Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 50:09 — 45.9MB)
Subscribe: Spotify | Amazon Music | Android | RSS | More
In This Episode
Seeing through the eyes of love is a practice and a choice. Karen Leba Baker is a teacher of consciousness and co-author of 23 Innovations in Selling. From her experiences and studies, she helps women communicate to find clarity, outgrow their stories, and change the lenses through which they see life. There is importance in realizing if something is worth doing, such as arguing, which can destroy love, according to Karen. Rebbetzin Bat-Chen relates these topics to connecting your marriage with God, who is the truth and the light.
Highlights
1:06 Teacher of consciousness and co-author of 23 Innovations in Selling, Karen Leba Baker, has been focusing her attention on the misunderstandings between the masculine and feminine energies. She teaches women how to harmonize their communications with men.
02:51 We can choose to see through the eyes of love or allow ourselves to let our mistakes and reactions take over. Conflicts are always happening but we don’t always have to act on it.
09:01 The responsibility of bringing harmony to all or a specific aspect in our life is ours and ours alone. This is an adult skill and although it can be easier to play victim, we can outgrow our stories, learn and grow.
12:33 Rebbetzin Bat-Chen adds that playing the role of the victim is also a protective mechanism because you can hide behind your story. However, like in marriage, you can single-handedly take control of your situation.
18:33 When you get out of your story, you become the creator of your story. Rebbetzin Bat-Chen shares a story about a friend in college who knew what she had to do to free herself from a tragic experience.
20:18 The Embrace Retreat of Karen Leba Baker is about different cadences or communication patterns.
21:44 When you have conflict on the inside what you’re doing is you’re looking for clarity on the outside instead of looking for clarity on the inside. We’re looking for the answers outside of you and so it’s almost like you have to manifest the conflict in order to see how it resolves itself so that you can then go take that in, and that’s a really long way of trying to solve a problem.
25:42 Some things are worth doing ourselves and then they’re worth not holding a grudge about. Is it important to ask yourself if something is worth doing.
27:30 In an argument or in any relationship, both people are right.
29:44 The solution to any conflict or lack of clarity, Rebbetzin Bat-Chen shares, is solved by bringing God into the situation.
34:05 Another piece of work that Karen does is distinguishing career from work. We think that we have to love what we do daily, but for Karen, you must be able to support yourself and your family financially, then you can develop your career that makes your heart sing.
38:49 For years, Rebbetzin Bat-Chen had been hiding behind her job in graphic design until recently, when she asked God what she could do to serve Him.
43:49 Join the EMBRACE Retreat with Karen Leva Baker.
45:21 You can also sign for ther the Marriage Breakthrough Retreat with Rebbetzin Bat-Chen Grossman, which starts on January 17, 2022!
Links
Karen Leba Baker: Website | Facebook | 23 Innovations in Selling | EMBRACE Retreat
5 Surprising Ways to Improve Your Marriage
Marriage Breakthrough Retreat
Upcoming Retreats
Books Mentioned
23 Innovations in Selling by Mia Sage and Karen Leba Baker
How to Talk to Men The Geisha and the Gorilla by Mia Sage
The Work by Byron Katie
Loving What Is by Byron Katie
Who Would You Be Without your Story? by Byron Katie
Let’s Connect!
Connected for Real is on Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn
For more information about Connected for Real, visit the website!
Subscribe to the Podcast
Spotify | Google Podcasts | Apple Podcasts
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Welcome to the Connected For Real Podcast! I’m Rebbetzin Bat-Chen Grossman, a marriage coach for women in business, and my mission is to bring God’s presence into your life, into your marriage, and into your business. Let’s get started. The following is one of the many conversations I had with experts and professionals about real life and how it affects marriage. Let me know your takeaways on Instagram or Facebook, @connectedforreal. Enjoy.
