Transcript of Episode

Leah Gervais: Hey visionaries. Welcome back to the Your Biggest Vision show. I’m your host, Leah, and I’m very excited to present our special guest today, it is Ellie Gervais. You may recognize the last name. She is a senior at the University of Colorado at Boulder. She is the producer of this show the Your Biggest Vision show. She has transcribed every single episode. So, we are having her on the show because we are at episode 40, which I cannot believe, it seems like just yesterday we birthed this podcast into life. But she has literally transcribed every one. So she probably knows even better than I do. And she’s my little sister and my best friend. So thanks for being here and talking to us, Ellie.

Ellie Gervais: Thank you so much for having me. I’m so excited.

Leah Gervais: I’m really excited to hear from you too. This is really brave of you to be in a podcast while you’re in college.

Ellie Gervais: Thank you. Yeah, it’s a little nerve wracking, but I’m so excited. I’ve listened to about 40 of them and transcribed them all. So it’s funny that I’m on the other side of it now.

Leah Gervais: And you’re going to transcribe this one. Awesome. Well for everyone out there, I want it to have Ellie on here for several reasons. As I mentioned, she has transcribed every episode and I wanted to hear the patterns that she’s found from hearing from so many amazing inspiring entrepreneurs. Hearing a lot about my story, hearing about my client’s stories and having her pull out the threads for us about the commonalities among the people that have really shared their successes with us. You know, success is not as complicated as we can make it out to be. Oftentimes you just need to study other people’s successes. And here we have the privilege of having her synchronize so many patterns from those people into one. So that was one and then I also really wanted to have her on here because it’s so inspiring and important to hear from someone who is sort of from the outside looking in. Now Ellie is an entrepreneur. She has an entrepreneurial bone. If I’ve ever seen one, she has been making money for as long as I can remember.

She’s done a great job doing this podcast around her school schedule, but she still isn’t quite in the thick of it and I especially know that she is surrounded with a lot of talk about a nine to five and getting jobs after college and very traditional career paths. So I’m really excited to hear her take on so much of what we talk about on this show from a different perspective. So with that, let’s dive in. So Ellie, you have heard about 20 episodes of just me and 20 of me interviewing people. What have been some of the most… So something I often ask is what people envisioned their life to be like when they were younger. Right? Cause my show is all about your vision. What do you think, is there any commonality between what people envisioned when they were younger and those who have become really successful?

Ellie Gervais: Yes, there’s definitely an overarching theme that I’ve noticed among the people that you’ve interviewed, I’ve learned that it can really depend on the personal circumstances for sure. As far as what they thought they would be doing when they were younger, if they had this vision that they were going to be a doctor or an astronaut or who knows, that can be very different. But I have noticed that there is a fairly consistent theme among these people that they knew there was more out there for them and they realized that and they realized that whatever job, whatever nine to five they may have been in didn’t align with their vision that they had for themselves. I think the huge difference that exists between people who become entrepreneurs and people who stay in a nine to five job is that they listen to their gut and they take that leap, whether it’s scary or terrifying or it might ruin their lives completely. They take that because they follow that intuition. Dad actually sent us a podcast a while back that is called Listen to Your Gut and Decide on Your Own Destiny. I thought that that really aligned with a lot of what people say on this podcast is that they…. like something about what they were doing just didn’t align with what they were thinking. In particular I think Kunal was working on Wall Street had this, you know, dream job out of college. People would die to be working on Wall Street and he just had this gut intuition telling him that this is not what he was supposed to be doing and he followed it. I think that’s scary for a lot of people and most people would probably logistically talk themselves out of following their gut. But what I’ve noticed from the people on your podcast is that they don’t ignore it and they follow it. I think that’s really inspiring. Essentially, what I’ve learned from all of that and the people that are on your podcast is that we can be confined or held back only by ourselves and it’s our thoughts and our actions that can either, I mean, in prison us or they can liberate us and set us free. I think that most entrepreneurs are very aware of the power of our thoughts and they take advantage of that completely.

