28. What to Do When You Want Two Different Things | Coaching Call with Lena

Ever find yourself torn between two conflicting desires? In this episode, I sit down with Lena, who beautifully navigates the complexities of wanting both certainty and adventure in her life. We explore how understanding your individual needs can help you create balance, even when those needs seem to pull you in different directions.

You might want to listen if:

• You’re struggling to balance stability and spontaneity in your life.
• You often feel conflicted between different desires or goals.
• You want practical tips on identifying and meeting your needs effectively.
• You’re curious about how to align your actions with your core values.
• You’re interested in learning strategies for communicating your needs in relationships.

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DISCLAIMER: Speak Honest podcast content is informational, not professional or medical advice. Jenn is an ICF relationship coach, not a licensed therapist. Consult health professionals for specific concerns. Client opinions do not reflect Speak Honest’s stance. We aim for accuracy but are not liable for errors or outcomes from this information.

Transcript

Hello everyone and welcome back to another episode of Speak Honest. On today's episode, I get to chat with Lena. Lena came on the podcast because she was struggling with her summertime schedule.

She's a mom of three, basically teenagers, a 16 year old and 11 year old twins. So she definitely has her hands full. And she is just realizing that every time summer rolls around. Everything she has kind of established in her fall time schedule just goes away. I mean, how many of us can absolutely relate to that, right?

We have our structure in place. We have everything going on. We're doing amazing. We're getting all of our tasks done. And then summer hits and it just goes.  And so we talked about, we talked about what that meant for her. We talked about how would she like to get back on schedule? And I know she came into the call really wanting to know how can she get what she has in the fall and the summer. 

But as she was talking, I started noticing that maybe she doesn't necessarily need to be doing this stuff in the fall all year round. So I started asking her some questions and you can kind of see through our conversation what she ends up figuring out. The biggest takeaway for this episode is talking about our individual needs.

So we really dive into our micro needs, which are basically our moment to moment needs. Our bodies, our minds, our subconscious is actively seeking out every single, like, second of the day, even right now, talking to you, even though you're not here, I'm getting a social connection met. I am getting excitement meant and novelty because this is a new podcast and this is exciting.

I'm getting contribution because I'm sharing with all of you, but I'm also getting validation because this podcast is going to, Go out into the world and you guys are going to see it and hear it means I'm also being heard. I'm being seen. Do you see how all these needs are being met by this one action that I'm taking? 

So we start going through that with Lena and we start really seeing, Hey, what is this actually meaning for you? Why are you sleeping in? Why are you staying up late? Why are you doing all these things differently now? And maybe that's okay. And so go ahead and listen for that as you listen in on my conversation with Lena. 

Jenn Noble (00:04.808)

Hi Lena, thank you so much for coming on the podcast today. How can I help?

Lena Cebula (00:09.788)

Thank you so much for having me. So I think it's really important maybe like maybe there are some somebody who is just like me have struggling with the summer. I don't know how about you guys maybe you enjoying the summer and and plants and all that stuff but for me on top of that before I was staying home mom and I have three kiddos they were young it was all about them it was busy.

Then I started building the business. So I still have a summer when three youngsters running around plus business. So now you have to figure out how to have to be any business woman, any mother, and with all this plan events. Now they're older. have 16 year old and 12 year old twins. Actually, hold on one second. They're going to be 12 year old next month, but I'm already

Jenn Noble (01:14.107)

Not quite, but super soon, yeah.

Lena Cebula (01:15.164)

Like next month, are you going to say in 17 and 12 year olds? And I'm so used to it. And now I'm asking them, are you guys still 11? And they're laughing, you know? So yes, they still 11 until next month and still 16 until the next month. But what interesting though, that for a first time in these 16 years, I've been a mom, I actually like can see clearly.

What is the problem? if like we can brainstorm the idea and you can help me to navigate that. I hate when the routine breaks and it's stressing me out because all of us thrive in routine. And I have whole, like I have like goosebumps. I have whole year when I'm placing this routine in, routines in place for all of us, not only children,

for myself as well and for our family altogether. But summer is like so many things unplanned, not sleeping on time, not eating on time. There's no school. There's no, there's groove, I would say, that we achieving through the year. And you would think that it's wonderful because we all searching for freedom, whatever it is, but...

Jenn Noble (02:35.527)

Yeah. Nope.

Lena Cebula (02:36.952)

It just become messy and mess is like so stressful for me. And I noticed through the years, it's really affected my mental health, my physical health and my kids too. You think like all over the place is fine, but now this is first time that I, not first time I see this clearly, but I'm like, kind of figure out how we can kind of keep those boundaries.

Jenn Noble (02:40.967)

Mm -hmm.

Lena Cebula (03:05.392)

but still have freedom? So that's the question.

Jenn Noble (03:09.171)

how to have the boundaries, how to have the structure, right? How to keep your routine, how to make sure you're doing all the things you want to be doing, like getting up in the morning, making your food the way you want to be doing it, but then still have the freedom of summertime. Am I hearing that right?

Lena Cebula (03:23.224)

Absolutely. And we do have plants. I'm not talking about those times when you go on vacation or like you're away from home. It's the home life that, that, that kind of like mundane, doing nothing all over the place life. And to figure out how not to be, to like a police and try to be like, cannot have the same routine in the winter and the summer.

Jenn Noble (03:37.8)

Yeah.

Jenn Noble (03:50.865)

Yeah, and I know so many people who try to do that and then they actually burn out because of it, right? So I love that you already see that. You're like, I know that this is going to be different, but I don't like it. I don't like what's going on and I want to be able to figure out how do I stay in this. So let me ask you a couple of questions. Tell me more about what the routine during the fall and the winter time, what does that bring to

Lena Cebula (04:13.83)

Well, first of all, for myself, it's bring the order. And when I feel that it's order in the routine, I feel more stable in like my decision making and I have a time for myself. My kids know exactly what we do. So like, I do believe we have like more peace and stability when we have this clear boundaries.

