Boundless Podcast - Nita Baum on how to "be free" and self-employed (Episode 18)

[01:00] Paul: Welcome to The Boundless Podcast. I'm Paul Millerd, and I created this podcast because I'm passionate about making sense of the future of work and having conversations with the innovators, creators, and thought leaders who are carving their path in today's fast-changing world. You can check out the podcast and more on boundlesspod.com. So today I talk with Nita Baum, who is a freelancer and has worked independently for almost 12 years, which is pretty incredible. She was ahead of her time. She is also the founder and creator of Be Free, which is a platform to help individuals make transformations into self-employment and make leaps generally, I think, in their lives.

We had a pretty fascinating conversation today. We talked about organizations, we talked about freelancing, we talked about mindsets, We talked about meaning. We talked about a lot of different things. So I think you'll enjoy the conversation today. Again, thanks to everyone that has been so supportive and hope you enjoy it. So welcome to the podcast, Nita.

[02:11] Nita Baum: Thanks, Paul. I really appreciate the opportunity to be here and chat with you.

[02:15] Paul: Fantastic. So I was struggling with how to introduce you, but I definitely just want to introduce you as somebody I definitely look up to for inspiration. I thought the best way to introduce you was say you're a friend, a sister, founder, writer, teacher, facilitator, researcher, and consultant. Does that cover it?

[02:38] Nita Baum: Yeah, I think it speaks to the idea that it's hard to put any of us in a box, but yes, I'll say I've done many of those things.

[02:48] Paul: Perfect. So you're somebody I see is just incredibly curious. You've done a lot of different things throughout your career and life and wanted to just start asking the question, how does somebody become so curious about the world?

[03:04] Nita Baum: Yeah, that's, um, that's a good question. It makes me have to get curious with myself. Um, so I don't know, I think I've always— maybe one of the significant drivers for it is just always being very deeply interested in people and the way that we relate to each other and connect to each other. I think the roots of that for me were very much at home, but also in school. So on the home side, like, my mom was a scientist and she was super passionate about her work. She studied cancer and the body, and I think definitely inspired me.

She's interested in nutrition and wellness and sort of like the science of being a human, and that was definitely inspirational for the analytical side. Like, I was pre-med and art history in college, which I think represents this like interesting left brain, right brain dichotomy. It's quite the two different paths. Yeah, totally, which maybe also just reflects like, you know, never quite exactly knowing where I would land, but being you know, being a seeker. And then on the flip side, my dad, who was also, he was a pharmacist, but he was also like an idealist and a philosopher and a big broad thinker. So our conversations when I was a kid, you know, very young, started focusing on things like some of his heroes were MLK, JFK, Gandhi.

So we talked a lot about the ways that how humans connect with each other. You know, what is the role of religion versus spirituality in the world? Where do we go and what are our tools when we're suffering? Like, how do we navigate those experiences? And our car, yeah, we were like big, we watched Charlie Rose and there were a broad range of topics. So I think some of that came from home.

And then in school, I just really remember being very curious about and like drawn to my peers. I was like shy, but very like, maybe the shyness went along with being an observer, which is something I observed in freelancers a lot too. We tend to be like these people who identify as sort of like, we're very comfortable in these positions where we're keen to observe and learn before, I don't know, before like taking big action. So Yeah.

[05:36] Paul: So I know everyone gets this, but how did you respond to the question, what do you want to do when you grow up? Or who do you want to be? Because like everyone gets asked that question. And, um, for me, I, for the longest time it was just like basketball player for me. It was easy to answer, but, um, that obviously didn't turn out to be true.

[05:59] Nita Baum: Well, um, I definitely had like delusions of grandeur when I was a kid. I was like, so I, one of my favorite things to do was to watch the Olympics. Like maybe that came from the fascination with the body, but also just with athletics. I ran and I played tennis and was always physical. So, and I think one of the things about Olympians, so like my secret answer within myself was something like maybe an Olympian, maybe some kind of a major athlete. The things I would say to people was generally an author, a writer, And maybe at some points I would say teacher.

But just to go back to the Olympian thing, I think I remember really distinctly, it was like very particular. 1984, it was the Olympics of gymnastics. And I was watching men's gymnastics. I think Mitch Gaylord won the gold that year. And I just remember being fascinated by the idea that here are these humans like accomplishing these superhuman feats. And being very curious about what was it that, you know, they were leaning on, or what was it that they were using to be able to progress themselves into these states that to, you know, our first-time observer seemed like impossible, right?

And it got me really— I think that got me curious about the human psyche too.

[07:22] Paul: So in some ways, you've always been curious about like what drives high performance. Instead of coaching Olympians now, you're coaching freelancers and self-employed people?

[07:35] Nita Baum: Totally, yeah. So, that's one part of the work. And it's a broad spectrum, people who are either early in their experience of leaving the world of work and exploring the possibility of doing that. And I definitely convert people whether I do it accidentally or deliberately.

[07:57] Paul: I've noticed I've had the same effect on people over the past couple years. It's almost like a correlation, like the longer you talk to me, people are like, I'm thinking about quitting my job. And I'm like, oh no. Oh no.

[08:10] Nita Baum: And oh yes, it's awesome at the same time. Yeah. And I, and I think that that speaks to probably their readiness.

[08:18] Paul: You've been doing it for almost 12 years. Is that right?