Leah Gervais: Ellie, you are so wise. That was so beautifully put and I really want to pull out two things that I think are so important here from what you said. So I believe, and I think most people would agree that we all have something we’re we’re called to do. Now, I don’t think everyone is meant to be an entrepreneur. I know that I’m an entrepreneur, I love it and I mostly interview people but I don’t think that means everyone needs to go and quit their nine to five job. What I do think is powerful about what Ellie said is that I think a lot of times people are looking for an equation or a clear map or some sort of cut and dry solution on how they’re going to say yes to whatever is calling them. Ellie said that it’s pretty much just saying yes to your gut. There’s no magic path, there’s nothing to wait for. There is no amount of savings you need to have. You really just need to say yes to your intuition. So I think it’s, it’s so important to keep it simple and remember that people who have done big leaps or big transitions didn’t have anything really figured out in a way that we might fantasize about having it. They just sort of decided to do that. So that’s a really powerful observation.

Then the other thing I love that you said was that entrepreneurs really, I forget exactly how you said it, but they’re very conscious of their own thoughts and they know they’re only limit is themselves and that’s everyone in everything in life. You’re only ever your own limit. I just read in a book that the human patterns are to give up only at 40% capacity. So when you’re working out and you’re sweating and you feel like you can’t move anymore and you feel like you’re totally gonna collapse, you’ve actually only done about 40% of what you’re capable of dealing with when you’re, you know, doing a big business risk, when you sort of feel like, oh my God, I just can’t do it anymore. You’re actually not even halfway there. I thought that was so incredible to learn because it is all in our head. It’s not about physical ability or even any other limitations were blaming. It’s our own. So really insightful alley. Great. Thank you.

Ellie Gervais:: Yeah, of course.

Leah Gervais: So another thing I like to hone in on when people share their stories is the MSCI beginning. And frankly it’s messy through the middle. It’s pretty much all messy people, it is not pretty. But it’s hardest in the middle because you might think, okay, I’m going to start a business or we had one of my fitness instructors, Dylan Ferris, who’s amazing, on here and he shared his story of losing a hundred pounds in a year, like going from obese to, you know, he’s in a fitness instructor. And then actually, she hasn’t been quite on yet, but next week we’re having a Jameela from journey to launch on who saved $85,000 in a year. All of these take a big shift in your lifestyle, in your pockets. You know, any transformation requires a big change. So in the beginning you can have this adrenaline about, oh, I’m going to start this business, I’m going to get in shape, I’m going to save all this money. Then a few weeks pass and you’re kind of like, I haven’t really seen any results yet, but I still really want to do this. How do you think, Ellie, people keep going when they are at the beginning of a journey, but they’re not seeing any results yet?

Ellie Gervais: Yeah. So I think that with a lot of the people on your podcast, they sort of all realize that, you know, Rome wasn’t built in a day. Their business or whatever they’re working toward is not going to happen overnight and I think that’s one huge mindset that has to be there if you’re going to start your own business or really accomplished anything. I mean patience is of course, super important. But, of course, I think it’s super easy to get discouraged and when you’re making a big transition like that and you’re probably feeling unsure and maybe you’re feeling like making this transition was a bad idea. But I think a lot of what I’ve noticed with the people that you interview is they kind of lean into that discomfort and they fully accept that state of change and transition because they know in the long run it’s going to get them where they want to be. I think that’s also like a place when you are in that discomfort, in that place of insecurity. I think that that’s where you can learn so much about yourself and it’s also an opportunity to grow.

I think that as an entrepreneur, as a lot of these people are, that it’s all about growth. It’s all about seeing where you can go. Change in general isn’t easy and change that carries a lot of weight, like your income and all of these factors in your life. Like quitting your job. Quitting your nine to five job is super terrifying I’m sure. I’ve never done it, but I can’t imagine being in a state where I’m not getting a paycheck every two weeks or however long you get paid. So I think that although that there’s that discomfort, usually you’re on the brink of greatness or success when you’re in a really uncomfortable place in your life because it shows that there’s opportunity lying right ahead of you. So, I think that it’s been pretty consistent among the people that you’ve interviewed that they just kind of, they sit there and they understand why it’s so uncomfortable and they just keep going anyway.