And it took me like a long time to figure out if your first time mom, of course, like honestly guys, this is going to be a hard road. But the fact that I've been on the job for 16 years, I was trying different methods and seeing that, if the kids sleeping, eating on time, they behave better. Or if I'm sleeping and eating on time, I'm behave better. So it was like all this long process to figure stuff out.

Jenn Noble (04:46.899)

What?

Lena Cebula (05:07.302)

But right now, because I'm building new business, actually revamping like totally all my career. So this is completely new territory for me. And what helped me thrive through the school year, it's kids being in school for eight hours. And I know exactly what to do with them so I can concentrate on me and my business.

Jenn Noble (05:32.595)

but in the summertime, they're not out, right? They're not going to school for eight hours a day or they don't have their extracurriculars. And to some extent, sure, I know even a lot of people be like, we'll go put them in summer camp or go do this. First off, I'd also like to say that comes with a privilege of being able to afford. Do you know how expensive summer camps are for teenagers? I have a 13 year old and I put him in for the first month and that was amazing. I got so much work done, but he didn't want to go for the second month. And I was happy not to spend a couple thousand dollars to send him to a theater camp.

So like now he's home all the time. So I totally feel you on that. It's just a lot.

Lena Cebula (06:06.94)

Exactly. And the age too, you know, when they were babies, they like not the babies, but the toddlers. And that time when everything was excited, they loved camp. But now, and in the other thing I'm thinking why we didn't put them in the camp this year or anything like that, because they are so busy at school. They're like, like, I don't want my kids to get the burnout, like at about 11 and 16.

Jenn Noble (06:18.853)

Jenn Noble (06:30.045)

Mm -hmm.

Lena Cebula (06:36.602)

So I want them to have that break. And yeah, I think that's what I'm looking for. I'm looking for the, that balance. And I think because I have it through the school year, I know it's possible to get in the summertime, but I don't know, maybe you can help

Jenn Noble (06:55.927)

It's interesting because as I hear you talk as well, and this is one of the hard parts about when we have like competing needs going on, where you want that structure, you want that stability. And at the same time, I also heard you say, but that's because the kids do so much in the school year and you don't want them to burn out. So it's like you want to give them that break. But then when you give them. Yes.

Lena Cebula (07:17.786)

I like the words you say competing needs. like, I like that.

Jenn Noble (07:22.417)

Yeah, we each have our own individual needs, or as I call them, our micro needs. so being able to go through and really figure out what your micro needs are is really important. And so these are our kind of moment to moment needs, things like emotional connection, personal growth, stability, safety. But then we also have things like novelty, freedom, adventure, autonomy.

All of these things. so when we put all of these needs in different categories, there's six different categories or the macro needs as you will. So we have connection and my gosh, I'd have to go through them right now. I'm having a brain fart because I'm thinking about like 30 different things right now. But each six needs, they all kind of get paired together. So you have certainty and variety. And these two needs are constantly competing against each other. So certainty, underneath certainty, you're going to have things like security.

stability, peace. A lot of these words you're saying you're not getting right now, right? So that sounds like your certainty need is lacking a little bit. On the opposite side, we have our variety need or our uncertainty need, but like variety need. And those are gonna have things like freedom and novelty and adventure and exploration, discovery, right? So that feels fun. Like it almost like, I don't know about you, but when I say those two needs, they feel different in my body. One of them feels

Lena Cebula (08:49.445)

Absolutely.

Jenn Noble (08:50.963)

peace and like calming. I love

Lena Cebula (08:52.76)

And I know that we have enough like variety in the summer. And yeah, I guess like definitely we lack in certainty. And even my husband, like literally he looked on his website and there was like opening that amazing park that he camped. And he's like, my gosh, there's two day of open.

Jenn Noble (09:03.761)

Yes!

Lena Cebula (09:18.222)

open time, there's never, this has never happened like in the summer, let's go. And it scares me because last time it was unplanned. have to cancel all my appointments, reschedule all this stuff, pack up the kids. I have to do stuff. And when we come back on Monday, I feel totally lost. And it took me like whole week to put all this back in place. And when he says that I literally have a panic. I'm

I don't like surprises. like everything planned. And, but he goes like, I like to go with my daughter. I'm like, thanks God. Yes. Go, go enjoy this life. Compromise, you know.

Jenn Noble (09:50.888)

Yes.

Jenn Noble (09:57.201)

You go, you go, you go do it. This is actually then what I'm hearing. Yeah, and this is actually so classic in relationships, specifically in families. What I'm almost hearing right now as you're talking is you personally and your Lena individual needs, high need for certainty. Like you feel good in certainty. And I love that, that's beautiful for you. And it sounds like, and shocker, we find partners that go the opposite of us.

Sounds like your partner might have a high need for variety. It might sounds like, yeah.

Lena Cebula (10:29.98)

But you know what's funny? You're right. But for almost like 13 years, he was working so much and I was so much at home. So I had so much variety and he had so much certainty. And last couple of years, we like changed. I like the certainty and he likes variety. And I'm so glad that he does because I want him to live the life. But I need, I need to be

Jenn Noble (10:42.211)

Lena Cebula (10:59.548)

focused.

Jenn Noble (11:01.223)

Yeah, because again, what does focus bring you? And this is why when we look at all of our individual needs, the most important thing is to keep going back down to the goal. Like what's our why? So what does the focus bring you right

Lena Cebula (11:05.34)

Mm -hmm.

Lena Cebula (11:14.609)

Well, because my new business have momentum.

Jenn Noble (11:18.476)

Mm hmm. Yeah. And what does this new business bring you? What does it make you feel

Lena Cebula (11:26.62)

It's exciting. It's my passion. It's my path and my purpose. And yeah, I want to serve people. And I finally have a vehicle. If you don't mind me sharing, I just got actually certified as a Christian Leadership Life Coach. And I am so excited because I'm helping women to find that actually.

Jenn Noble (11:39.997)

Please, yeah.

Jenn Noble (11:46.131)

Congratulations! That's amazing!