[08:22] Nita Baum: Yeah, so I, I mean, I started my first— so Alight was my first freelance consultancy. It was a strategy and policy and primarily worked with really large-scale education organizations, mostly in urban ed, somewhat in higher ed, and then occasionally mission-driven for-profits. And the goal there was just really supporting people through major strategic shifts. So the work was like strategy, policy, and org change became a very big component of it. Because I was doing strategic planning. And at the time, I was like, you know, I think despite the staggering number of people who are self-employed, you know, the current statistic is it's supposed to be over half the US labor force by 2027.

And we're on trajectory for that. I think we're in like the early 40s. So, but at the time, you know, I was Among my peer group, I was one of the few people who was working for myself. Yeah, that's pretty rare. Yeah, totally. And, you know, and also, I mean, peer group and context matters too.

Like, I didn't come from— I came from like— I didn't come from like a big entrepreneurial background. I went to business school. I worked for a consulting firm. I worked for the government. So I was in these very like bureaucratic theoretically stable organizations. So when I left, it was sort of, it was kind of a big deal.

So my friends would send me people who were thinking about doing the same. And so it was interesting. Like I just, I started coaching people very early on and partially I was just never oriented to be particularly competitive. I would share like tools and rates and just all forms of support. I was just oriented to be collaborative. It always made sense to me.

I would send people work and referrals to other potential places. So, the genesis of BeFree was that. It was like supporting people who were doing what I was doing and being able to do that, being in a position of mentorship mostly because I had a little more experience than they did.

[10:33] Paul: Got it. So, we'll definitely dive into BeFree. I think you're up to some pretty incredible things. But what are some of the changes you're seeing in just the types of people being attracted to self-employment or freelancing? Over the past 10 years?

[10:47] Nita Baum: Yeah, that's a great question. I think, you know, I think, I think it's just more people and it's more across industry. I think like, I think there were particular pivot points where, you know, maybe around the 2008 financial crisis and, you know, where layoffs were one of the, some of the people I was encountering were people who were coming out of industries where there were high numbers of layoffs. And I think that now, I think one of the big shifts that I observed more so in the past couple of years is like, there's less of an internal pressure from the corporate or government, wherever it is that people are coming from. And it's more like people are just, people are leaving of their own volition. And I think that's probably due to a number of factors.

I mean, one is that I think the more, the more people do it, the more people have the sense that it's possible. Like one of the major questions I would get from people, the very first question was just like, can I actually do this? Is this sustainable? Is it, is it possible? And I think there's this, you know, it's kind of like the Olympian. It's sort of that you start seeing people do it and you're kind of like, oh, maybe I can as well.

And then I also think there's this really massive social, political, cultural shift, a shift that I think of from an evolutionary standpoint in our consciousness, our desire for like greater purpose and meaning in our lives. And I think also some of the younger set, like the people who are coming out now, you know, people talk a lot about the millennials, but I think there's a higher drive among among younger people to potentially skip the traditional worlds of work and go straight into self-employment. Those are a couple of things I think I've noticed that are different.

[12:41] Paul: Yeah, so I'm curious what you think about the whole like meaning at work. So I've been diving into this and I almost think we've gone too far in terms of trying to extract meaning from work. I found that almost working on my own, I've had to search for meaning outside of work more than actual work. And I'm seeing like more and more the people talking about meaning at work are mostly full-time employees.

[13:10] Nita Baum: Yeah.

[13:11] Paul: So I'm curious how you're thinking about that and just how everything fits together.

[13:16] Nita Baum: Yeah, that's a really interesting framing of the question. So I'll take it from two perspectives, like from the perspective of people who are inside the world of work I think they're seeking meaning because— and this is a sort of harsh view of the experience of being internal to organizations, and it's also a generalization, so I'm aware of that as I say it— but, you know, from my experience, a lot of the people who come to us don't feel fulfilled in the context of work, and they don't feel like physically healthy, they don't feel seen, heard, and they don't feel self-expressed for the fullness and the totality of what it's possible they could be contributing in the world of work. So, and I think it feels— work feels much more transactional in conventional settings where it's like, here I am, I'm showing up to do this job, right?

You've afforded— like, it's your vision and I'm executing on it. And that's a much less creative stance, I think, when then, by contrast, when you're out working for yourself, I think it's interesting. Like, I think meaning meaning itself takes on a new meaning once you're outside of that context. So I think there's a hunger inside the context, and I think once you're out, I think at least initially, like, I think there are different, there are different things that become important depending on where you are in the life cycle of your self-employment experience.

And I think at the inception, you know, which for people it varies, but maybe like the first like 0 to 3 years maybe, is what I've seen is you're in an exploratory phase and it's really difficult to, I think, in that inception, because especially if you're coming out of worlds of work and educational experiences where you're, you're heavily conditioned and oriented to be doing work that was defined, the vision for which was defined by people other than you and your own alignment with it was like you know, medium to mild or low at best. And so I think the first few years are this exploratory phase. They're this— you're redefining yourself, you're starting to become deconditioned from those environments, and you're kind of awakening to the idea that you could be the source of this new vision.