Leah Gervais: Really, really powerful. I think a big realization for me, what, you know, so for me, when I was starting a, came from a place of making not minimum wage but entry level salary as a paralegal in New York. I was making like $45,000 a year, which in Manhattan that’s like under how much it costs to live here. So, it was not fun or easy. So when I started my business, I didn’t really know it was going to grow into so much of a business, but I definitely was excited about changing my income and my financial reality. I think that’s true for a lot of entrepreneurs. It is uncomfortable to reach out to people, to sell something, to feel like you’re shouting from the rooftops that you have this good product and no one’s listening. That is uncomfortable. You know, what else is uncomfortable being broke? So it’s like you get to choose your discomfort.

Ellie Gervais: Exactly.

Leah Gervais: You want to be uncomfortable and making money or do you want to be uncomfortable because you’re broke? That was freeing to me. But I love that you said, you know, people recognize these things do take time. I think one of the reasons that people get extra frustrated about this, like the phrase Rome wasn’t built in a day is, you know, should be such common knowledge. But now we have social media where everyone is an overnight success. I don’t know, Ellie, cause I feel like your generations even more on social media than I am. I don’t know if that’s something you experienced with your friends. Is comparison a problem or is that something you hear about a lot? Do you have any thoughts on how social media might be making people believe in themselves less?

Ellie Gervais: Definitely. I think social media is a big contributor to people feeling discouraged and feeling like they’re not good enough or not going to be successful because yeah, I mean, you can make yourself look any way on social media. People perceive you as whatever you put out there. And there are people of course who are successful overnight and they just somehow did it. You know, there’s always gonna be those people. But I definitely think that there’s a kind of this misunderstanding that, oh, there’s these people online who are super successful overnight and well, I’m just never going to be one of those people. Or why can’t that be my life? I wish that was my life. And it’s like, well, it can be, you’re just seeing these people who have already done it, so it looks like this unattainable goal and I think that really discourages people from trying because they think, oh, I’m just a normal person and they’re famous and successful, or have a check mark next to their name, whatever it is. But really they’re just people.

Leah Gervais: Yeah, really good observation. It’s amazing that you highlight that even if there are these people that have a million followers and $1 million dollars and a million everything, you still can do that. I think it’s important for people to recognize that social media might not be serving you in the sense that it can make you feel inferior, but it should be serving you in the sense that it’s reminding you that they’re no better than you. We’re all equal here. And so how can you get motivated by what someone else has done to do the same thing for yourself? Not Dismiss it, not judge it. Not say it can’t be real. It can be, you’re totally right. Right, right.

Ellie Gervais: I mean, short of being extremely famous to begin with, everyone who is social media famous started with zero followers. I mean, they started with nothing, just like everyone else. They got an account just like everyone else. So you can do it.

Leah Gervais: Right. I always tell people that like I had one subscriber for a long time. It was my mom and Adam reading my emails and that was it. We’re all there. Great. Okay. So yeah, I love everything you shared and I think it’s so inspiring to remember that everyone goes through those early times. Everyone has times where no one’s listening, just remember it’s totally normal. You just have to remember that giving up is not an option. I think that that really is when this stuff matters and when the mindset stuff matters and why we talk so much about the hard times on the show because they’re going to happen and then you get to decide if they’re going to define your path or if they’re going to be part of the deal, just like there are everyone else’s. So Ellie, from the outside looking in and I’d love if you want to share anything about what you feel like is or isn’t talked about in college in reference to the content on the show, but what do you think are three of the most commonalities amongst entrepreneurs and what might you feel like you’re not learning in school that you’re learning on this show?

Ellie Gervais: Yes. Well, there’s definitely, I feel like with most of the people that you’ve interviewed, I hear them talk about their childhood and it always seems that they have somewhat of an entrepreneurship bone or way about them. But I think even more than that, all of these people that you’ve interviewed and most entrepreneurs are just, they’re tenacious people. They’re not willing to let their vision or their goals slip through their fingers and they grasp it firmly with both hands and they don’t stop until their vision has come to fruition. And I’ve noticed that with a lot of the people you’ve spoken to. I also think that they alter, and I see this a lot in you and your last episode with Kathryn, is they alter their environment to reflect what they want the reality to look like. So, I’m actually reading this book right now, and when I was transcribing Kathryn’s, I stumbled upon this quote and I was like, okay, this is a sign from the universe. This is exactly what she was talking about. And the quote is “as we alter our thoughts toward things and other people, things and other people will alter toward us.”