Lena Cebula (11:54.094)

and violence because we're overwhelmed. And honestly, this is perfect topic for the summer as well, because we need to have time for ourselves and I helping them in the time of transitions because I have few of those that were very serious and by the grace of God, I overcome them and thriving. So I would like to be that coach in the corner. So now this is, I think.

What happened is all of my life kind of like have like all of us, you know, like in stages and it's finally, it's my time to build my business and myself and my self development tools and all this stuff. And still my main purpose, it's still being mom and wife. You know, that that's what I'm trying to perfect

Jenn Noble (12:46.033)

Yeah, yeah.

Lena Cebula (12:49.857)

summer because I think everything else I already nailed

Jenn Noble (12:54.235)

Yeah, you're like, I got this, check, I got this. And now it's summertime. So I love this because I think you can absolutely figure out a way to make your summers, especially because you have your oldest one, they're still going to be around for one more summer after this. And then, of course, you have your littles and you have their twins. you know, extra work. so building your I love how you're figuring this out. I love how you're like, I'm OK. I really feel a level of acceptance and almost compassion towards yourself right now, which I just want to say, like, awesome job because

just even sitting there right now and being like, I know we're a little bit all over the place this summer. Maybe we're not gonna figure this out to this summer, but I wanna start setting up something for next summer. So, yeah, yeah.

Lena Cebula (13:34.382)

I see that every summer it gets better and better better.

Jenn Noble (13:44.273)

So just keeps going with that. Now let's do a fun little thing that I like to do sometimes, which is if I gave you a magic wand and next summer you can have whatever you want. What does it look

Lena Cebula (13:58.522)

Mmm.

Jenn Noble (13:59.549)

And I want you to tell me everything. I'm talking, I don't care if it's even like, I want foot massages every day. I don't care. I wanna know what is your perfect summer? What are you looking for? What are we striving for here?

Lena Cebula (14:15.394)

I definitely, it's so funny how you were naming this certainty and varieties and connection. I want all of that. But each of my kids first, like, course, like first with myself and my God and my faith. And then with my husband, I like uncertainty and connection and variety. And I want everything, you know, like everybody say like, balance and all this stuff. It's unattainable.

Jenn Noble (14:25.659)

Yeah.

Lena Cebula (14:44.54)

But I know it is, I know you can get it. It's not like, I, when I'm talking about balance, I don't want like, 50 % for my family, 50 % for my work. No, I know that I will be satisfied with watching the movie with my family. And I think that's another thing because they kind of like teen and preteen, so they cool like that. They passing by and I'm like, almost like it's a first date.

Would you like to watch a movie with me? Would you like to come for dinner? Would you like to go walk with me? And sometimes they're like, I'm hanging out with my buddies, you know, so stuff like that. love to have any connection with them. and it doesn't have to be like any percentage. don't count this like, in a day I have to give 20 % or 50%. I just would like to have that satisfaction and certainty that.

I did my work, I spent time with my husband, I took care of my home. I spent with my child individually. It doesn't matter if we went to Costco together and have a lunch, know, or we had the movies or we walk in the dog. We don't have to have like anything special. And there, of course, we already kind of like nailed our vacation time when

together at the cottage or me and my husband away or my husband away with the kids, stuff like that. So that would be like with the magic wand, I would come and work Monday, Wednesday, and Friday on my business to take care of my people. And Tuesday and Thursday, it's my wellness day where I do my gym and swimming and taking care of Lena.

and Saturday is pajama day that we take care of the house and then we eating pizza, watching movies and stuff and then on Sunday I'm going to church and hanging out with my church family as well and definitely for them too I want them to see their friends and their cousins and still want to hang out with me too.

Jenn Noble (16:42.286)

Mmm.

Lena Cebula (17:06.246)

So that's kind of, yeah, they are good kiddos, but for them as well, I want them and sleep and eat and exercise and know that this is for them as well. Everything that I'm doing, even like sometimes maybe it sounds like nagging in the magical world, I would have them appreciate it. Everything that I do for them, know, mentally, emotionally and physically.

Jenn Noble (17:07.129)

Always the hope.

Jenn Noble (17:30.843)

Yes. Yes, that's why I have to give you a magic wand, because we all know teenagers don't do that, but that's fine. I know.

Lena Cebula (17:36.932)

Yeah, I know that would be like really glorious. Mom, I love to spend time with you and watch a movie and thank you for making me eat broccoli. Thank you for going to Costco. Yeah, you know, I, it's kind

Jenn Noble (17:49.543)

Mom, see how hard you work. Mom, you spend such the perfect amount of time on both us and your business. I'm so proud of you, Mom. Yeah, no, I know that's amazing. So let me ask you this question, because I love this. And also great specificity. I just want to say, like Monday, Wednesday, Friday, you're working on your business. Tuesday, Thursday. I love how you call it your wellness day. You're working on Lena. Stunning. You know what you want to be doing. You even plan for your rest.

That's how it should be. You plan for your PJ day. You plan for your pizza. I really love to see like in your mind how much you've thought about this. So let me ask you this then. What's holding you back right now from getting that

Lena Cebula (18:35.49)

Interestingly enough, because I'm working with the coach on Mondays for my business, everything that I put in place that habits, like for example, my wellness day, like it works, but everything that I'm trying to implement on summertime, it just doesn't stick. I don't know, everything like, yeah.

Jenn Noble (18:58.451)

So let's explore that more. Sorry, I don't mean to interrupt you, but I want to almost kind of really hone in on this.

Lena Cebula (19:05.18)

Yes, because that's, I think that's where this disconnect is, you know, because it's not like I cannot put habits in place. It just like almost summer and I don't know, like honestly, I don't know if it's like drama from the days before when it was like so busy, everybody eats everywhere, like I always gained extra 10 pounds.

Jenn Noble (19:15.271)

Mm -hmm.

Lena Cebula (19:31.972)

and sounds like we're busy and doing stuff but it's so overwhelming. I actually said to my friend another day, I'm I'm dreading the summer. I'm like, Whoa, that's a big words. You know? Yeah.

Jenn Noble (19:36.861)

Mm -hmm.