And we are live. Welcome to the connected for real podcast. I am Rebbetzin Bat-Chen and I’m a marriage coach for women in business, and what I love to do is I love to take different topics and how they relate to marriage. I like to go really, really deep. So, today is going to be an amazing topic and we called it the Eyes of Love and it’s with Karen Leba Baker. She’s going to introduce herself and then we’re going to get right into it. So, Karen welcome.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
Thank you, Bat-Chen. I love seeing you. I love knowing that we’re so far away yet so close. I’ll introduce myself so I’m from Houston, that’s where I grew up—Houston, Texas. I’m a third generation Texan. I’ve lived in various places in the world, both overseas, out of the united states and around the united states. Right now, I live in Austin, Texas, and I like to swim and hike. I like to be with my 18 year old son. I’m currently divorced and I have been an educator—I guess I could call myself a teacher of consciousness and where my attention has gone is the misunderstandings between men and women or the masculine and the feminine, or Zachar and Nekevah, or Shakti and Shiva. There’s many different names for the polarized energies that exist in the universe, and I have been a student of that for many years teaching women how to harmonize their communications with men. That’s actually what fascinates me. I’m also an author. I’ve written a book with my friend, Mia Sage, and that book is called 23 Innovations in Selling. That’s me down there when I used to have my married name, and she’s also the author of a book called How to Talk to Men, which I just want to plug because it’s a profound read. It’s lighthearted really tells it the way it is between those two polarities and how to bring them closer together and then gracefully let them drift apart because that is kind of the order of things. I’ve just been studying what works in masculine feminine communication, practicing it, making all the mistakes—believe me, all the mistakes—and at this point, I reckon I’ll probably make a few more but I have mercy and compassion on myself even when I make mistakes and I love to talk about the eyes of love because it’s really a choice.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Tell me more about that what do you mean by a choice?
KAREN LEBA BAKER
Well, I was really tough with one of my clients today. He wasn’t keeping his word about an agreement that we made and instead of addressing the agreement he launched into a long list of complaints he has about his life. So, I said, “I am actually not in the mood to hear any complaining today. What are you going to do about the agreement that you made?” And what I mean by that is that he has a choice whether he puts his attention on complaining or he puts his attention on being grateful. Either one of those is a valid choice. They’ll just give extremely different outcomes and so seeing through the eyes of love is also a choice. It’s easy when they’re little and they’re not talking back but then they grow up and they have their own opinions and then of course when we have a spouse or a close and intimate partner, or even a business partner, we see things differently or different humans with different sets of experiences and it is invariable that the energy of conflict will arise but it doesn’t mean we have to act on the conflict and the actual opposite energetic of conflict is love. Conflict is when you’re in your heart. “Should I do this or should I do that?” Which answer is right? That’s called being conflicted and if we’re conflicted in our hearts then we bring the conflict out into our environment. As within, so without, and so choosing to see with the eyes of love is a practice—literally a practice. Like you said, you do yoga and you have a swimming practice on Friday or movement practice in water. So choosing to see through the eyes of love is a practice.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Yes. Oh my goodness. I love everything you’re saying. you know when we were in new York, we went with the whole family, I had like six speaking engagements, my husband was selling his book—it was really fun. It was right before COVID, and I’m so grateful to God that we did that and we got back to Israel four days before the lockdown, but during that month, we had so much fun. We took them all around, to all the different science museums because that was the goal. It was to get to every single science museum in New York. I don’t think it was all of them—yeah, we didn’t get to all of them but we did a really good amount and everybody has really good memories and we were waiting for the subway and the wrong train arrived. You know how the same platform has multiple numbers coming to it? And I told everyone, “Hold back. Hold the kids. Everybody back.” the older ones keep the younger ones from jumping in. “We’re not getting on this train,” and the train opens the doors closes the doors and leaves, and then right on right behind him, the next train comes and it’s the right number so I’m like, “Okay, this is this is the one.” We all get into it. We make sure everybody is here and then the doors closed and I look at the kids and I say, “Did you see how awesome that was?” And they’re like, “What?” By this point, they know their mother already so they’re waiting for something for something profound. “We didn’t get on that train. It opened the doors. It was waiting for us to get on to it. We didn’t get it. We did it. It’s not taking me to where I want to go, so why would I even get there?” So, you’re saying conflict will arise because the person has it in their heart they’re not really in peace with themselves. There’s something going on. They’re going to open it up for you to interact with it. Now, you get a choice you’re going to get into the train or not, and you could totally not. I’ve caught myself asking this question when conflict arises between me and my husband or other situations. Obviously, we have a perfect marriage, so you have nothing to worry about.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
Wait, what about that expression that we always teach what we need to know? [Laughs]
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Of course, are you kidding? I’m having the biggest aha moment week. Ever since Sunday, it’s just been aha moment after aha moment that I am going through all these things right now because this is what I need to learn in order to teach it and it’s amazing. So, now I’m having this thing about perfection and how I want to be so perfect but really, if I was perfect, nobody would want to learn from me so it’s really interesting. So, I’m very relatable. I have a husband and he’s very normal, and I am a very normal wife. I get on his nerves often and he’ll say something like, “So why didn’t you do it?” Or whatever it is that he has complaints about. like you said, it’s a practice. I’ve gotten really good at being like, “You’re right. Thank you.” It’s just like, “Oh, okay. She didn’t get on, so should we get in a different train now?” Which train is coming next? It’s like, “Okay, so what do you want to have for dinner?” A different train will come because you closed the doors on the other train, like you just didn’t get on it.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
So wise. I will use that metaphor. It’s a really good story.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Thank you.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
Sometimes people say “Well, I just can’t help it. I can’t help but argue. I can’t help it,” which is putting all of the power outside of herself and saying that who she’s choosing to argue with has all the power, and then I just ask the question, “Have you ever sung in a choir?” Have you ever swung in a choir, Bat-Chen?