And it takes, you know, we're an urgency-driven culture, but But that's like, it's as deep as shifting your identity. And that's work that takes time and it happens over the course of a number of years and may not happen in the first 3 years. So I think sometimes the desire to find meaning can start feeling like pressure if you're kind of pushing toward it more quickly. And then I also agree with you, work is not the only place where meaning can be found, but I do think that the opportunity of work is that it can be the expression of what is very meaningful to you. And I think, I also think in that sense, like, once you figure out what that is, it can be very healing. Like it's, so there's this one theory that I work with when I work with clients on defining their purpose and kind of looking for the meaning in their work.

Work. And it's the idea that our wounds are very directly connected to our purpose. And maybe just to step back for a second, it's like, why does purpose and meaning matter? The way I think about it is that, you know, we know from all the research that extrinsic motivators ultimately have diminishing returns. So very concretely, and you probably have, you know, specific— I think I've read some of your data points on this, but the idea that you know, at a certain point money doesn't motivate us anymore, right? It like plateaus and then it diminishes.

So what becomes a source of motivation? One of the reasons I'm interested in purpose and our wounds, which I'll come back to in a second because I think they're connected, is because I think once you're self-employed and really any context of work, we need to find sustainable sources of motivation. Otherwise, and we know the extrinsic ones don't matter. So where does that sustainable source come from? It comes from, it comes from you. Like, you are the potential source of it.

And that's where I do buy into the idea of the importance of meaning because, and I think one thing that's important is to recognize like that is dynamic, right? That's not going to— adults, there's adult development psychology, like we develop and we change over time. So our identity shifts in some very fundamental ways. And the old school idea that you don't, you don't develop anymore following a certain age, um, that's not true. Like, we— the research shows that, and I think so does just like straight up logic.

[18:16] Paul: Yeah, I think we always underestimate how much will change over the next 10 years. And totally, uh, looking back, we always— I think, I don't know, I was reading something, I think looking back, I think we overestimate how much we change, but looking forward, we dramatically underestimate it.

[18:35] Nita Baum: Sure. Yeah, that's really interesting. Yeah, that's really fascinating. That, that makes, that makes sense to me. I think, I think looking forward as we're anticipatory, like if we're coming from a space of— when we're anticipatory, we're often anxious and we're coming from a space of fear. And maybe one of the reasons we bound our perception of how much we're going to change is because it's It's too overwhelming to actually conceive of that.

I don't know, but I'm always interested in the psychological drivers of that.

[19:09] Paul: In terms of meaning, how have others reacted to you? First, when did people accept that, okay, self-employment, she's actually in this for good?

[19:21] Nita Baum: Yeah.

[19:21] Paul: And two, how have you noticed just people having conversations around you? I've had some people say to me, well, you don't work. So, you have a good life, but how have people reacted to what you're doing and carving your own path out there?

[19:39] Nita Baum: Yeah, it's a great question. I think we've spoken about this too. I definitely used to get— my parents used to be like, "You don't have a real job, so you can do all this other stuff. Come home and fix the garage because you don't have a real job." Like, I always like to look at things from the internal contours and the external ones. I think my own relationship to self-employment has shifted over the course of it being, you know, like a decade and over, like just recognizing this is a real thing myself. And I think my ability to communicate that and articulate what I'm doing has shifted and I just feel more grounded in it.

So I think I communicate differently. My vision has grown as well. Like, I definitely went through a process, you know, Alight was my first endeavor, Be Free is a second one. And I would say as far as meaning goes, like, Be Free is the expression of a multitude of threads in my life that I'm really interested in exploring and sharing with the world. And as you know, that's definitely getting to that place really, like, just has helped me have the confidence to be like, yeah, I'm doing something that's worthy. It's a worthy contribution.

And then externally, and I should say just to close that arc, like when I got out, I was like, what the hell am I doing? I was on these trajectories where I was technically successful according to typical metrics of success. Right? Like, I, I was making good salary and I was getting promoted regularly and I had recognition and all those things, but they didn't feel— that didn't feel particularly fulfilling to me, um, which I think again is a testament to the extrinsic versus the intrinsic motivators and metrics of success. Um, I think the ones we define internally are, are much more powerful and sticky, but I think it takes us a little while to get to what those are. And then, yeah, sorry, go ahead.

[21:45] Paul: What are some of those for you? Like, how are you defining success for yourself these days?

[21:51] Nita Baum: Yeah, number one is like, number one has to do with learning. And I don't know how to make it pithy, but it's like, I cannot tell you how good it feels to have the opportunity to just like read research in a totally self-motivated way, which is I read and research both for work, you know, and something I'm working on specifically, but also very broadly, just according to like whatever my current interest is. And I think when I worked in traditional environments, I was always feeling the void and the lack of that, and always feeling like, you know, sort of like rushed to be providing counsel as a consultant, for example, to be providing counsel to other people. Without feeling like fully having had like the full expanse of time to research and study. So I think it's one of the great opportunities of working for yourself.

Like you can really invest in learning and that becomes, it becomes this thread that's like at some point, I know initially I felt uncomfortable. I was like, I'm supposed to be productive. And eventually I redefined what productive was. And productivity included learning. Another one is just like the ability to follow my own natural physical rhythms. I think when you work for yourself, for me certainly, it just becomes like the relationship between production and consumption at the very personal, you know, with your whole mind, body, spirit sort of ecosystem becomes really clear.

Like what I consume, you know, the rhythms of my of my body, like, have a really big impact on my ability to create. And so I'm— it's really awesome for me to be able to, uh, like, nurture, nourish my own physical well-being and mental well-being so that I can be a better contributor in the world. Um, so it's time— allocating my time, like, to friends and family. That's a big one too.