Jenn Noble (19:44.391)

Yeah. So let's get more clear real quick than about what is it that's preventing these Monday, Wednesday, Friday, Tuesday, Thursday days. So are you having wellness days in the summer? Let's start there.

Lena Cebula (19:56.368)

Mm -hmm.

Lena Cebula (20:00.878)

Yes, actually, then like the wellness days now the easiest to keep because it's been long time that I work. And I have to say, I'm very proud of myself because even if I don't want to go, I still go to the gym. But what happened is because the gym was like so tied up to the kids, actually everything tied up and the kids going to school. So I wake up at seven o 'clock.

Jenn Noble (20:17.603)

Ugh.

Lena Cebula (20:31.164)

I'm not the early riser, but I have to because this is the work. I wake up, I take care of them. I send them to school, 9 .30, I'm straight from the school to the gym or I straight from the school to the office. And that's where, where like it's, it's raw. Now that's what first week of the summer was that I couldn't make it to the gym or something happening because always stay up late, which is

whole week, like, my goodness, I actually really like to stay up late. Why? Because the kids doesn't need to go to school. And so that's a huge boundary that I have on myself through the year because of this responsibility. So I have to train myself again to go sleep on time because I realize if I cannot go sleep on time,

then I cannot wake up. If I cannot wake up at seven or I try to wake up at seven and I force myself to go to the gym, I pull the muscle because my brain is sleeping. I'm like, okay, this is not working out. yeah.

Jenn Noble (21:39.023)

Mm -hmm. You want to be careful with stuff like that. Well, let's go back real quick because I want to kind of keep us on track because one thing I am kind of noticing is when you were so great at being specific when we were in Magic Wand land. And now as we're getting into real land, I'm noticing what's happening, which is you're kind of going back up in your head and getting almost like abstract about stuff. And I love this because it's really showing us where we need to work on this. So what I'm hearing on a specific level is

Lena Cebula (21:56.956)

Again.

Yes.

Jenn Noble (22:08.253)

You're not waking up in the morning because you're staying up

But I also heard you like staying up

So let's explore that real quick. And you can keep doing this for each tiny thing. I'm gonna give you a little bit of tools right now to do during one kind of tiny thing. then throughout, I want you to kind of go through and find each reason why you're not doing the thing you're doing and break it down into chunks. And so you're staying up late. Why? Because your kids are staying up late, because you like it, because you're connecting with

Lena Cebula (22:22.)

Mm -hmm.

Lena Cebula (22:44.004)

No, actually I make them go sleep on time.

Jenn Noble (22:46.685)

okay. And so why are you staying up late then? What are you doing at night?

Lena Cebula (22:50.138)

Yes, I just, I don't know, I watch TV, I hang out, my husband stays at play too, but usually I just go to sleep anyway. So I think like it's, I like the peace and quiet.

Jenn Noble (23:00.861)

Mm -hmm.

Jenn Noble (23:05.029)

Okay, okay, so you get some peace and quiet. That's beautiful. In the school year, in the summer, I mean in the fall, when are you getting peace and quiet?

Lena Cebula (23:14.384)

when I'm sleeping.

Jenn Noble (23:16.211)

Okay, so you're not really absorbing it, right? So when we talk about balance, when we talk about, and I love how you're like, I know balance doesn't mean 50 -50, because this is exactly what I of want to bring out to you. Balance is about both a day -to -day balance, like a month -to -month balance, and then year -to -year balance as well. So it sounds like in the summertime, some of your other priorities are just going to kind of get put on the back burner just slightly.

Lena Cebula (23:21.372)

Mm -hmm. Mm -hmm.

Jenn Noble (23:42.577)

because they've been filled up for eight months out of the year. I like to think about our needs as needs buckets, okay? So picture like a bunch of buckets you have sitting out and it's raining or whatever. And every time you fulfill one of your individual needs, one of your micro needs, like emotional connection. Like right now, you're getting a need met for emotional connection, because we're having a deep talk, probably some social connection, novelty because we've never met before.

personal growth because you're learning about yourself, but also some contribution because you're giving back to other women by getting to share your story. Do see how you have put water in every single one of these buckets by coming on here with me? Yeah, yeah. So when you stay up late, you're putting some sort of fulfillment into your peace and quiet bucket, right? That certainty kind of thing. That's how you're getting your certainty met there because you're not getting it met throughout the year. So you really like that in the summer.

Lena Cebula (24:18.896)

That's really cool. I like that.

Jenn Noble (24:35.603)

So there's two ways you can do this, which is to say, you just accept that and you allow that bucket to get filled. So that way you have that kind of momentum going into fall and you can kind of lean back on that peace and quiet that you had in the summer. And you're like, I know I'm not gonna get it unless I'm sleeping in the fall. So I'm gonna embrace the crap out of it right now. Or you can see, well, this actually isn't that important to me anymore. So I'm gonna go to bed early. But what we don't wanna do is love something and then almost kind of push it away because we're shaming it for any

Lena Cebula (25:06.465)

That's really cool perspective. I never thought about this this way about the day balance week months year. It's pretty cool. But I was thinking about it's good that you brought it up because the way I usually think I don't kind of like force myself through like negative because I know I have this

Jenn Noble (25:16.775)

Yeah.

Lena Cebula (25:34.202)

this persona or character, you know, like cannot be like, like forced or I push back. So I'm kind of one of those. yeah. I'm like really strong personality. my goodness. So, so now with my first one, it's, it's challenging because it's exactly my personalities. Actually all three of them. my goodness. And my husband says to me when I was pregnant with Vince, he goes,

Jenn Noble (25:40.551)

Yeah. You don't like to be told what to do. You don't want to be trapped. You like your freedom. Yeah, yeah. That's fair. Good.

Jenn Noble (25:57.68)

I hate that.

Lena Cebula (26:04.24)

What did you expect? Cute and sweet, kind kids. I'm like, yes, they cute and sweet and kind, but man, they like tie pace. my goodness. But anyway, I don't know where they got it from, but anyway, the funniest part though, I was like, okay, what can I do? I know this is just temporary and I know that I can, I can get back into the routine and I know that it's more.