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Yes. I have. I love choir. I was in choir in high school—the entire
KAREN LEBA BAKER
I also loved choir. I was in alto. You can probably tell.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
I had a lot of solos. I really enjoyed it. I loved it.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
Oh, so you have a good voice. Maybe in a minute you’ll sing for our listeners. That would be really fun.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Oh, totally. My kids just made fun of me the other day.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
Well, of course they did. That’s their job. They make fun of everything. That’s their job, but I say, “When you’re singing in a choir and the person next to you is off-key, can you still hold your note?” “Well, yeah. Of course.” “Oh, so when they’re arguing. That’s an off key not. You could still hold your note, whatever it is.”
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
But that’s a skill because not everybody can hold their note and it takes awareness and it takes practice. it really is not everyone. Not everyone can hold their note when somebody else is off key. A lot of people are affected by it and will go off key slowly without realizing, and that’s how much other people’s energies affect us if we don’t prepare, if we’re not aware.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
So that’s sort of the process of becoming an adult. Another one of my clients was complaining about how it’s Christmas and nothing’s happening and so I said, “Well, what would make it feel like Christmas for you?” He said, “Well, if we were watching Christmas movies and if there were piles of presents under the tree and if I had a tree and various other things,” and so I said, “Well, how did that used to happen?” And he said, “Well, my mom and dad would do that.” I said well, “This is what it’s like to be an adult is we have to learn the skills of adulting. When we’re an adult and we want Christmas, we have the responsibility to make Christmas.” If we want harmony in our marriage, we have the responsibility to make harmony in marriage and once we get clear on what our posture is on it, then we have the chance to invite others into the game with us, and so when you say it’s a skill that not everyone has, that’s right. It’s an adulting skill to respond rather than react. A child has no choice but to react because they have no emotional self-control, not as a judgment but as a fact. Children don’t have emotional self-control and that’s also by the way, why they’re victims because they don’t have self-autonomy or self-control yet, but as we grow, we can outgrow becoming the victim because now we actually do have a choice as long as we’re not telling ourselves the victim story, which is an easy story to fall into it’s a human dynamic story.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Of course. It’s also a protective mechanism because as long as you have a story, you don’t have to do anything about it.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
Say more about that. Give us an example.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
There’s so many examples. So first thing that came up for me when you were talking by the way is that one of the things that I speak about is that you can single-handedly change your marriage because—
KAREN LEBA BAKER
One hand.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Yes, one hand. Single-handedly.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
The other hand tied behind your back. I agree with you. I want to hear what you have to say about that.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
The biggest downfall to marriage that I see is when a woman takes her husband by the ear and says, “You need to come with me and we’re going to get help,” and it is so painful for the husband because he has no idea what he did wrong. He doesn’t understand why he has to go to the principal’s office. he doesn’t feel like the principal is on his side, so he feels attacked by two people now, and his ego is just all over the place. what happened? He’s completely shocked. He has no idea. he really thinks he did his best. He doesn’t understand, and the worst thing you could do is bring him into that room and be like, “you see, we have a problem we have to deal with it.” It’s like, maybe things aren’t great but it’s not that bad. they’re really, really not—they’re not there. They have no idea what you’re talking about.