[23:53] Paul: That's awesome. So it If I were to summarize, I feel like your two questions, if at the end of the week you would say I'm successful if I've learned something and if I'm energized.

[24:05] Nita Baum: Absolutely energized. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. And they're, and they're pretty, that's pretty different metrics of success, I think, than ones we're often, you know, like I know that in the school systems I was raised in, it was like, The proxy back then was like, what did you get on your test? Did you get 100 on your test? Right.

And then that eventually turns into like, you know, how much money did you make or how many, I don't know, external accolades did you receive?

[24:36] Paul: I think you were good at school too.

[24:39] Nita Baum: Yeah, I was. I was good at school. And in a sense, like sometimes I think I— and I think that was like a— it was sort of like it had, it had a lot of pros and cons. The pros were I did learn to rely on extrinsic motivators, you know, and I was motivated by them. So I was like, yeah, I wanna get 100 on that test. And that was part of my drive.

And the downside was, and, and I identified with that a lot, right? And like the downside, the downside was like, one, I was like, what happens once I'm done with my test and I got the 100, like, who cares? And two, so I realized there was like an emptiness to it. And two, I feel like when working for myself, I had to decondition myself from—

[25:28] Paul: Yeah, like unlearning.

[25:30] Nita Baum: Exactly. It's like sometimes I describe our program at Be Free as like an unschooling process, right? So much of the ability to work for yourself is about unschooling yourself from what we've learned. About what it means to work, that work is drudgery, that the metrics are extrinsic motivators, and a whole variety, that learning is lesser than producing. I think unlearning some of those messages is really important.

[26:00] Paul: Yeah. So you've mentioned Be Free a couple of times. We should probably dive into that. So people are like, what is she talking about? What is Be Free? What were you, what were you trying to create when you launched that?

[26:14] Nita Baum: Sure. So I came up with the idea for it in 2013, and really it was the product of, I think, 3 major things. One was like the very powerfully transformative experience that working for myself became in my life. You know, like I traveled, I did yoga teacher training, I went to nutrition school. Those are all things I did after quitting my job that I think I would not have done or felt much more constrained to do beforehand. So that was one driver.

The other was at some point I realized that I had been coaching in a pro bono capacity, like a couple hundred people who kept coming back to me for increasingly sophisticated forms of advice. Around self-employment. And I recognized that there were like a few key themes that were convergent in what they were asking and seeking. So that, that was like another major driver. And, and then the third one was, I think I was just ready. I was at this turning point.

Alight was going really well. Consulting-wise, we were doing great, but I also felt like, to the point of identity, there was this moment where I was like, okay, I feel somewhat aligned to this form, this sort of version of meaning and purpose, but I also think something is shifting internally. And I think a lot of that for me had to do with wanting to be more creatively self-expressed. So that's a little bit about the genesis. And then finally, I was just observing, and that data point really got me. I was following Freelancers Union, at the time and the fact that the numbers about so staggering.

And I really thought about them. I was like, this is not just about the labor economy. People are leaving. What is it that they're seeking? And I was interested in that. And I felt like we had somewhat of a sense of like I had some answers about what that was.

So Be Free, we do a few things, but the original intent was We work with people who are leaving the world of work or who are self-employed, and we're really about investing in the individual to support their sustainability, well-being, and greater freedom. And we take a holistic approach to that. So the way I think of sustainability is I take a systems view of the human, of the person, which is like if your mind, your body, your spirit, and your work— and your spirit and work I sort of think of as like as like the creative life force within you and the creative process that is what you make in the world. If you're not nourishing and attending to each of those components of the system, there'll be a lag in the system somewhere else. And so the idea is to take this holistic approach. So ultimately we design learning experiences.

The major one is, is a 5-week immersive program that takes a holistic approach that includes personal development, wellness, and business skills all integrated. And we, we help people. Originally I thought that was going to help people who are leaving the world of work, and we actually get a mix of people who have left and then people who are at a pivot point in their freelance careers and ready to shift and do something else. So we support them. Yeah, in that space. Yeah, that— and that's— I think that goes to your question earlier too, like, who are we seeing?

I think, I think now I'm encountering people who are you know, who've been at it for a while and are further along, but then also ready, like at these new pivot points, they're just like, they're ready to build something else. Um, and then, yeah, go ahead.

[30:04] Paul: What are the, what are the biggest blocks that people face, uh, that either the unexpected ones or just the ones that people continually, um, face and might not realize in terms of, uh, working on their own?

[30:18] Nita Baum: It's so funny because I sometimes describe our program and our work, you know, we also do, I also do one-to-one coaching with freelancers and I kind of describe all of it as just like, we're basically a response to people's most common blocks and fears and our whole job is about like helping to remove those. Just kind of like that obscurity so that, you know, the inner capacity and light that are the people who come to us can be can be revealed, really. So the major ones, I think power is a good one. So we have these 5 values, and I think they really were designed to be a response to that. So maybe I'll just go— I'll just give you the 5 because they probably summarize it well. The first is that I think our first value is about being free and it has to do with the idea that you can create the life you want and you can design the contribution that you want to make from the inside out.

I think one of the big blocks is people seek— and that's not the end of the story, but I think it's a beginning. So I think people look to the external world to say, what does the market demand of me or what's possible?