Jenn Noble (26:12.317)

I get

No, definitely not from you at all, no.

Lena Cebula (26:34.364)

positive for me. now actually like through the coaching and brainstorming as well, I figured out that on Tuesday and Thursday, I can't sleep in and still go to the gym. So that's what I decided to do. I go to the gym at 12 o 'clock after I slept and

Jenn Noble (26:51.165)

love it. And sleeping in, sleeping in is like, in my world, I would think it's like freedom, at least for me. Like when I get to sleep in, I am very protective over my sleep and I love sleeping in. And sometimes I can get very anxious when I have to wake up when I don't want to be. And so I've learned for me, sleeping is almost a level. It's not just comfort. It's not just peace. It's actually freedom. It's like autonomy to choose my day the way I want it to be.

Lena Cebula (27:19.706)

And you know what, it's sorry to interrupt you, but it's very hard to be your own boss, create your own hours and actually protect those ones. But sometimes like I'm so grateful that on Tuesday and Thursday, I can sleep in and I have so much gratitude that I have this privilege to live this life to actually work in like choose my work and still be with my kids and still.

Jenn Noble (27:22.236)

No, please.

Lena Cebula (27:47.706)

sleep at night, you know, like this attitude of gratitude. And that's why I don't want to like say stuff like, I'm dreading the summer anymore. Just because like, I want to find better and positive way. And for me and for my kids to live that better life, you know, and, and have that vacation time and enjoy themselves and don't.

feel like forced into anything. And like you said, that freedom and just be grateful for this wonderful country, wonderful opportunity for me to be like my own boss and build business and being stay -at -home mom. You know, that's huge privilege.

Jenn Noble (28:29.683)

I that.

Jenn Noble (28:34.543)

Mm -hmm. It's a huge privilege. I love that you see that. And also, it's absolutely OK to be upset when our things are going wrong. And we both know that, of course. I just kind of to remind you of that as well, which is why what I love doing is there's kind of this idea out there, right? Which is like, be grateful for what you have, because there's starving kids in Africa. That whole concept of My mom and dad used to do that to me all the time, right? Like, eat your food, because people are starving.

Like that level of gratefulness is what we call, you know, like the toxic positivity kind of thing. That's not real true gratefulness. It's actually shaming ourselves into getting, just shoving our feelings down. So we pretend like we're happy. But it's not true gratefulness, is it? Like we know what gratefulness feels like, especially from like the love of God. Like we know what that feels like in our hearts and it's not pushing down these things. So if we can start to reframe,

Instead, and like you said, so every time you sleep in, you fill up, know, bloop, bloop, bloop, bloop, bloop, bloop, little needs bucket of your freedom. Like, beautiful. You filled it up. So now when you go later on in the day or the like the year in the fall, and you're starting to feel a little bit stressed out because you have not had any freedom in however many days you've been a chauffeur to your children and you've had to do all this stuff for your business, then you get to kind of go

Lena Cebula (29:40.924)

thing.

Jenn Noble (29:58.991)

into your storage and be like, yeah, I had that freedom in the summer. Now look what's about to happen. You're going to start looking forward to the summer.

Lena Cebula (30:08.721)

That's a great perspective, because I never thought to look into the summer as

Lena Cebula (30:18.894)

as this way, sorry one

Jenn Noble (30:21.171)

That's it.

Lena Cebula (30:28.836)

I'm drinking this tea.

Jenn Noble (30:32.031)

no, is it causing you to cough? Yeah, don't worry about it. can take a, Duncan can easily just edit some of this out. no

Lena Cebula (30:49.808)

funny just and then my throat like the powder from the tea at the bottom funny

Jenn Noble (30:51.485)

all of a sudden.

Jenn Noble (30:55.415)

It's just like stuck right there. Do you need to go get any water or anything? We can take a second. It's totally fine. Okay.

Lena Cebula (30:58.842)

No, I'm drinking, have it, I have it here. So.

Lena Cebula (31:07.76)

Man, it's hurting my throat, it's funny.

Lena Cebula (31:17.2)

So anyway, I was saying that I never look into the summer as these buckets of freedom that I have. So yeah, it's good spring.

Jenn Noble (31:32.243)

Yeah, and so we can, as we kind of wrap up here, go through now what's going on in your summertime, all of the things that you get to do in the summer now that you are not gonna be able to do in the fall. And also take track of everything that you don't get done in the summer that you get done in the fall. And then you can start kind of prioritizing them. And you can see on a scale from one to 10, how important is this bucket to me? On a scale from one to 10, how important is this? And you can also see,

Am I ever getting this met in the fall? No? Okay, then let me actually go ahead and double down in the summer and get this filled now, because once fall hits, this is gonna start happening. But let's say you need to get stuff done with your business. For me, I can't just double down on sleeping in. I need to get up and do my podcast and get it all sent in and put all the socials up.

I can't just rest on that. So I understand that that's like a 10 out of 10 priority for me, that I have to make sure is scheduled into my system. And then comes, and we didn't really get into this, but comes the boundaries of, know, setting them with the family and saying, this is what has to go. But then also having your boundaries with yourself, because I work really hard to make sure I can always have dinner with the family. I want to make sure, you know, I can still like sit down and watch. Yeah, exactly. gorgeous. Exactly that. Because I actually in the past used to be really bad at that. I'd be busy working.

Lena Cebula (32:47.534)

Yeah, that's non -negotiable. Everything has to be done.

Jenn Noble (32:56.177)

And then dinner time would come and I'll be like, I'll just take it in the office. You guys just eat without me. Work, work, work, work, work, work, work. Like that is not the way to, it's like, and that's my own time boundary I'm crossing. And so now we kind of start learning. I'm like, wait, yes, I'm getting my work need in. I'm getting my fulfillment of my contribution and my career and that feels great. But I'm kind of overflowing in that. And that's when we burn out. Burnout is almost like an overflow, but in a bad way. It's like you're drowning in your own success.