When you take them off the hook and be like, “You’re fine. You do your thing. I free you to be you. I’m going to take responsibility over my life. So, I’m not happy not because you’re not making me happy but because something is going on here that I need to deal with. You’re not meeting my needs because I’m not aware of my needs and I need to get really clear on what I want. I detach myself from being dependent on him for my happiness,” and suddenly everything opens up and the coolest thing that happens in my Mastermind is women who signed up with me for a year— when I sell my program I say the first three months, you’re going to get resistance. Your husband’s gonna be like, “Why do you need this thing? So expensive. You’re doing this, you’re doing that,” blah, blah, blah. “you could just do it for so much cheaper. You do it yourself. Why are you paying someone else?” Right? they have this real man mentality. Very square [Laughs] and it’s fine because it’s them. Then, you don’t tell them to change anything. You’re completely taking them off the hook. Suddenly, you’re a much nicer person because you’re not naggy. You’re not annoyed. You’re not frustrated with them. You’re not taking it out on them. You’re taking responsibility over yourself. It’s like, “Okay, what just happened?” And by six months, they’re dying to know what you’re doing because they want to do it too. my beta people are so blown away by the way that their husband reacts to what they’re doing. One of the guys who said no twice to signing up and by the third time, he said, “Fine, do what you want.” He is now reading her entire journal of everything she wrote as notes of the entire six months because he wants to know—he wants to find what is the gold that you learned that made you transform in such a short period of time. It’s like blowing their minds and the best part of it is nobody told them to do anything. we trust that you will figure it out because you know men and male and female energies, the male energy is really about I know I will figure it out. I just need to go into my man cave and figure it out. So taking him out of his man cave to go into the lion’s den and fight for his whatever is not going to help him figure it out. It’s more like, “Okay, you go do your thing and I’ll do my thing and when we reconvene, and you see my progress, you’re going to be like, ‘Oh, I want in.’” So that’s how you single-handedly take control over your situation.
Now you’re talking about the story and the first time I heard about having a story was from Byron Katie, from The Work. She has her whole book called What’s Her Story? Or something like that—
KAREN LEBA BAKER
Yeah, Loving What Is.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Yeah, Loving What Is, and she has she has a book also with story but she says it like—
KAREN LEBA BAKER
Who Would You Be Without your Story?
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
There you go. Yeah, and it’s like you’re swimming in the pool. So, as long as you’re in the pool you’re swimming in the pool. You can’t really see it as a different entity than you because you’re in it and the second you take yourself out and you’re willing to be like, “Okay, I’m looking at it as a separate thing from me,” like you were never part of the pool but you were in the pool so much that you didn’t even you can’t grasp what the amount of water and the amount of everything that’s going on. You get out of the pool and you look at the pool—and by the way, I had a really interesting personal experience where we did this exercise where you dive into your emotion— that one emotion, you dive into it and you go deeper and deeper into it and really unpack it to really get it all out and then you’re willing to let it go and when I said, “Okay, I’m willing to let it go,” and I came out of the ocean and I’m standing outside on the sand and I’m drying off and I see the hugeness of the ocean. I feel like, “Whoa, I’m so proud of myself that I was in that and I came out of that.” It is so it’s limitless. There is so much of this emotion but now I’m not in it. I’m just outside of it. Yeah, I have some drops on me and I’m still not perfect but oh my gosh, this is a completely different situation now.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
Yes, what a beautiful way to experience having it and not having it.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
So when you’re out of the story and you take responsibility for just being without it, what does that look like and how is it affecting your life now? One of the things that made the biggest impression on me was when one of my friends— we got to college and she didn’t tell anyone that her father had passed away from—I think it was cancer. I think leukemia, and I didn’t find out until the second year because I had just met her and she’s decided that she’s not telling anyone and she’s just going to be like everyone else. For the first year and a half of college, pretty much no one knew that she had a story and it helped her free herself from the story because there was so much pity, and this and that, and just victimhood as a kid who lost his parent and now she’s always getting the that look like, “Oh, poor thing.” She was suddenly like everyone else and everybody was treating her like her, and then anytime something went wrong and she’d be like, “Yeah well I don’t have a father,” she’s like, “No, no, no. That’s okay. I’m okay,” and it was conscious what she did but it was mind-blowing how much it freed her from the story to then be able to grow herself into a completely responsible adult, like you said.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
Yeah, she became the creator instead of the victim. The creator of her story.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Yes, it helped her grow up and it was beautiful. It was powerful and I was like, “No, you should tell people. It’s really important that we all know,” but I think it was a good move for her. This is very personal—
KAREN LEBA BAKER
She knew, right? She knew what was right for her.