[31:42] Paul: What's my boss telling me to do?

[31:44] Nita Baum: Exactly. What's my boss, you know, right? Like, what's somebody outside of me telling me to do? And what we encourage people to do is to go within to discover, like, who are you and how do you want to express, like, you know, the naturalness of your gifts and what you come with, and also what you just may want to experience and, like, create and play with and experiment with. How do you come from the inside out? So that's like one That's one of the major ones.

And maybe I won't go through all 5, but another one is, another one has to do with power. So a really typical example of this is like, I think many of us, many people are oriented to abdicate our power in places where we could just hold on to it. Or we could claim it. And I think, you know, I think you could see that a lot in the traditional world of work. So an example of that is like when our freelancers are starting a consulting contract with someone or starting a contract in the initial stages of that relationship, they often feel subject to the client, right? And it's like, you know, can I charge X or can I, negotiate for a certain set of terms in my contract with this person that I know will lead to my own success.

And the idea is like, often people feel subject to the powers that be, you know.

[33:18] Paul: And meanwhile, meanwhile, the client is just desperate for help.

[33:23] Nita Baum: Totally, exactly. And the other way to see that is like, you're there for a reason. They're hiring you because they actually need you. So how do you value yourself appropriately, right? And so one of the simple things I do is I have people do these ideal client profiles. And it's really more of like a, you know, a mental and a mindset exercise, even though it's got a very pragmatic component to it.

Sort of like, who are your ideal clients? So that when you walk into, you know, conversations with potential clients, you're cognizant that it's a mutual fit that you're going for. You're selecting for them as much as they're selecting for you. And I think that that's like a simple example of how to shift that power dynamic. Like you're actually like, you're both needing each other. You're not subject to them, right?

You're not less powerful. You're actually like, there's a mutuality to why that relationship is happening. So that's another one. The power is a really, the power is a big one.

[34:27] Paul: What do you notice around money? So everyone tells me I couldn't do it because, well, how am I going to pay my rent? Or, and it doesn't actually make sense because you could easily make money as a freelancer or self-employed, but like, what is the block with people with money and having that steady salary?

[34:49] Nita Baum: Yeah, yeah, that's a big one. So, so that's maybe where I'll go.

[34:55] Paul: Or is that even not even about money? I think, I think sometimes it's almost about identity and like, I am this type of employee or I am this type of worker.

[35:04] Nita Baum: Sure. I, yeah, I mean, I think it's a mix of things, but on the money front, like the way that I see it is I go kind of straight to like, like the psychological roots of that. So Money is such a tricky issue because we associate money psychologically, very fundamentally, with safety and survival. Right. And so it's like the idea that— and then we have tremendous fears around that specifically. So, you know, in Maslow's hierarchy of needs, the very bottom of it is like in order to feel safe, you've got to have your survival needs cared for, right?

Like, you've got to have the roof over your head and all of that. We have, over time, I think, come to associate that level of survival with money, but I think we over-associate it with it. Like, we don't actually know how much money is, is, is going to yield our survival. And because we're coming from this place of, um, of fear, I think we we, our ability to actually like size what is necessary for our survival is wildly off.

[36:19] Paul: You can't even see the actual facts around like what it, what it costs to cover those basic needs.

[36:27] Nita Baum: Totally. I also think from a very practical standpoint, so, you know, you know, so if you want to wrestle with that one, I think you really do have to face your fears very directly and be like, am I being rational or am I being fear-driven? And is that like compromising my ability to actually like, you know, see this from a reasonable and a rational standpoint? But I think the other thing is like people often seek advice around self-employment from people who are not self-employed. So it's like, and that one comes around a lot. I frequently ask people who come to me like, who told you not to Who, you know, I went and asked so many, you know, X number of people and, you know, 8 of them told me not to do it.

And 2 of them told me to do it. Okay. So the 8 who told you not to do it, who are they? And like, what has been their work experience? And inevitably, like literally inevitably, I should do a study on this because it was like, really like, you know, they are, there are people who've never done it. Right.

So they're speaking from, from a very different perspective. The people who've done it will always say, go do it. And here, you know, and you can be scrappy, like, you'll be scrappy and resourceful and you'll figure out the money thing. And yeah, I think it does, you know, it does take planning. And I don't necessarily think there, you know, you've got to be reasonable about it. And you've got to be aware of your own, you know, your own circumstances and potential for resources.

[37:58] Paul: Is there anyone you think shouldn't become self-employed or freelancer?

[38:04] Nita Baum: Yeah, that's a great question. So I think there are two things that are really important when you're, when you work for yourself. The first one is the ability to build relationships with people.

[38:26] Paul: And I mean, it's like the secret sauce, I almost feel like.

[38:31] Nita Baum: Literally. Yeah. I mean, the last statistic I saw, which is a few years old, is like 86% of work for freelancers comes through word of mouth. Right. And I mean, I think in my case, like my first business, it was 100%. I did nothing.

I did no other form of marketing. Um, so I would say if, if you're, if you're disinclined to do that or you don't have the, and I think that like everything is learnable, But I feel like if it's really something you don't want to learn or don't have the capacity for, it's not a great idea because that fundamentally— your relationships will be the foundation of your business.

[39:10] Paul: Yeah, so the advice I've been giving around building relationships is actually counterintuitive. I tell people to just start writing and like make sense of what they believe and put it out into the world.

