Unpacking Social Comparison with Dr. Nicole Lipkin

SPEAKERS

Kyle Mountsier, Dr. Nicole Lipkin, Paul Daly, Michael Cirillo

Paul Daly  00:00

Paul, we're laughing already

00:11

this is Auto Collabs.

Kyle Mountsier  00:14

How do you know all these people?

Paul Daly  00:16

That's a great question. Look, if some people's superpower is running a P&L Like a boss or operating a business, or taking care of the insurance side, I love those people very much because none of those things are my superpower. I just happen to have some kind of strange knack for getting to know people quickly, and apparently in mass and apparently keeping those relationships going for many, many years. Dr. Nicole Lipkin, our guest this week. Fun fact, I think only you may know this car, because I just told you last week, she is the very first person I ever interviewed on a podcast ever really,

Michael Cirillo  00:54

really how long ago was this was

Paul Daly  00:56

about four years ago, I was at the CBT. I can't remember it's called it was a CBT live event.

Michael Cirillo  01:03

Yeah, some forum, something like that in

Paul Daly  01:06

Atlanta. And it got to be a form of the forum ish. And she was a guest speaker. And I just was like, well, that's a guest speaker. She was really good. And I just asked her if I could interview her. And she doesn't know this either. But I was terrified. Because at any moment, she was gonna figure out I had no idea what I was doing. I just had two microphones and some headphones looked official. You know

Michael Cirillo  01:29

what, though? Me thinks, because she's, Me thinks that because she's agreed to be on the show. That a, you left an impression. So you need to give yourself and be typically what I find, you know, that I love most about people in in this kind of category of helping others and whatnot is there. So understanding of those that are putting in the effort may have no clue what they're doing, like they welcome it. So I'm excited to meet her. And I'm only expecting that that's what we're gonna feel when experience when we talked to her.

Paul Daly  02:06

So she she kicked off the very first ASOTU live stream, she was the first guest and I slotted her in right there. Because I knew we needed something different as an industry and no people expected to see him get my mic up. It's my mic is correct. So I knew we needed something to to like kind of shake people out of the trauma that they were in the middle of because we didn't know what to do. And all of a sudden, she comes up on screen and she starts talking about how human beings process change. From a psychological standpoint. She's actually a practicing psychologist. So she's not just the theory. She actually has a practice. And she speaks and consults with OEMs and CEOs. And she's going to be talking about mental agility at ASOTU CON and she's got all kinds of other great stuff going on. She's also she's a Philly native too. I you know, that's what

Michael Cirillo  03:00

did okay, so that must be why she's also

Kyle Mountsier  03:02

not she that was like love at first Philly, right.

Paul Daly  03:05

I was like, Oh, by the way, it's in Philly, by the way. So, you know, we're really excited to introduce you to for the first time and all of us who are going to ASOTU CON are excited to meet her for the first time. Dr. Nicole Lipkin.  Nicole, it is so good to be back. You're having conversations about, you know, business and life and laughing a little bit. Thanks for joining us today.

Dr. Nicole Lipkin  03:35

So happy to be here. Thanks for inviting me. All right, so

Paul Daly  03:38

the first time that you got to speak to the automotive audience in our world, in the Automotive State of the Union world, we had just locked down for a pandemic, we had this live stream and like 1000s of people showed up. And you kind of brought a little levity to the situation, in talking about something that you've really developed, it seems like over the last two or three years is this concept of mental agility? So you're going to talk about it at ASOTU CON live but give us an overview. So we can kind of get introduced to the term mental agility as Yeah, totally,

Dr. Nicole Lipkin  04:07

totally. Look, I you know, I think by far hands down, it is the most important skill that any entrepreneur can develop leader can develop human being can develop. And it's, you know, in my, in my terms, the way I describe it, mental agility is all about being open and flexible to things are coming at you. But more importantly, it's about, it's about being open and flexible internally with your own stuff. Because I you know, we we just kind of just keep on going thinking the same way over and over and over and over. And therefore, we think the same way, we feel the same way. And then we react the same way. But when we can shake things up a little bit. And when we when we recognize that we actually have the ability to shake things up a bit. We don't have to think the same way and therefore we don't have to feel the same way and therefore we don't have to show up or behave the same. Anyway, and that is gold, like, that's solid gold. And I'm like going back to Solid Gold, you know, remembering my dad watching. But it's solid. It's like magic, like when you realize that it doesn't have to always be the way you think it has to be. Damn, that's like, that's crazy.

Paul Daly  05:20

You said, we are internally, what did you say? Open? And what? Flexible? Flexible? What do you mean by open and flexible? unpack that I'll use a therapist or unpack them for that. So let me let me let me I'm sure it was packed away for a really good reason. But unpack it for us.