Lena Cebula (33:22.428)

yeah. I have one of those. That's why I closed my hair styling business because I assumed that my 40 year olds were independent because they in the, in the school and all this stuff, don't know who thinks like that, but I want to be a business woman so much. and I paused to have kids and then took care of them. But then when they went to school, I'm like, okay, I can have this eight hours to myself.

Jenn Noble (33:37.479)

Mm -hmm.

Lena Cebula (33:49.748)

And no, hairstyling business when the clients need you and you still have three kids in homes, especially that young, no way that was sustainable. And that's how I got burnout. And that's how I learned that the dinner is non -negotiable. So I know all this stuff. I actually really want you to, I don't know, say it here or give me more about this certainty slash variety.

Jenn Noble (34:05.232)

Yes!

Lena Cebula (34:19.052)

examples about the emotional connection and all this stuff. So I can write those buckets and see how I feel them and when I'm missing out. And maybe that's what helped me to actually see that I'm nailing them or somewhere like I'm missing it. So I can adjust that through my days and definitely very helpful.

Jenn Noble (34:41.715)

I actually have a worksheet. yeah, I actually have a worksheet I'm gonna send you, Lena. And it's a part of like my 12 week program I have. I'm gonna go ahead and send you just the needs worksheet that I have, which is all about identifying them. And they're gonna give you this more, but it's really great because it talks about, you have connection and significance. Those are your macro needs. So there's six main.

Lena Cebula (34:59.568)

Yeah, I think that's what you actually nailed it through all me like brainstorming these ideas. You actually nailed it. What, what I need. think I need that worksheet so I can

Jenn Noble (35:12.687)

that's yeah, I'm definitely gonna send it in. And cause it's gonna be so much easier for you to look at this than it is obviously for me to tell you. But like just even the overview of it is to say, since there's six main, like macro needs, you know, like the higher end ones, they each balance each other. So connection and significance balance each other. In other words, it's basically us, them, right? Connection, significance, and then there's certainty, variety. They balance each other. And then there's growth and contribution. They balance each other. So it's like, what do we give and what do we receive?

Lena Cebula (35:15.92)

Yeah.

Lena Cebula (35:24.165)

No.

Lena Cebula (35:29.36)

Mm -hmm.

Jenn Noble (35:42.237)

kind of thing. And so those macro needs are always wanting to kind of be in alignment and balanced. And oftentimes we get out of alignment in our life because we kind of put all of our focus into, so a lot of times like in relationships, we'll put all of our focus into like emotional connection. And we don't realize how much other things we get out of our relationship. That's what I talk with a lot with women and things. But when it comes to our business, for me, I know it's like, I just want to give and give and get right. And I just want to contribute and I want to do all this stuff. And I realize I'm actually

Lena Cebula (35:48.635)

except

Jenn Noble (36:11.923)

growing if I keep contributing. I need to actually also learn how to receive and how to integrate and how to have awareness. And so all of these micro needs, these kind of moment to moment needs are what we look through. And the worksheet, you're going to love it because you're actually going to have to answer questions, things like, what do you often think about? What could you talk about?

Lena Cebula (36:23.14)

Mm -hmm.

Jenn Noble (36:37.693)

for hours on end and never get tired of. What do you read? What kind of TV shows do you like to watch? All of these things is actually our subconscious mind slowly trying to get these needs

Lena Cebula (36:49.628)

So actually I like to say that it's maybe not balance that I was looking for, this alignment. I think it's so much, I couldn't, I couldn't grasp what, what is this, but honestly, like from talking to you, this is what now I have a clarity is not the balance. And that's why I couldn't explain. I'm like, it's not 50 -50.

Jenn Noble (36:58.875)

alignment. I love the word alignment. Yes.

Jenn Noble (37:16.373)

It's not balance.

Lena Cebula (37:16.528)

But the alignment it's different because that's where, and especially I'm very visual. If I can actually track it and see it, it would tell me, yes, you are doing it rather than I'm like, I'm spending an hour for work and this and that. So definitely helpful.

Jenn Noble (37:29.149)

I, yeah.

Jenn Noble (37:35.731)

I love that for you. You know what? I'm also gonna make sure that I'm gonna put this in my notes to send you. I made this cute little worksheet that has little buckets with little lines on them so you can write at the top of the bucket. Like it helps me. You write out what need it is and you kind of like ask yourself a scale from one to 10. How did you meet that this week? You know, kind of thing. And then all of sudden it's like the self -awareness of realizing like, you know what? didn't actually get my validation need met this week. And validation for me

like beauty validation, these are sometimes the needs that also we shame ourselves for, right? And I realized, no, like right now, I like to curl my hair when I like talk to people. I'm like, I did that today. I'm gonna go ahead and like scribble off that I got my beauty need met. I'm so proud of myself, like a job.

Lena Cebula (38:22.14)

But isn't that funny? I don't know if you guys like I have a kid, you know this like bucket analogy. So when you were start talking about buckets, that's exactly what I saw in my mind. Cause my kids were talking about like, you feel my love bucket. You know, it's

Jenn Noble (38:37.491)

Love bucket. That's where I got this from. Exactly. The love bucket is like, I always say that it's like, yeah, that's my love bucket. And I think there's a book, the love bucket book that my son read as well in like the first grade. And so taking that concept and really all needs are is just ways to love ourselves. And so it's really just the same concept. It's just how did I fill my love bucket up today? But with us as complex adults, our love buckets consist of like 15 different buckets.

And it's okay to get them met individually instead of just trying to pour everything into one bucket all the time. Instead, like really break it down, chunk it down and really see like, I got this met, that's beautiful. Maybe I didn't do this today, but I did do this. And so that still filled up that bucket, which also lets us understand if there's a day where you felt up nothing, like that's okay too. It meant you were needed something, who knows, but you can also just kind of keep an eye on that and say, I'd like to do something a bit more tomorrow. Okay.

Lena Cebula (39:34.822)

I think this is important too, you know, for self -awareness, because when we are not tracking the way we feeling or what we don't get needs met, I do believe that's how we feel like overwhelmed and confused and on stress and all over the place. And you know, it's funny because I'm teaching this to my kids. It's easy to teach someone else as well because look,

Jenn Noble (39:39.207)

Mm -hmm.