There was a story that you were speaking so when you say single-handedly take responsibility for your marriage, so I also do a retreat it’s called the Embrace Retreat and the Embrace Retreat is about different communication patterns, or I call them cadences, because I really do teach communication like it’s music. So, learning to sing in harmony with others is the key to good communication because once you are harmonizing with them and different systems call it creating rapport or pacing and leading or future pacing, once you have that harmony then you can take the conversation in the direction where you want it to go. So, she came to one day of the retreat I think it was the day where I said arguing destroys love, and then I went through all of the exercises that we do and what’s the tone of arguing. It’s not the same as conflict, actually. It’s more the tone of pressure the tone of aggression. Conflict is when you’re feeling in your heart that you don’t know which way to go and so you have to have conflict on the outside but arguing is actually when you do know which way to go and you have to have conflict on the outside.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
That’s so amazing what you just said. Can you just slow down there for a second? When you have conflict on the inside what you’re doing is you’re looking for clarity on the outside instead of looking for clarity on the inside. We’re looking for the answers outside of you and so it’s almost like you have to manifest the conflict in order to see how it resolves itself so that you can then go take that in, and that’s a really long way of trying to solve a problem.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
A really long way. Not to mention, an alienating way. When you feel conflicted, it’s different than alienation. Alienation is what causes us to argue but conflict is what causes us to see everything as not aligned with us. So, she realized that she had been arguing with her husband about something. They have two children. They’re both professionals who work long hours and she had been arguing with him about his responsibilities towards the children, as her picking them up from school, preparing them dinner and the argument was getting them nowhere. He hadn’t changed at all and she was still browbeating him to do the thing. Anyway, she spent that one day in the retreat and she just decided if arguing destroys love, I’m going to stop arguing. “I can’t afford that. I do love this man even though we argue. I’m gonna stop arguing.” So about two weeks after the event, I called to ask so how’s it going, what have you used from the retreat, how has the retreat impacted your life, thank you for coming. She said, “Well, I heard that expression arguing destroyed love destroys love. It really hit home for me, and I just decided to stop arguing. Well, within a couple of days without me arguing or mentioning anything, he started picking the kids up from school and he started feeding them dinner but I wasn’t saying anything.”
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
What do we think, like as a parent also, do you think that your kid doesn’t know you have told them at least 500 times, right? They know what the right thing is. They know but you we think that if we keep reminding them, it’s going to change something. It’s so powerful, like, “wow. I wonder how he figured out what I wanted.” Well, you’ve been saying it for almost like 600 years.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
And so arguing is pressuring for your way. Arguing is pressuring to get your way. So, she stopped pressuring him and it’s a skill that we teach in the retreat to stop pressuring, to take the pressure off, and then he could do what he probably wanted to do all along, but her behavior was preventing him from doing the very thing that he wanted to do. He wanted to make her happy but she was so busy arguing that she couldn’t even be happy because arguing and happy those are very far apart.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
You know what’s funny? One of my favorite jokes about marriage. The guy says to his wife, “ I said I was going to change the light bulb. You don’t have to remind me every six months.” [Laughter] it’s so funny to me because it’s exactly—that’s exactly how it is. They know. They know, and they just want to do it on their terms.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
I want to use that. That’s really good. I wanted to say about some things are worth doing ourselves and then they’re worth not holding a grudge about. They’re worth just accepting. Well, if I want the light bulb change I can actually pick up. I can actually change it or I was thinking about picking a mosquito in my office here. I’m talking about picking up clothes off the floor. Well, he doesn’t mind clothes on the floor, or actually, I have friends—a couple and she always leaves everything on the floor. She just drops it. Even her pizza box. She drops it on the floor. Yes, this is a grown woman, and he likes things tidy and he loves her and he appreciates their harmony. So, why would he argue about it? He just picks it up because he likes it that way. Why would anyone argue about the toilet seat if you like it down, just put it down and then go on your merry way. It’s not really worth it.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
You know, I’m having such a good time with you. You just reminded me of another joke.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
Please joke away.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
[Laughs] you know—you know those jokes about how many whatevers does it take to change a light bulb?
KAREN LEBA BAKER
Yes, I do.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
So, how many coaches does it take to change a lightbulb?
KAREN LEBA BAKER
How many?
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Well, it really depends. Does the light bulb want to change?
KAREN LEBA BAKER
[Laughter] That’s a good one. Okay, well then I have a joke about change too is that men marry women hoping that they’ll never change and we always do, and women marry men hoping that they’ll change and they rarely do.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Yes, and that’s–
KAREN LEBA BAKER
We have such unrealistic expectations going in the first place. That’s why it’s so important that we are grounded in who we are. What’s the song that we’re singing? What’s the note that we’re humming? What is our own sovereignty? What’s important to us and what’s not important to us? Otherwise, we literally sell our dignity down the stream in an attempt to be right. But both people are right.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Yes, always both people are right because every person is living their own story and that goes back to the story. There is no non-story. You are living your own life and you have a story. So as much as we want to let go of stories, we also choose stories that serve us and that’s part of life.