Dr. Nicole Lipkin  05:37

Again, this is something I talk about, you know, when I'm speaking about it, but when you get like when someone says, Can we talk? How do you feel?

Paul Daly  05:49

The worst this?

Dr. Nicole Lipkin  05:53

Worse, like, immediately, right, because of our own crap, because of our own crap, because most of us have been in a situation where we've gotten that, like text or call or like that look, and we talk we've been broken up with or we've gotten in trouble, or whatever it is. So we project our own crap onto whatever that person saying, or texting. And there

Paul Daly  06:16

we go. So somebody says, Can we talk and all of a sudden, our mind is like 30 steps down. And it isn't like, and it doesn't default to like, Oh, I bet. They're going to tell me how good of a job I'm doing.

Dr. Nicole Lipkin  06:28

Right now we default, oh crap, I'm in trouble or something bad's about to happen. And because of that, then that cycle happens. And like it, that because of the way you think you show up with like dread and anxiety, and all that, or whatever it is that you feel when you get that. And that's like, and then you just show up that way. And when you show up full of dread and anxiety, you're not able to psychologically maneuver in a conversation, you're not able to really hear what that person say to you, you're not able to groove with that person, because you're just stuck in that dread. And I'm not saying dread is a bad thing, like dread's just an emotion, right? And so there's no good or bad. But when you have really strong feelings, you're less able, you're less able to maneuver, that conversation and that process. So you know, that's the thing, like that's not being flexible, that's just reacting the way you always react, but we have a lot more power, we have a lot more control in the way we show up and the way we think and the way we react.

Paul Daly  07:31

So when I think about flex, Kyle, before he put a pin in that real quick, because I realized I forgot just a really important component. And then I will, I will cede the microphone to you and Michael. But can you just give us a quick background, because I think there are a lot of folks out on the interwebs, who kind of deliver this message of you know, like, you know, don't overreact and own your emotions and things like that. But you are different in the sense that not only do you have like the educational background, but you have a clinical background where you've just spent so much time running a practice and spending time in, in therapy sessions speaking with people working with with patients or clients, if you could just give us a quick overview, because I think that's just a really important baseline to set. Before we get into cows

Dr. Nicole Lipkin  08:20

personally. Absolutely. So my background, I'm a clinical and organizational psychologist. So what that means is that I have the clinical background. So I've been doing that for years, like 20 plus years, this keeps on getting years. So I've been you know, I've been a clinical and organizational psychologist for years. The Organizational Psychology is I take that background, and I apply it to the workplace to leadership to entrepreneurship, to organizational culture, to company culture, to getting people working really awesome, we together and grooving with one another like it's that's what I do. So my specialty is you know, leadership development, executive culture, executive coaching, culture, work, culture change, because the reality is, I think I've said this to you before, until the robots take over. We're humans working with humans. So it's all about understanding and having expertise in human behavior, group dynamics, team dynamics, that's the stuff and that's the stuff that's sticky and sticky and gooey, that we can work through. Because that's, it's us. And so when I'm doing this work, it's not about like, follow these five steps to be a really great leader or have a really great team or have a great culture. It's about get what's going inside here. Get what's going inside your team a little bit, understand a little bit about human dynamics and group dynamics, so we can all maneuver a little bit better. And when we group together, it's awesome, man, when we step on each other's feet, the world's not over. Like right now, in our world. We're constantly stepping on each other's feet. And it's like The worst right like we can't handle disagreeing with people we can't handle having different opinions like we are in this place. So I can't like offending all of this stuff. If we could learn to groove a little bit better, and know that like, it's all about being flexible and open and getting it and understanding our own internal workings like we wouldn't be fighting so much. Let's just say that

Paul Daly  10:26

very good. Thank you Kyle. So you're

Kyle Mountsier  10:34

all in Kyle, I'm gonna need to see Paul Michael I'm going to need you to see yourself out. I got about 80 Questions Okay, next question. Paul left the screen for those not for those that watching. First thing is and I'm hoping that I'm that I that I give you somewhere to go with this because when I hear flexibility, yeah, my mind immediately I played sports all my life. And I am there, right. And I'm, I'm thinking of the guy that I used to play tennis with. His name was Ron Duan. And Ron Duan may could only touch his knees, when we started in freshman year with a tennis racket with a tennis racket. Right? He was like, you know, wow. And so what I want to what I maybe want to unpack is like, what's the road to becoming more flexible? Because if you become like, I'm the way I'm thinking of it is like, if you become more flexible, your aptitude to approach things that you have never seen or heard before. Then then your flexibility allows you to be a part of them. Right? Yeah.

Dr. Nicole Lipkin  11:45

So yeah. Like Ron Duan become whose name I'm loving?