Leah Gervais: What book is that?

Ellie Gervais: It’s called “As You Think” by James Allen.

Leah Gervais: Amazing.

Ellie Gervais: Yeah and it’s really, it’s super inspiring and it’s just all about how you cultivate your own environment and yeah, I see that a lot with the people you interview.

Leah Gervais: Dad was like that alot too.

Ellie Gervais: Yeah, Dad was definitely all about that mindset. So, yeah and then one thing that’s just like a small little thing I noticed is they all recognize the importance of taking a break. They all have talked about, you know, a hobby they have when they get too caught up in their work. How they take walks every hour or two to clear their mind, how it’s important to take care of yourself so you can take care of your business. And that is one thing that I feel like I haven’t learned in college is that they teach you how to be a doctor, you know, in business and all of this stuff. But they don’t really teach you how to take care of yourself and how that’s important so that you can also give your energy to your job.

Leah Gervais: How do you think learning about the things on this show and from the people on the show has changed the way you think about your career path?

Ellie Gervais: It’s changed a lot for sure. I think that learning about entrepreneurship and personal development at this age, especially in this time of my life where, you know, you’re three years into college and people are turning to you and asking, what are you going to do after college? What are you doing when you’re going to graduate? What do you want to be when you grew up? And it’s just like you’re supposed to apparently know. Or hopefully by the time you graduate, you wake up one morning and you figure it out. I think that listening to your podcast and having you as an older sister is a great example of you don’t need to follow the conventional path. It’s just taught me that I can keep my mind open to the idea that I don’t need to be in a nine to five job, if that’s not where I want to be and we can, we should challenge that idea and the notion that in order to be successful you have to go to graduate school or you have to sit at an office job from 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM and that’s that. So it definitely helps me think about other options and honestly makes me so much more excited about my future and about what my job or profession looks like for me because I think that there’s so much opportunity there and it excites me more than a nine to five job, I think ever could or will.

Leah Gervais: Good. Do you ever talk to your friends about this kind of thing or do you feel like it’s pretty accepted given where you’re at, that you’re a senior and so you need to be finding a job?

Ellie Gervais: I try to talk to my friends about it. I think that most of my friends are super serious about finding a nine, five job and that’s a huge stress around that whole topic. Yeah, a lot of them are stressed about finding an internship or they don’t have an internship or what’s on their resume, what are they going to do? I try to really just take all of that with a grain of salt and almost let it just go in one ear and out the other because I know that it’s just not serving me and I don’t need that mindset because I think you can do whatever you want to do regardless of an internship that’s on your resume. So yeah, I mean, I’ll try to talk to them about it. I think it’s so ingrained in the heads of people my age that I don’t really get through to them, but, I definitely try to put it out there and yeah.

Leah Gervais: Yeah. Well that, that’s amazing. I mean, what you just said that was going to be my next question is, aside from your career path or entrepreneurship specifically, do you feel like you’ve started learning more about just your own mindset and how to not absorb stress and how to decide your own thoughts? And I know dad has always taught us this, but I’m just curious to hear what you, how you feel you kind of manage that.

Ellie Gervais: Absolutely. I think that if anything, I mean I of course don’t know much about business and I’m not in the business school and I haven’t started my own business. So I think that producing this podcast has taught me a lot about mindset more than anything. It’s really, I don’t know, it’s taught me that success is not limited to what everyone thinks it is. It’s also just like our thoughts of courage and the trust that we have in ourselves and in our vision can and will crystallize into our circumstances if we allow it to. So whatever we’re putting into our mindset and the way that we work toward things and if we have something in mind, and of course Dad would always say, you can do anything you set your mind to. I totally believe that, you can do. And I think that that’s totally helped my mindset.

Leah Gervais: You know, when people say things about stress and you’re like, oh, should I be stressed? I don’t want to be stressed out.

Ellie Gervais: Yeah, like I just don’t want to be, I don’t want to be worried, so I’m not going to be.

Leah Gervais: That’s amazing. You will shave years off your life.

Ellie Gervais: I was just gonna say, I just know that worrying isn’t gonna get me anywhere and I just try to better myself self day by day instead of worrying about a year and a half from now, which is probably completely unnecessary to worry about. So, yeah, it just doesn’t do anything for me.