Lena Cebula (40:00.112)

That's why I still working with the coaches, you know, and for my business and for my life. And actually guys, honestly, I'm still working with the therapies and psychotherapies, because if you're ever going to hear my story, I have tons of trauma that I'm working through by the grace of God, redeemed, redeemed and loved and forgiven, but it's still everyday work. I'm so grateful to you Jen for.

Jenn Noble (40:21.127)

Mm -hmm.

Lena Cebula (40:27.098)

Allowing me to come on your platform and brainstorm this idea. And honestly, I don't embarrass to say that I need help and I still need help of the professionals. And you are fantastic. Like you, did such a good job. And I know sometimes when I freestyle, have like, I have difficulties to find what I'm looking for. And that's why we need coaches. You know, somebody who.

Jenn Noble (40:39.345)

You're such an inspiration, Lena.

Lena Cebula (40:55.664)

have the expertise and they can look at it and they can pick up on something that we couldn't pick up. And guess what? I could coach myself through this stuff, but guess what? I'm coaching with my own brain. So it's really good to have opportunities to go and tell this to someone else, you know, and get the feedback. And I think like you're great. Thank you so much. I'm really grateful for this opportunity to sit down with you and...

Jenn Noble (41:08.039)

Yeah, exactly.

Lena Cebula (41:24.848)

work now on my alignment and I kid you not, like I feel like my summer gonna be better now. That's pretty cool. Yeah, very hopeful. Yeah. Like few things like, like the way that you were talking, my perspective was shifted and it's very interesting. I never thought about this before. I think like, yeah, especially like this about the fog

Jenn Noble (41:31.277)

Yes, that's what we wanted by the end of this. that makes me so happy. Yeah. Well.

Lena Cebula (41:54.69)

it's always different, know, the summer, summer like the needs, you know, you can actually tap in the freedom and actually love the summer because it's allow you to be this and have freedom and all this stuff. I never thought about this this way. And I'm like, man, summer is actually awesome because I can't sleep in because I never sleep in, you know, that kind of pretty cool. Yeah, that's awesome. Yeah.

Jenn Noble (42:19.421)

You get that this time. I love that for you. Well, thank you for all of that, Lena. That is just, warms my heart to hear. I'm honored to be a part of this with you. So that's like so fun to get to have that. And just thank you for your vulnerability. You're an inspiration like to so many other women who are absolutely in the same space that you are, which is like just, you know, trying to get things done, but also live that alignment, you know, with your values and your needs. I just love that. Thank you for coming on and for sharing this.

Is there anything else that you need as we wrap up today?

Lena Cebula (42:50.46)

you know what, when you were saying that, first of all, thank you for your kind words, but I like to say for any woman out there, it's not selfish to have the self care. It's not selfish to spend money on the coach. It's not selfish to spend money on yourself wellness, you know, it doesn't matter if it's chiropractor or nail salon to feel good, you know, anything. Take care of yourself, mama, because honestly, when

you take care of yourself, not only mamas, know, I'm talking about kids and relationships, but in general, women, you know, because when you gonna love how you feel, how you look, how you take care of yourself, your bucket gonna be full. So you can feel and you can serve from overflow, you can love from overflow, you can work from overflow. And that's what I wish to you guys.

Jenn Noble (43:36.167)

Yes!

Jenn Noble (43:47.152)

What a beautiful way to end this. Thank you so much, Lena, for coming on. And I hope you have a beautiful week. Thank you so

Lena Cebula (43:52.614)

Thank you and you as well. Thank you, Jen.

I just want to thank Lena again for coming on to the podcast. What?  Just an inspiration she is with everything she has worked through and where she is now in life and how she's just still trying to seek that growth. But nowhere in our conversation did I hear her really shaming herself or hurting herself or beating herself up for this.

What a beautiful place to really come into the conversation. Just one of curiosity.  So, as you might have noticed, one of the big things that Lina and I were talking about were our individual needs. Now, what are those? If you have no idea what we were talking about, then that can be very confusing. Now, some of you might know because a lot of this work that I have is from what I learned in the integrated attachment theory.

And a lot of this work comes from Thais Gibson, as well as Tony Robbins. And so we have our six basic human needs. That's connection and significance. And then we have certainty and variety, and then we have growth and contribution.  So within those six macro needs, as I call them, there are a ton of, just a bunch of tiny little micro needs under each one of those.

So you may have a high need for connection, but what does that really mean? Well, maybe you love communication, closeness, compassion, emotional connection, social connection, a romantic connection. There's also intimacy and romance and empathy. And you can kind of see how all of these have to do with connection, right?

So it's not just, Oh, I love connection. It's what's the tiny little moment to moment need that you're getting met while you're doing that. So when it came to Lena, We started noticing there was kind of a disconnect with her certainty and her variety need. Now this is very common with the six basic needs.

Each one of them kind of counterbalances each other. So connection and significance. They need to kind of stay balanced in order to be in alignment with your life. Same with certainty and variety and same with growth and contribution. With her, we started noticing, hey, Your certainty need is not getting met in the summertime.

What's going on there? Why is that not happening? And I think most people would understand why it's not happening. It's summertime, right? Summertime is the time to take a break.  But when we take a break, it also can often mean that we're not getting the things done that we want to be getting done. So we have to really think about that.

Well, what is our goal? What is our purpose? What are our values? And how do we align our needs to meet with all of those? So as you heard, we started talking about our different needs buckets, and for her, she really wanted that structure, that safety, that consistency in the summertime. Well, also, what was she getting?

She was getting freedom. She was getting novelty. She was getting playfulness. She was getting discovery and new experiences. All of these micro needs are part of variety, part of the macro needs up here. And that just happens to be what she's getting in the summertime. So when we really started to reframe how to look at balance, instead of balancing every single day, instead of every single day, I have to make sure my certainty, my variety need is balanced.