[39:21] Nita Baum: Yeah.

[39:22] Paul: I've actually found like that's the best way I've formed relationships because then people resonate with your ideas and then you find people you actually want to talk to.

[39:31] Nita Baum: I think that's like such a powerful— I think it's a really beautiful way to do it. I also think like, yeah, it's just a very powerful form of communication. It's also really interesting because it flips the pyramid a little bit. It's like you put out your ideas, you just kind of creatively self-express without being censored by anybody, right? So it just really allows you to be yourself. And then they come to you, which is kind of really nice.

[40:00] Paul: The introvert playbook.

[40:01] Nita Baum: Yeah, that's really wise. I like that a lot. Yeah, that's brilliant. Yeah. And like, one of the things I tell people to do is to be really broad. Like, we do this ecosystem of you exercise with clients where it's like, just make a really broad map of every community that you're part of or every group or association that you're part of, and irrespective of whether it seems directly related to work or not.

And the whole idea behind it is, is, you know, just to come up with people who you'd like to tell what you're doing in the world, whether it's directly relevant to them or not, and people who are natural advocates for you and where the affinity with them is really high. Because, and that's also come from experience and observation of just like the people who are natural advocates for you, it takes the burden off of you for having to sell yourself. They'll sell you for you without— and their resistance to your idea, they just naturally believe in you. And it just winds up becoming this really efficient method of spreading the word about your work. And it's nonlinear, which I think is one of the beliefs that people have. It's like A leads to B leads to C.

No, I don't know what your experience been Paul, but like mine is just like, uh, doesn't make any sense. It's not linear. No, it's much more— we don't operate in linear ways. It's not, you know, there's very few constructs in the world that are actually linear. Um, it's a much more organic process.

[41:33] Paul: So what, what are some of the most unexpected upsides from working on your own you think you've realized over the past 12 years?

[41:42] Nita Baum: Like everything.

[41:44] Paul: Everything. So it's all upsides, no downsides? Should we talk about the downsides instead?

[41:50] Nita Baum: I, I'll speak to the upsides, but, um, I, and I can, yeah.

[41:54] Paul: Or the most unexpected though.

[41:56] Nita Baum: Yeah, the most unexpected.

[41:57] Paul: I think for me the, um, yeah, it was actually more freedom and more energy than I actually imagined.

[42:05] Nita Baum: Yeah.

[42:06] Paul: There's some things I didn't expect, but, um, I think that was like the, the most upside. It's almost like unfair sometimes, I think.

[42:13] Nita Baum: Yeah, I think, I think one of the most unexpected is just like, it feels like it's hard to capture this one, but it just kind of feels like a total identity transformation, not just like a change, but a transformation. When I think about the mindsets I held, the way I, you know, the worldview I had, even like my beliefs before I started working for myself and after, I think they're like wildly different. And in my case, you know, personally, I would say I like my worldviews better. I like my— I was always optimistic, but I think now I'm just kind of— I do feel It has to do with creativity too. I just feel much more awake and alive, a lot less numb. And then noticing the ways in which that just kind of shifted my habits and the things that have fallen off in my life, things I don't do.

Like, I don't watch television, I don't drink, I don't, I don't do a lot of things that feel like distractions or numbing to fill a void because I don't feel that void anymore. Anymore. I'm so like crazy energized by my day-to-day that, and by the opportunity to learn, create, you know, contribute, that it's like, it's extremely fulfilling. And that doesn't mean it's not hard. Like, you know, doubts arise, questions arise all the time. Money, you know, money's always the ability to make it and to figure out how to do it steadily and creatively is always feels like the sort of moving point.

So it's really fun.

[44:00] Paul: Well, I told you one key to that could be leaving New York.

[44:03] Nita Baum: Totally. You do have the solution. That's fair. That's totally fair. I can't argue with that at all. Um, but yeah, like it's, it's been pretty sweet and I feel really grateful.

[44:18] Paul: So if, if you're talking to somebody that's like curious about working on their own, I think, uh, it's actually incredible. So many people say, oh, I'd love to work on my own one day. But like, how do they even get started? Like, what is the smallest thing somebody could do today to just get kind of a taste of like what this is all about or disrupting patterns and moving in new ways?

[44:44] Nita Baum: Yeah, I think, I mean, it's a little bit, you know, it's a little bit cliché, but I actually do find it a really powerful practice, which is just like like do something that does really scare you. And I think that's just whether that's directly relevant to whatever you'd like to pursue or not, it doesn't matter. Just like the ability to, I mean, I could go on about this for a little while, but I think one of the things that's really scary to people about self-employment is that it's both— it's the same thing that's scary that is very exciting about it. It's this vast expanse of the unknown that you're entering. Like, I know when I left work, I was like, oh, people started asking me, what are you doing? And I didn't really have a plan when I first decided to start Alight.

I was just like, I think I'm going to consult them to see how it goes. And people also asked me, you know, they would ask like, what, what are you doing? And my response at the time was a confused one because I was like, oh man, like whenever people ask me what I was doing, I always had this reference point. Like my whole identity was a function of like this place I work for, this institution I'm affiliated with. And now I have to like define that for myself. And that is, you know, that, that can be pretty scary.