I want to talk about something you said— just let it go, let him figure it out, or stop arguing but the danger that I want to caution people against is bottling it in, is doing it the wrong way because this is what we do as women. Maybe not me or you but—
KAREN LEBA BAKER
Well, most of us are taught that we’re too dramatic or we’re too much or that those emotions are inappropriate instead of that those emotions are actually a part of a living being . Trees don’t have them. Humans do. Dogs don’t have them. Humans do. We have emotions.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Somebody once said there’s no such thing as good or bad emotions. They just are, and I was like, “No, there’s bad emotions.” I really fought for this real belief that has to be that there’s something bad but no, it’s so amazing. It’s just an experience—
KAREN LEBA BAKER
Maybe you were on the conflict channel when you were having that argument.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
I was very young. [Laughter] I was very young. So, yeah the danger of bottling it in because we do try to make peace. Some of us are really into appeasing and making sure that everybody is okay around us, and I’m talking from experience I’m a very nice person and I want everyone to be happy around me. Those are my two big goals in life. It’s dangerous to think that if I just don’t say anything and I hold my tongue and I pretend that I am not saying anything and I don’t care or blah, blah, blah, there’s such a negative type of energy there there’s like [buzzing sound]. You could feel it. I’m holding my tongue. I’m holding—I’m not saying anything but did you see how he just dropped the box on the floor. Oh my goodness. There’s like 17 eyes on you and, “I didn’t say anything. I didn’t. I was so good.” It’s not going to get you anywhere.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
What do you recommend?
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Well, my approach is bringing God into it because any situation, any conflict, any lack of clarity is always going to unravel itself when you bring God into it because God is truth and God is peace and God is light. You turn light on in a dark room and you will see where you’re going and you won’t bump into things. When you connect to what does God really want, like bottom line, what is aligned here? Then, rarely do you have to control the situation. You no longer have to worry about things that aren’t in your control. You no longer have to hold on to making sure that things are done right or that things happen or whatever because God is taking care of it.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
I’ve heard God called Good Orderly Direction.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Yeah, God is everything so it’s one of those amazing things. I called my business Connected for Real because when I was asking people what is my superpower, people were saying that I’m very connected. I have this direct line to God and we were talking about this before we went live. I just talk to God when I need something. That’s just how I grew up. So to me this is very natural and I don’t see it as a skill. I don’t think of it as something that I had to work on and so I didn’t think it was something I can help other people with because usually you think of work as having to do something hard. You have to learn something in order to do it and it has to be hard and it has to take time and you have to–you know it has to be—
KAREN LEBA BAKER
Well, by the sweat of your brow shall you earn your bread. That’s indoctrinated into us from a very young age. I mean, it was happening in the stone age that they said that but never mind we’re still learning it.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
I had this discussion with my husband the first baby we had. I was pregnant with my first and he was learning to be a Rabbi so he was not working. I was the one working and I’m very, very grateful that I was able to support him and his learning and his studies So, one day I had this joke—I don’t remember if it was before I gave birth or after because I had the epidural and I didn’t really feel much—so I said to him, “Listen. If you don’t have to do your part of the deal, then I don’t have to do mine.” Right “I didn’t have to go through childbirth pain because they gave me the epidural, and you didn’t have to work hard because your wife worked for you,” so it was a funny, a cute joke but yeah. By the way, I just had the baby five months ago and this one I had at home with no epidural and I think that is reflective of the inner work that I’ve done, very much that I still have the same experience of almost no pain and a very good birth but now it comes from within and not from without. That’s really amazing. I just realized that while telling it to you—is it? it really was. It’s been 15 years in the making this process of becoming more inner—I don’t know what to call it innerly guided.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
Inner peace.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Yes, inner peace is good. I like that.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
There was also just another thing I wanted to share that came to my mind. So, one of the pieces of work that I do when I work with women on a year-long basis is I work with distinguishing career from work. So, work is something that we do like a task list. It’s something that’s just needing to be done. Washing the dishes, going to do our job, it’s what we do for money or it’s a task that needs to be done, and that’s how we distinguish work. There’s also a stream of thought if you love your work you never work a day in your life. I call that career. If you love your work then it’s called your career. In the way that I distinguish it, and career is what we do for self-expression, and career is also how others know us. So, if we’re in the community as a Red Cross Volunteer and that’s how people know us, the fact that we’re also a school teacher on the side may not make a difference because the school teaches the work but where our passion is and our self-expression is as is as a Red Cross Volunteer. So that’s how I distinguish because I think it’s difficult for people these days, with the changing face of employment, people think that they have to love what they do in their day-to-day work. Well, I don’t advise that we hate it because it hurts our morale but I do advise that if you’re doing a work day job that you get paid for and support yourself and your family financially with, then you develop your career because your career is what makes your heart sing. It’s your