Leah Gervais: The main root of worry is that we’re worried about things becoming out of our control. But the reality is things are pretty much already out of our control. You’re going to change no matter what. So you freak out about the fact that they might or realize that they’re gonna and stop and I love always what you say about and what dad would say about anything being possible. Just this morning I was walking to my coworking space in New York and I watched by the Chrysler building and I just kind of stopped and thought the Chrysler building was once just someone’s idea and they probably were told it was crazy and no one had ever built a building that high. It was the highest building in the world and people probably just thought, you know, who are they to do that? Who are they to think that? But there it is, you know? So everything was just once in someone’s mind. We just have a few more questions. I want to back up a little bit. This has been so inspiring, Ellie, I’m so proud that you have gotten all of this out.

Ellie Gervais: Thank you.

Leah Gervais: Yeah. You’re amazing. Do you have three things that have surprised you about entrepreneurship or a transformation?

Ellie Gervais: Yes, definitely. One thing that has surprised me, and I think you really hone in on this a lot, is that you don’t need an abundance of savings to start a business. I definitely understand that it’s important to have some sort of money so you can invest in yourself and work toward building a business. But you talk a lot about how you don’t need this huge, you know, stash of money in order to quit your job and then use all of that. You know, it doesn’t work like that. So I thought that that was super surprising because in my mind it would make sense to be like, Oh yeah, I’m going to put away, you know, $200,000 and then one day when I have that money, I can quit this job and I’ll have that to lean on. No, you say to not do that and it makes sense why you wouldn’t. Also a big thing that surprises me and I think is a huge misconception about entrepreneurship is that just because you work for yourself doesn’t mean you have to teach yourself every little thing that goes into your business. You can ask for help, you can hire people, you can learn. It’s a learning experience and it’s not, I think people have this misunderstanding that entrepreneurs are just natural geniuses, that every entrepreneur is an Elon Musk or a Steve Jobs or some crazy, you know…

Leah Gervais: Just like born with technology in their brains.

Ellie Gervais: Elon Musk and Steve jobs didn’t get to where they were all on their own. No one does. It’s just impossible to do all of that all by yourself. So that’s a huge thing that I’ve taken away is that you can ask for help and you can continue to learn as you should.

Leah Gervais: I think I just want to pause here really quick cause I think the reason that this exists for, first of all, I try to be open about the fact that I was a huge, a victim to this. I totally thought for like the first year that being an entrepreneur meant I figured things out on my own because I just thought you needed to invent something basically. Like that’s what I think that idea comes from the days before the Internet is what it is. And before we had this just flood of information, which is a good and a bad thing some of the time, but one of the things we all have to get honest with ourselves about now is that, you know, entrepreneurs may have been about figuring out something no one else knew back in the day. But now it’s about figuring out what works fastest and it’s about like beating yourself and other people to the best solution. It’s not about having the only solution but the best one. You can’t do that if you are trying to learn every single part of everything on your own. People want the best information now more than anything because they assume that people out there creating businesses are learning all the time about what they need to put into their businesses because we can, because we have the internet. So it’s really just about like speed and time at this point and you don’t have the time to do everything on your own anymore.

Ellie Gervais:  I completely agree. Yeah. And just the fact that people think that you have to have this huge business, this huge business idea and plan to become an entrepreneur when really you’ve talked about it a lot, that it’s better to have a niche community or like a niche audience that’s going to get you where you want to go. I mean, not everyone can be this humongous entrepreneur you know?

Leah Gervais: Right. Well, and you can get there eventually, but even if you look at someone, like even if you look at the Steve Job’s of the world, like, he knew early on that this was going to be a more creative, intuitive, different way to consume technology. He knew his market wanted something less robotic then than Dell and Windows and you know, the Microsoft model. So his audience has you know, obviously grown to like the whole world, but it’s just about knowing who, who wants what you have and it doesn’t need to start huge. So amazing advice Ellie.

Ellie Gervais: Thank you.

Leah Gervais: Did you have a third one or was that the third one?

Ellie Gervais: Sorry. I think that I mixed probably the second.