The idea that there is this vast unknown. On the flip side, I think anything exciting and interesting that any of us have ever done in the world, like, arises from our ability to get in sync with the fact of uncertainty and the unknown. And another way to put that, like, another really simple thing is like, we encounter the unknown every single day. We're much more equipped for it than we think we are. We're just like conditioned to think things are known to us. Like, you wake up each day and you don't actually know what it's going to hold for you, even if you technically, you know, like, you really don't know.

And we're we're equipped to adapt.

[46:44] Paul: Like, yeah, you know, we mistake comfort for certainty.

[46:47] Nita Baum: Totally. That's great. That's a great point. Yeah. So I would say like get yourself comfortable with discomfort and uncertainty as a first step.

[46:57] Paul: Um, and then specific things you've tried, tried with people that kind of help people expose them to uncertainty or their fear. I actually, I tell people to figure out some way to drop the ball at work, whether it is like stay home from work, don't tell anyone. Um, and just like face that fear of like, oh my God, what if they find out? And I mean, sometimes people might say something, but most of the time there are no like, uh, bad outcomes from it.

[47:31] Nita Baum: Yeah, I love that. I think that's, that's, uh, that's super great. One of the things I— so sometimes I take it from a— I often take it from a sort of internal or psychological perspective, but there's this great book that I love that we use in the program that's called The Fear Book. And I have people really like reflect on and like meditate on their own fears in order to just gain a new perspective on them. So a specific example is like, what is a fear that manifests for you when it comes, you know, when it's specifically around self-employment? Like, what's something you're really afraid of?

And then there's this kind of 4-part process to reflecting on it. Um, one is to identify the thoughts that arise as you think about that. The other one is to identify the beliefs you hold that kind of strengthen those thoughts, whether the thoughts have merit or not. The third is to acknowledge the emotions that arise. So around fear, there may be a whole other set of emotions like anger or jealousy or whatever the other aversive emotions might be. And then the last one that's really powerful is just like, what are the sensations you experience in your body around fear?

Around this particular fear. And the reason I have people do that is because one of the reasons our fears hold so much power over us is because they get kind of congealed, like your thoughts, your beliefs, your emotions, and your sensations get very congealed into this like one dark obscure ball in your body that either has the impact of making you want to fight, flee, or be paralyzed, right? Take no action and be immobilized. When you're able to actually parse— this goes kind of to the question fundamentally of what is fear. And fear is actually— you could parse fear into each of those individual pieces. And specifically, like, when you think about what fear actually is, fear is like— fear is a sensation in your body to which you ascribe a certain set of beliefs, and then you act like your behavior is that— that becomes a function of those beliefs, right?

And so if you're able to kind of backtrack into it and be like, well, when I feel afraid, my stomach feels uncomfortable and I have this thought or this worry, but to acknowledge that those things are actually different. They don't actually— it's not necessarily the case that, you know, to the point you made, like some people won't take that action because— won't just like stay home because they're super afraid that a certain set of outcomes that are not actually going to happen are going to happen. And they convince themselves, we convince ourselves like neurobiologically that that's going to be the case. So it's a really powerful exercise for people to be able to say like, just because my stomach is telling me, you know, that I'm uncomfortable in this way doesn't actually mean my behavior or my assessment of, you know, the potential outcome of this fear is accurate. Right.

And so it's, it's, it can be a very like empowered, empowering practice internally to be able to parse those things. Um, I love that. Yeah.

[50:52] Paul: So what are the big plans, um, in your pipeline for BeFree and, uh, what's exciting you that, uh, you're working towards?

[51:02] Nita Baum: Yeah, great. Um, question. So in, in addition to our work, uh, with freelancers, we also have an evolving line of work that focuses on working with companies. And what I should say really more specifically is like the focus of my work is always individuals. I'm really interested in individual humans and individual human potential. And I believe like our collective sustainability and well-being is a function of our individual sustainability and well-being.

So the work will that I'm developing this year. We're sort of— I'm kind of playing with a set of workshops that are based on some really interesting neuroscience combined with some spiritual perspectives and some conflict resolution work that I've done, like pulling together a variety of multidisciplinary threads to come up with— right now it's just a sort of workshop format, but a little scaffolded experience of how the whole mind-body system can be engaged to create greater connection to yourself and then greater connection to the people around you in the workplace to support more effective dialogues, irrespective of the content of the dialogue. So that's like one, and maybe I will expound on that a little bit because I'm very excited by that.

It's basically like one of the things I've observed in workplaces, and I observe this a lot in my strategy work, is, you know, there's so many ways in which, to just go back to the topic of fear, our individual fears are projected into the collective experience in the workplace. And one thing I've been thinking a lot about is the idea that you know, you walk into a workplace and you feel like the culture of the workplace and the environment is something that's done to you as opposed to something that you are co-creating. And you actually are a co-creator. Like, how you show up actually matters, right, on the one hand. And on the other hand, yeah, it is bigger than you. But there is this possibility for— it's kind of the simple idea of like, if you want things to shift, that shift has to be embodied at the individual level.

Like each person's actually got to embody it. So, but one of the things we naturally are in the world because we're wired to be evolutionarily and otherwise is we're self-protective. And so, you know, and we're also kind of easily triggered psychologically. If one of your colleagues says or does something that you don't like, or, you know, your leader does something you don't like, that gets manifest in your system. And our natural reactions are to be upset or to distance ourselves somehow from those circumstances and the people. And it creates a lot of, like, culturally, I think some of the things we see very commonly in many organizations is there's cultures of secrecy and gossip and preserving reputation.