self-expression in the world and it’s ultimately how people will come to know you and how they remember you, like my friend, Ruth Steinfeld. She’s my mom’s hairdresser for many years, for over 40 years. She was my mom’s hairdresser and she’s the one that introduced me to transformational work through the landmark forum that she was a hairdresser and she also became a public speaker talking about herself as a child who was hidden during the holocaust in a French farmer’s family with her sister, Leah, and how people know her is as a docent at the holocaust museum in Houston. They know her as a speaker who’s been the voice for the 1.5 million children that were murdered in the holocaust. She’s the grown-up child the survivor who’s spoken for them. They know her as the person that tells her story and has grown beyond her story to be not a victim but a contributor and she recently received the French Legion of Honor award, which is the highest award that the French government gives for her work in both surviving and being a contribution to others by teaching about the holocaust. I don’t even remember how that ties back to the original story—
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
I’ll see how it ties back because I was telling you about my process of becoming connected for real. I was a graphic designer for 15 years and one day, when I was pregnant with my number six, I had this aha moment that since God is limitless and what I want is to do His will then why don’t I just ask Him to align my work and my career so that I don’t have to be in both, so I don’t have to separate myself and so I started praying for that. Show me what You actually want me to do that will put the two together, and what am I here to contribute that will also pay the bills and how do I make that work and I want You to show me step-by-step because you’re the only guide and you’re the only one who could show me and you see it from above and you know what’s going on. I was very clear on what I wanted and that was the beginning of my complete transformation from graphic designer. I left everything and I started coaching and then I niched into marriage and I niched into marriage for women in business and so it’s so amazing for me to sit there and just watch my own transformation from that moment where I realized it’s possible because God is limitless. He did it.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
I appreciate your faithfulness.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Thank you and that’s, by the way, what I’ve just realized this week. Part of my clarity is that I was hiding behind graphic design in order to reach advising people. I love making peace with people, so my favorite clients were the ones who had a family business and the father said this and the mother said this and the kids are in it, and they’re all trying to take the sides and they’re taking a piece of the pie and everybody wants to have a say, and here I was the graphic designer who was putting everybody’s ideas in order and everybody’s lives were just put back together and peace in the home and all this great stuff. They loved having me around and it wasn’t for the graphic design. It was for the fact that I was really powerful and the energy I was bringing and the in the work that I was doing, but I was never willing to be anything but the graphic designer because I was really scared to be open about that and that was the biggest, the first aha moment was, “Okay, I don’t have to hide behind graphic design anymore. If God wants me to be an advisor, then I’m gonna go be an advisor,” which by the way is called a coach these days. I had to come to peace with that.
My biggest aha moment this week is that even though my specialty is marriage and marriage is the way I reach people and am able to help them unravel everything else in their life, it’s really the bringing God into their life that is what I really do. So, that was a big aha moment—
KAREN LEBA BAKER
That’s a pretty interesting coaching niche.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Yeah, yeah but it still very much has to do with marriage and with everything else. I’m not pivoting yet. I don’t feel I have to leave the marriage part in order to do the bring God into your life part, but I suddenly feel more comfortable saying it and talking about it and not hiding behind it. Maybe because it’s so not acceptable or just weird to be the one to say, “I want God’s presence in your home.” [Laughs]
KAREN LEBA BAKER
I often call people and I actually say to them, “I really want you in my program. I know that I can make a difference in your life. I know that the community, having a community of nurturing sisterhood where we talk about everything, where you can show up however you are and be accepted, I know that will make a huge difference in your life,” because most of the women that work with me are directors of a non-profit or they are global directors of some large organization or their physicians with their own practices, and there are people that don’t find the time in the way our culture is set up to have girl time, but throughout history we’ve had girl time because we have not been working. We’ve been nurturing in the home and we’ve been raising the children and taking care of the animals and it’s not like that anymore, but having membership in a group of women and that social time and our innate spirituality, which women have connected to the cycles of the earth, being connected to other women and having that plus our body senses of humor about various things that we usually won’t discuss with the opposite sex—all of those things are part of being a woman and they’re part of making our life worth living.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Yes, yes. It’s so powerful because we’re women working in a man’s world and that’s the problem I think is for so many women is they think that they have to play the game the same way like the men play the game and men are very isolated. They climb up and they end up alone on top and that’s the man way to do it, and women actually fly in flocks. they really thrive when they’re part of something bigger and when they have that support from each other and that’s something that I’m also building in my community.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
It’s true.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
So powerful. So, so powerful because getting in touch with your feminine side is really understanding that you cannot do this alone and you should not do this alone and it’s actually not to anyone’s benefit if you are a loner.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