Leah Gervais: That’s okay. Do you have any favorite quotes from anyone or any particular stories that really stood out to you, you want to share?

Ellie Gervais: Yes, I do. I loved Bolas entire episodes so much.

Leah Gervais: Sorry to interrupt. I just want to have everyone know Bola founded Clever Girl Finance and her episode was episode 37. All right, go ahead.

Ellie Gervais: So one quote that I love from her, she said, “it’s also about upholding other people in your space who are pursuing a similar idea or on a similar path because there’s power in numbers.” She also says “if you forget about competition and instead you focused on collaboration, you find new ways to help grow your business.” And then she says, “so we all have to start with ourselves. It starts with us and we have to do what we can to inspire that change.” And I love that she says this for so many different reasons. But, one thing that really stood out is that I think collaboration is so underrated and a lot of the people you’ve interviewed have talked about whether they’re in your mastermind class or a different one, they are very passionate about those mastermind’s helping their business grow so much specifically because there’s other people who are on a similar path, not the same path necessarily, but a similar path and that has made all the difference in their success and their growth because they have other people, they’re bouncing ideas off, they’re collaborating,   they feel supported in that space. And Bola said that and I just thought that that was really interesting because a lot of people talk about how your mastermind helps them because there’s power in numbers and that was really interesting.

Ellie Gervais: Then another quote that I had, this is from Dad, no one that you’ve interviewed, but he texted me this big text of advice maybe two years ago and one of the pieces of advice was the more you focus on money, the less you will have and this also kind of reiterate bolas point about the fact that we shouldn’t really be focusing on competition or money or any of that. I mean you should to some extent of course, but in the end, your work should be a product driven by passion and a hunger to do something unique and original. And then I think the rest will fall into place if you’re aligned with that.

Leah Gervais: Beautiful takeaways. Thank you so much for sharing those. I love that you have those from Dad.

Ellie Gervais: Me Too.

Leah Gervais: Yeah and what Bola has done is amazing because she also really values from the quote you said. It also points out how much she values empowering other women. I love that she talked about it because especially her space, personal finance is so male dominated. Right. She’s done a great job photo. Well Ellie, you are amazing.

Ellie Gervais: Thank you, so are you.

Leah Gervais: You really inspired me. Thank you so much for sharing all these takeaways and being such a great podcast producer.

Ellie Gervais: You’re so welcome. It’s my pleasure.

Leah Gervais:I have a few flash questions I ask all my guests, are you ready?

Ellie Gervais: I’m ready.

Leah Gervais: It’s not a surprise for you. She has a little advantage to every other interviewee. How do you fight for your vision when things get in the way and things go wrong?

Ellie Gervais: I’d say fight for my vision by not letting worry overcome me about what’s next. Instead I try to just sink into the present moment and work on bettering myself each day just in bite sizes and not take the entire world on  at once.

Leah Gervais: Beautiful, good advice. What are you most proud of in your life so far?

Ellie Gervais:

Hmm. I think, I guess I’m proud of not falling into the mentality that I need to do X, Y or Z to become successful. I’m also just proud of keeping a positive attitude about life and times of adversity and change and confusion. I think that the way that we handle those times of adversity or what we’re going through is really what makes us stronger and I think it should be viewed as an opportunity to grow. So I’ve been proud of trying to hold that mentality at least.

Leah Gervais: You’ve done an amazing job. Life can be hard. You’ve done great.

Ellie Gervais: Thank you.

Leah Gervais: Do you have a book you love or podcasts you recommend?

Ellie Gervais: Well, the book I mentioned earlier “As You Think” by James Allen is a great read. It’s really quick and the original is called “As a Man Thinketh” by Marc Allen. But I read the abridged version and a podcast, obviously Your Biggest Vision and I’d also say I love the Joe Rogan Experience, especially the one where he interviews Alex Honnald. I mean, talk about following your vision, Alex Honnald is the epitome of that.

Leah Gervais: Okay, well thank you so much, Ellie. Thank you for producing this podcast twice a week, every week. You do and amazing job and thank you for sharing this all with us today.

Ellie Gervais: Thank you for the opportunity.

Leah Gervais: I’ll talk to you very soon hopefully.

Ellie Gervais: Okay, sounds good. Thank you.

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