Keegan and Leahy, who are some of the foremost culture researchers, talk about this a lot. The second job that everybody's doing that nobody paid for is like preserving their reputation. And it's a lot of energy that goes into, into like those aspects of the way you show up in the work environment. So I have this theory that a lot of that is a function of our neurological, neurobiological wiring, both our minds and our bodies. And that if we want to like reduce the kinds of shadow behaviors that we experience in the culture. If we have more control of that, control over that at the individual level, where we learn to bring a lot of self-awareness to the way that we show up.

And for example, as opposed to like judging, blaming, or becoming angry, we learn to navigate the experience of that internally so that we can show up with less of those things in the culture, then we kind of create much more ease and positivity in the workplace. So I do some funky stuff in our workshops where it's like, you know, I have people start with love, which is to me that the fundamental antidote to fear. And part of the reason— so we'll do like exercises where we imagine—

[55:32] Paul: you must make some executives pretty uncomfortable.

[55:34] Nita Baum: Yeah. And it's part of what makes it super fun for me. Just like, what's happening? Love and fear in the workplace? But like, when it comes down to it, that's exactly what's happening in the work.

[55:44] Paul: Like, I love the framing of just like culture as the, uh, collection of everyone's fears. That, that just makes so much sense. When you— when I think, when I think especially about some of the cultures that weren't as positive, I think that is incredibly, uh, true. And then the positive cultures have been part of just are really the result of like a lot of work to kind of overcome those things.

[56:08] Nita Baum: Totally. Yeah. And the positive cultures do have, you know, the terms we hear about today are like, you can be vulnerable and still be seen and that's okay. Or empathy and compassion. Like those to me are all just like manifestations of love, you know? And I think that's what we're kind of trying to decondition and recondition ourselves or deconstruct and reconstruct our environments toward.

And so I'm really interested in like those roots and how do we, how do we unleash more of that and equip individuals with the awareness to be able to navigate that more in their internal experience so that when they show up in the collective experience, they're contributing the more loving version of themselves, you know, and they're operating from that place. So yeah, that's, that's been, that's a fun area of like research and experimentation. And then I'm working on a book called Workplace as Healing Space. The central tenet of that builds on what I was just saying, but it's really the idea that, you know, personal transformation is essential for organizational transformation because who's the organization but the people who comprise it. And then org transformation, you know, also varies with collective evolution and systematic change. So thinking about things at those multiple levels.

Yeah, those are some points of excitement. I'm working with my co-creators. There are 15 of us. They're really awesome people who, they're all independent people who have been freelancers at some point and are very freelance empathic. I say at some point because they're now more entrepreneurs. And the distinction I make there is just that they're operating at larger scales.

So as opposed to building systems for one, they're kind of building systems for many. And they're all really cool. So I'm co-designing some of these experiences with them and thinking about how we're, you know, like, where do we really want to go deep in our work with organizations? To try to make some impact on the individuals who work there. And then the last big area is higher ed. I think we've spoken about this a little bit, but I've been having— and I know you've, you've had these conversations too— and like, I've been having conversations and I'm having— I have a few more coming up with higher ed institutions in New York and around the country, just asking them, talking to them about how they're preparing primarily grad students but also undergrads, especially in the career services space.

Like, how are, how are they thinking about supporting students in the transition from school to the career space? And they're, they're really interesting dialogues. Like, I I think increasingly people who work in career services are aware of the disconnect because they're starting to notice, and this is super interesting, like they're starting to notice the high levels of self-employed, like of grad students who are wanting to become self-employed even in like industries where that's so uncommon, like the law, for example. Like I've been talking to them, so some folks at law schools who are like, the appetite for students coming out to start their own practices is really high. And yet they're like, really, they're not equipped to do that. School certainly has not prepared them for that.

And one of the reasons I'm interested in that is because our program, like our 5-week program, it has a lot of elements that I think would be super useful for those students. Both the pragmatic skills but also the ways to think about, you know, your routines and your structures. Like, how do you, how do you do this? How do you become self-employed?

[01:00:12] Paul: Yeah, once the lawyers are self-employed, I think the transformation is complete, right?

[01:00:16] Nita Baum: Totally. That's why I used them as an example. Totally. It's like, whoa. But yeah, like, some of them are coming straight out. There's a woman who's coming straight out of law school and just like went in to build her own practice, and she's I love it.

Yeah, it's really exciting. So yes, I think, I think that's happening. And we're trying to support and fuel that. And I should also say, I mean, sort of like, I'm not— I'm curious, I think the same way you are, Paul. And I think the work you're doing is awesome in this realm of like, just continuing to explore and imagine, you know, the future of work and the possibilities. Like, I don't actually know what's going to happen.

To the corporate structure. I do know, and the traditional hierarchical structures, I know we're evolving. I know we have to evolve away from them. And that's actually just naturally happening. And at the same time, like, you know, I don't yet, I don't yet see, like, I don't know what the future is going to hold on that realm. How are we going to, because we're interdependent, we want to work together.

We're social beings. There's a lot of beauty and positivity that comes from being really deliberate and conscious about the way we organize ourselves and community up, and the benefits of that. And I think it's an exciting time to think about and imagine what that could look like. And I also feel like I don't know. And that's both like, it's exciting and it's also motivation to be contributing to that conversation.