I noticed I’m getting super hungry and it’s almost lunch time for me and I’m going to Houston today to celebrate my dad’s 87th birthday.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Wow, mazel tov.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
Thank you okay we’re ordering the cake from three brothers.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Oh, that’s nice.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
My website that you can go to to learn about my retreat and the work that I do in the seven days is called businessaspleasure.com/retreat. You may want to know why I called it Business as Pleasure is because that world that you were describing of a hierarchical, top-down, barking orders, masculine world, it just wasn’t for me. I didn’t like it. I didn’t fit there. It was no fun and so I said, “I’m tired of business as usual. I’m gonna go for business as pleasure. Let’s do something that makes us happy. Let’s do something that we can put our spirits into. Let’s actually play instead of working,” and that’s where the name Business as Pleasure came from is when you’re tired of business as usual because as working with women leaders, what’s really important to me is that women don’t opt out of leadership just because the cost is high. Find another way to do it. That’s why so many women are in business for themselves, in my opinion, is because we want to do it differently we want to run our businesses like we run our know families with love and lightness and fun and contribution. So, yeah. That’s where it all came from. It all started because I just didn’t like working in that system. It didn’t work for me.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
I love that. I love that you said that also. I’ll put up my link too so you guys can go connectedforreal.com/retreat and that is for women who are in business because as you just said, don’t avoid leadership because it comes at a cost. So my thing is it doesn’t have to come at a cost. You don’t have to choose between your marriage and your business. Yes, you shouldn’t have to choose and it’s not fair that that’s the message that’s being given to us.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
We live in a time where really, we can—just the way you build a business team, you also have to build a team at home. Maybe you need somebody else to go do the grocery shopping. That’s okay. It’s below your pay grade to do the grocery shopping. It’s beneath your pay grade to do the other tasks around the house. You can do the things that you’re called to, your self-expression, your leadership and let other people do those other things for you just like you would in your business. There’s no reason to be falsely modest and say, “I have to do the grocery shopping.” No, not really. You can make the list. You can even make it so it’s the same thing every week and you don’t have to remake it. we’re living in a very different time and it calls for different role models, so I’m glad that we’re talking about that as role models.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Yes, I love it that you gave the topic of the eyes of love because it’s not putting on the pink glasses and seeing something . pink glasses is like see what’s not. Like, “ Make it look like it’s pink,” but really reality is not pink, but that doesn’t matter. The eyes of love is like your eyes are you know—that is exactly what is there and there’s nothing filtering or anything else. It’s just a choice. You’re choosing love and you’re choosing to bring it in, and I love that.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
Yeah, who brings the love? Raise your hand. [Raises hand] I bring the love and eventually they sing along with me. I bring the love.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Oh, thank you so much for joining me. I enjoyed this conversation. I had so much fun having fun. You’re awesome—
KAREN LEBA BAKER
And telling jokes, I love that.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Yes, yes. This is one of the best podcasts yet.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
Thank you. Thank you for inviting me. I really appreciate it. I do intend that at some point in the not distant future, in the next year, I will be married so I can come back and tell about my transformation, and I would like to call on you I think you have some real wisdom to share from a perspective that’s not far from mine but not the same as mine, and I feel like I could learn a great deal from you.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Thank you. I bless you that I should be invited to your wedding. Well, I bless myself. I bless myself.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
Maybe it’ll happen in Israel.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
There you go. Okay, guys. Listen up. We’re looking for you.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
That’s such an amazing thought. It really is.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Yeah I’m inviting myself to your—
KAREN LEBA BAKER
Please do.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
There’s a beautiful Spanish. we used to live in Venezuela and there was this saying that they used to say when you say, “Oh, it’s my birthday,” or whatever, so they say, “Oh, may we may we count them together?” something like that until 120 and that we should count them together, and I thought that was just so sweet so
KAREN LEBA BAKER
I’ll say it to my dad tomorrow.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Yes, and he should have the merit to be at your wedding next year or within the year.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
God willing. That is so sweet.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Yeah, anyway. Thank you all for listening to our fun conversation.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
Thanks, everybody. I look forward to meeting you sometime. Maybe at my wedding. Who knows?
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Yes.
KAREN LEBA BAKER
Bye Bat-Chen.
REBBETZIN BAT-CHEN GROSSMAN
Bye. And that’s it! Thank you for listening to the very end. I would love if you can leave a review and subscribe to the podcast. Those are things that tell the algorithm, this is a good podcast and make sure to suggest it to others. Wouldn’t it be amazing if more people became more connected for real? And now, take a moment and think of someone who might benefit from this episode. Can you share it with them? I am Rebbetzin Bat-Chen Grossman from connectedforreal.com. Thank you so much for listening, and don’t forget, you can be connected for real.