I need to make sure I'm doing this. I'm doing that with my kids. Instead we can see that, Oh, throughout a course of a year, maybe we have eight months  Really going hard on certainty, you know, when we're in school and when we're in a structure and we're waking up in the morning, we have to go to bed, but maybe in the summer, maybe we get to explore our variety need.

Maybe we get to explore our growth need. Maybe in the fall, we're giving and giving and giving. We're helping and we're sharing and we're assisting and we're nurturing, right? That's the contribution.  But maybe in the summer we just get to be challenged and we get to learn and maybe we get to just kind of be expansive and progress ourselves.

We get to read more books, right? How many people just want to sit by the beach and read? That's just your growth happening in those moments. And so I'm not saying you have to balance every single macro need all the time, like every single day. Don't like sit there trying to balance your needs buckets out every day.

Think of it in more of like an overarching concept.  You can keep track of them every day. Although I personally prefer to kind of do it weekly, like a Sunday night, maybe a Monday morning where you're checking in with your needs buckets and you're saying, okay, how did I get this done from a scale from one to 10?

How did I feel I did do, do, do, do, do. And that's a really good way to kind of To just get an idea for where am I,  am I getting my needs met and what's stopping me, what is my goal, what do I want to be doing and why am I not doing it? And then we start working backwards from there. Now I talk about. All of this in my 12 week reboot program.

Okay. So I have a program coming out and it's actually going to start in September. It's going to start on September 23rd. So if you're out there listening and this is something that you think you really want to be a part of, please reach out and let me know. I'm taking 10 women through this program.

It's going to be my beta program, which means, you know, there's going to be some hiccups. There's going to be some like issues, probably some typos, but. For the first 10 women that come in and help me with this program, they're going to get a great deal. And they're also going to get unlimited access to any other program I have after this program, because you are helping me out.

I truly appreciate it. But in this 12 week program, right around week six is when we start looking at. are micro needs. Needs are so important that we actually have three whole weeks of just needs. So week six, we talk about identifying our needs. And then week seven, we talk about meeting our needs. So for example, if I was working with Lena right now, we only got into identifying them.

The next step would be learning how to meet them. That's what we're writing our ideas down and where we're figuring out a scale from one to 10, how well is this getting met? And we're going through ideas and we're figuring out what can I do here? How do I meet connection? How do I meet romance? But even if I don't have a partner, you know, how can I get my need for touch and when my partner doesn't like to give hugs, that's kind of what we go through.

So that's how we meet them on our own. And then in week eight, we start to learn how to communicate our needs to others. And so I didn't really get into that too much with Lena. It sounded like it wasn't a problem. Maybe one tiny hiccup where, you know, her husband wanted to like go out on a big trip and she doesn't like it.

If that was becoming a bigger problem for any reason, the goal there would be to then communicate to her husband that, Hey, this doesn't actually like align with my needs right now. I love this for you. You know, it's okay. That's a part of his needs, but everyone is going to have their own problem. unique needs buckets.

And that's what's really cool. Just honestly, what's really cool about being human in general, but that's, what's cool about living our own autonomous lives is we each have our own unique set of needs buckets.  And so for week six, seven, and eight in the program is all about needs. So if this is something that's interesting to you, if you really resonated with Lena as well, and you were just like, Oh my gosh, yes, I have competing needs.

I love comfort, but I also love adventure. How do I? Deal with this. Well, that's what we go through in the program. I would love to have you be a part of the program. You can reach out to me via email. You can also schedule an assessment with me to see if you're a good fit because it is a lot of work, this program.

I'm not even going to lie. So I only allow a certain amount of people in there and I already have a wait list. And so even by the time this podcast comes out, I'm not sure if there's going to be any space left, but if there is, please reach out, email me. You can, all this information's in the show notes.

You can join our Facebook group and reach out to me that way as well. And you could join this 12 week program with yourself and a bunch of other women that are all going through the same relationship patterns over and over again that are keeping them stuck and they don't know how to get out of them.

I was right where you were. I was there. It's why I created this program. I basically did this program myself just throughout the course of like four years. And now I have figured out a way to make this into a nice compact program. Now I'm not saying you're going to heal after 12 weeks. Please do not hear me.

I am not one of those types of people that are trying to be like you, you could be secure in just 12 weeks with six easy payments. No, what I'm doing is I'm setting you up with the tools. Okay, I'm creating a tool bucket for you to be able to take out into the world so you can figure this stuff out for later.

This is going to take years to heal, right? We don't heal from our trauma. We don't heal from our toxic relationship patterns in 12 weeks. That's never going to happen. Anyone who is telling you that there are just a load of crap. I just got to be really honest. But this, this is going to set you up for success.

And that's what I love about this program. For any reason you don't get into the program this time, don't worry, it will be starting again in January. It just won't be a beta program at that point in time, so you won't get as many perks as you do obviously in the beta program. But if it does interest you again, reach out to me, let me know.

And I just want to again say thank you to Lina for coming on with her vulnerability. Every single time someone takes that step, And they come on this podcast and they share a part of themselves with me. They share it with this whole community as well. All of these women, you know, there is someone out there right now, driving their car, just going insane in their head with what the summer has done to their schedule.

They haven't hit the gym. They're not drinking the water the way they used to. They're not taking their vitamins. They're not doing their stretches. They haven't been to a yoga class in two months.  You're not alone. We've all been there. We're all going through that. And that's what I love about having women come on this podcast so we can all see we're not alone.

We're all doing this together and it's about women lifting up each other to make our lives the best that they can possibly be. And that's what my goal here is, is just to be a vessel for that. So thank you all so much for listening. Thank you, Lena, for coming on, and I will talk to you all next week. Take care. 

As we wrap up today's conversation, always remember that healing is a journey, not a destination, and it is an honor to be a part of your healing journey. If you want to dig deeper into the topics we covered today, Be sure to head over to our show notes where you can find all of the valuable information mentioned in today's episode, right there.

And please remember to rate, review and subscribe. If you enjoyed today's podcast, your feedback means the world to us and helps others discover our podcast until next time, remember to speak up and speak. Honest.