pond. It was like this alpine little pond.

20:59And I would constantly, I was constantly hiking up there. It was what I would do every single morning. And so, and it was a very, it was a great time actually of life. And, and so I would lie when I was living in New York city and super stressed out and had babies and was like in a disastrous place in my career. Like the whole F minor, I mean a horrible, horrible time of life. So I would lie on my, lie on the floor of this apartment in the East Village. And I would picture just walking up to that little pond. And then five years later, without any deliberate decision making at all, ended up living in Telluride with a pond in our backyard.

21:36I mean, it's just, life is funny. You know, I would, and then I would do this exercise where I would sort of change the channel and picture myself as like Hillary Clinton with like a haircut and a suit. You know what I mean? Like, I would just channel change of like, who do I want to be here? You know what I mean? Is that because from the way I was programmed from my mom, that actually probably would have been something that it looked like. You know what I mean? But that's like my idea of misery. You know, I'm just a more creative person than that. And I need more independence. I don't like to be, I don't like anything corporate.

22:08I don't like to be boxed in. And it just sort of, that kind of exercise led me to sort of this, I'm just going to be the talent because I need to be so good at what I do that I can just be who I am. I can be this kind of soft, sensitive, Midwestern sucker walking through the world. Like I'm just going to be so good at what I do that I don't get eaten alive by alpha personalities in boardrooms or whatever it is. Did you have a lot of that? Yeah, that was how I spent my 30s. Like I would say just getting really beat up by alpha investors and as like sort of the second in charge of COO or CMO type of companies as a sort of almost professional co-founder.

22:48So I would go into company after company and like help them scale it and figure it out and do whatever the founder couldn't do. And so it just was not, anybody who's done that type of role on a serial basis knows how brutal that existence is. So I mean, so I just had this kind of defiance of the soul moment of like, I'm not gonna work for anyone anymore. That is over. I'm never ever doing that again. and I don't like I'm just going to do what I'm good at which is the growth part of all this I don't want to do all this other crap and I'm not getting dressed up I'm not going to run around in skinny jeans and they're out of style anyway so you left at the right time yeah I know thank god no I just I just had like this and that gave you the courage to start your own I mean I was just sort of at rock bottom.

23:38I was just like, you know, so I built back up. I did this very, you know, irrational process. I think trying to solve with purely with your rational side of your mind is not going to work. I think that you have to let instinct bubble up and guide you. And you have to listen to that, you know? And so my way of doing that was this meditation of like picturing myself, you know what I mean? And then I kind of right or left brained it in terms of, okay what am I going to do and I think like I just got to work you know what I mean I just kind of created a rule set and I was like I'm not gonna I think it's a big gotcha to to pay attention to the scoreboard I think the score takes care of itself I think you just do to get you know do something diligently in a way that is honest like you always talk about being in your own integrity if you're focused if your flashlight's on the page pretty close I think you it's like a data science thing.

24:30If like, it's a, it's a proven thing. Like the number of steps ahead that somebody can see the worst decisions they make, like they put people trying to get through a maze or whatever. You got to shine the flashlight close to the page, you know, and just do in your circumference of, of, of your life, just do what you like doing and, and what you're, what you're good at, you know? And I think the pieces kind of fall into place from there. So that's kind of what I did. And how do you hold that? And like the, the vision board, the sort of manifestation, the big picture I'm going here? Well, for me, you know, again, I just started to make these micro decisions.

25:06Like, okay, I can picture in my life that I don't want to be in boardrooms and I could care less about a career track or a title, or it's just not how I'm driven, you know? And I'm just going to start doing the stuff that I like and have faith that it's going to, you know, bring me to the life that I want, which, which is, you know, a materially driven life. I don't think there's anything wrong with having ambitions around the life that you're creating for your kids or for yourself. But for me, trying to like do something explicitly to create that life wasn't successful. And I just had to do what I, what I liked and what I was good at.

25:47And that was, for me, was marketing and growing companies. That's the piece of doing this that I really like. And I feel like I have a nose for it. I feel like I'm, like I always tell the kids out of school, if you lined up 100 people, what's the thing you're best at? That's actually what you should be doing. And so I think half the battle is figuring out what that is. And I was lucky that it was clear to me, you know, what that was. I think that leads to joy, too, when you can index into doing the thing that you're good at doing. You know, it's like my, my hardest part of my job is to try when I'm trying to do the things that I'm not good at, like I'm not born to do.

26:25Yeah. You know, it's part of my job sometimes. But I mean, because of course we all have responsibilities in our jobs or most of us, right, that are outside our zone of genius. Yeah. Yeah. It's this part of life. Yeah. But it can be demoralizing. Yeah.

26:47it can like yeah i know like i'm just i'm like why i'm so like there's so many things i'm just not naturally good at me too you know it's important to know that like onboarding people i'm just so bad i just can't i just can't do it we've got us we got our 90 day plan you know function. Thanks to you I know. But I do think that there's been there is kind of a great freedom that comes when you can admit the things that you're not good at and be like this is not my life's purpose to create a 90-day onboarding plan. Like it's just I'm not good at it and I'm never going to be so I can rely on other people to help me with that.

27:38I agree but I think there also i mean i want to hear like your your time in your 30s that we talked about yeah was this time for you too the 30s are brutal they are and i feel like nobody kind of warned yeah you know nobody foreshadowed what the 30s are which is like this very bizarre it's like when you're in your 20s you kind of still have the latitude of being a kid right you're sort of the under the it's like you're in your 20s and anything is still possible you could still like choose a different career and your friends and family wouldn't freak out you know you could call off an engagement you could move to a new city you're in your 20s you're in a intense period of self discovery yeah so kind of anything goes yeah but then I felt personally like all of a sudden I was turning 30 and I was like, okay, you know, and professionally I was in a good place.