We caught up with the brilliant and insightful James Hyland a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
James, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. What’s something you believe that most people in your industry (or in general) disagree with?
That you need to listen to your heart and not your ego.
Here is a story of how I learned that lesson…
It’s 2 am, pitch black in the middle of South Dakota, and I’m driving cross-country for the first time.
My eyes feel like they are about to pop out of my head.
I am having trouble seeing straight.
That warm, sweaty feeling of anxiety washes over my body.
I grip the wheel harder and can see the whites of my knuckles…
I take a deep breath as it pours buckets against the windshield.
I feel like I am going to crash…
But we need to get there as soon as possible!
It’s worth it to push it a little bit further…
Earlier that day, we were in Detroit for my wife’s keynote and had a little over a day’s worth of driving hours ahead of us to get to our tiny home in the mountains of Idaho.
The keynote went so well that we were dancing all up in the car vibes.
So when the GPS showed that we could arrive a whole day earlier than planned if we drove 24+ hours straight, we both looked at each other and said,
“Let’s go for it!”
Ten hours later, those vibes shifted. I was struggling to keep it together. But I didn’t want to change the plan again.
MaryBeth kept asking if I wanted to stop for the night. But there was this little voice in my head that started screaming that I HAD to push through… like:
“Hey you sissy, man-up! You don’t need to listen to your body right now! People drive through the night all the time. Keep pushing. You’ll be the hero if you show up a whole day ahead of schedule.”
This inner dialogue was all too familiar…
You know those mean self-talk wounds you’ve done a lot of work to heal from?
The ones you think you have moved past?
It can be a real pain when they come back in full force.
A few hours later, I’m jolted when my wife says,
“I’d rather arrive a day later alive than push through and possibly die.”
She was right. I take a deep breath and agree.
It was a good day for my ego to die.
Why do we do this to ourselves?
Why do we choose to suffer when there is another choice?
Why do we push through when we could ask for help?
Why are we in such a hurry?
Road trip or not, here are three lessons to apply to your life and business if you’re ready for part of your ego to die too!
1. Love Your Triggers
The longest journey you’ll ever go on is from my head to your heart. When you are healing, you are tapping into your heart’s wisdom.
It can be frustrating when you think you have done the work to heal a part of you, only to have it reappear.
Your ego will always try to protect your hell and keep you stuck in your head. So, what is important is how you respond once you are triggered.
Can you be aware that you are triggered? What is your trigger inviting you to heal? Can you love this part of yourself right now as it is? What might be different if you sat down next to this wound and asked it what it needed instead of trying to shut it up?
Forgive yourself. Release your grievances. Give yourself permission to be human.
2. Remember to Breathe
Anxiety is excitement without breath.
When stressed, you tend to hold your breath OR you breathe really fast. When relaxed, you breathe slower from your nose to your belly.
Research shows that breathing in through your nose – sending your breath down to your belly activates your parasympathetic nervous system. AKA your “rest and digest mode.”
So the next time you’re anxious, take a long deep breaths and witness the shift in your well-being.
Focusing on your breath brings you into the present moment and out of the mind chatter of your ego.
Breathing is a great way to access your values of health, self-care, and inner harmony.
3. Set Healthy Boundaries.
Life is like a game. There are different levels when it comes to lessons you need to learn. So, when you keep getting the same lessons, those are opportunities to level up your boundaries.
Where might you be pushing through and listening to your head (your ego) and not your heart?
This is an opportunity to learn how to (re)set some boundaries to protect your energy. When you do, this lesson won’t show up in the same way next time. (no broken records required)
Remember: Boundaries are the key to ultimate freedom.
So, where in your life do you need to let a part of your ego die?
And which lessons might serve you best today in making that possible?
Meet yourself where you are and give full permission to be human.
James, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
Before joining SparkVision, I spent nearly 15 years in finance, building and overseeing a high-performing sales team from the ground up.
During this time, I developed an innovative sales process that won numerous industry awards and hit record-setting sales numbers.
Sales increased from $1M annually to over $2.75B, bringing in over 20,000 new clients.
Amidst this lightning-fast growth and success, I also became an angel investor to support companies looking to change the world.
Throughout my career in finance, I was deemed “successful” by everyone I met, but something didn’t feel right deep inside of me.
I was making a lot of money but I wasn’t happy.
And I started to feel like a piece of my soul was dying every time I stepped into the office…
When the voice inside got too loud to ignore, I began a personal internal journey to discover more about myself and to identify my truest potential.
And what I found was that I wasn’t drained because I was doing too much. I was drained because I was doing too little of what aligned with my values.
Values are intrinsic motivators that represent a person’s principles or standards of behavior—one’s judgment of what is important in life.
Your core values are as unique as your fingerprints.
They serve as your internal compass and represent what you stand for.
When you honor your values, life feels good. And when you don’t, your mental, emotional, and physical states suffer.
After experiencing what life is like living in alignment with my values, I am on a mission to help others do the same.
Aligning their life and their business with their values.
SparkVision is a pioneer in the space of taking the complex and overwhelming process of igniting core values and simplifying them into a manageable plan.
How did you build your audience on social media?
I mainly use LinkedIn as my social media platform for business. What I found is consistency and authenticity is key. That means posting 4-5 times a week and connecting with 5 – 10 people daily. When I connect with people, I look for those who have shared values with me that I want to engage with. Then, when it comes to my posts, I make them as authentic as possible. I’m not trying to follow some formula that the gurus are preaching. I don’t try to write to everyone but think only of the people I want to connect with.
Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?
That the only thing to learn is how to unlearn! We have been programmed and domesticated ever since we were kids. And as business owners, especially if we have worked in corporate, we typically have been programmed to do things a certain way. Most of us start our businesses so we can release a lot of those things, but it takes time to unlearn. I used to think I had to work at my desk from morning till night to be successful. That I was “productive” the more I stared at the screen. That is how I was programmed in the corporate world but not how I want to run my business! So it’s all about choosing a new story and releasing the ones that don’t.
Contact Info:
- Website: sparkvisionnow.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/marybethandjames/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jameshyland20/
Image Credits
Tara Pokras