Kyle Mountsier  11:53

Because I can't really I can't remember it. So

Dr. Nicole Lipkin  11:55

not a real person. I love it. How did Ron Duan become more flexible? What do you

Kyle Mountsier  11:59

see stretched every day? He worked on it, right? All that. And I'm bringing a little bit of like my, my, this much knowledge to psychology. But, you know, a lot of times we talk about like the tools to approach new situations, it's like, it's not that there's a prescription for everything that you're doing gets like, like you said, the 12345 it's it's an approach, it's a flexibility to understand that these tools can be utilized in different elements and different relationships and all that. So I guess like, what's the path to gaining more? What's the what's the I stretched every day? Like sports analogy? In the agility perspective?

Dr. Nicole Lipkin  12:38

Yeah, I mean, I mean, I'm going when we talk and do this, I'm gonna be giving some like basic tools that every single person can use in practice, and it's literally about practicing. It's the reality, it's like, just like, your physicality, just like becoming more flexible, physically, requires a daily commitment to like your health, your physical health requires a daily commitment. And you're going to not do it on a daily basis. Like, you know, you're gonna have weeks where you're like, I don't want to stretch or I don't want to work out or I don't want to eat well, you're gonna have weeks, you're gonna have months, you're gonna have days where you don't want to, but then if you're committed to it, you get back on track, and you do the right things for your body, right?For some reason, because for some reason, we can see our bodies we can see the results, right? But for some reason, we minimize the mental stuff. Because we don't see it. It's not tangible. Like we think about mental health, we think about mental wellness, we, you know, we think about the guy on the side of the street, freaking out screaming, talking to himself. We don't think about us on our every day, you know, our everyday work in life, but the reality is, and I'm coming around to answer you. The reality is is mental health and mental wellness and flexibility, mental flexibility and agility. Like, that's how you're productive. That's how you wake up in the morning and get motivated to get out of bed. Even. That's how you can function. Doing the tasks you do when you're mentally well, that's how you take care of other people communicate have interpersonal relationships. We minimize that, when we're comparing it to how big our biceps are, or how small or bigger but is

Paul Daly  14:30

what are we? What do you think we minimize

Dr. Nicole Lipkin  14:32

it is this intangible? It's intangible, and for some reason in this in every culture, not for some reason. We've equated it with disease, we've equated it with weakness, versus looking at the fact that you know, mental wellness mental agility is literally what makes you function on a daily basis. Mental agility is what makes your relationships easier. Because you can flex. mental wellness is that motivation, it's that productivity, it's being able to move from one task to the next. It's all of that good stuff. But it's intangible.

Kyle Mountsier  15:10

Okay, so I'm going to take, here's questions, one through 10, please. Okay, so. So there's, for me, there is a direct or a lot of times and you said, like the way you think, leads to the way you feel. And a lot of times emotional agility is also tied to mental agility. And so, like, it is, do you think one leads to the other? Or is it like that? You know it? Does mental agility lead to emotional agility? Or is emotional agility and awareness lead to a mental agility? So you can approach situational awareness? Like, which one kind of leads first? Or how do you care for both? Because they're both intangible things that we have to approach recognizing our historical like aptitude to approach new situations, right?

Dr. Nicole Lipkin  16:02

It's like a figuring they're attached. It's the same thing. It's like your emotional agility. You know, your flexibility with your emotions. And when when I'm saying is like, you think a certain way it affects your feelings, and then that the feelings affect how you show up. It's, it's that it's all it's all connected, like you can't you have emotional experiences constantly, whether you're aware of it or not, like we're all having an emotional experience right now, it might be like, you know, it doesn't have to be extreme, but we're all having it. We're all experiencing emotion right now. And it's tied into how our brain is functioning, how we're interpreting the situation. So it's, it's this emotional and mental agility, agility, or that it's all tied in. It just what I'm saying is that we have way more, we have way more control, we might feel or think something doesn't mean it's gonna stop. But we have way more control and maneuvering, how it ends up. It's like a constant. You know, this, isn't it. This is an everyday thing until the day we die. Because we're constantly evolving. Until the day we die with everything, and constantly learning with everything and forming new neural connections and all that good stuff. But that is this is a just like our physical health, our mental agility, or emotional health is a lifelong commitment. If I answer you did,

Michael Cirillo  17:32

I think you just have created more.

Paul Daly  17:35

So I was a kid, no way. I have to ask one more question.

Kyle Mountsier  17:42

This might be a long podcast, y'all hang with us. Alright, so and I apologize if we go like another angle here. Because, like, it's a lifelong commitment. And I was just thinking about the flexibility thing, and I just My daughter is eight right? And my daughter who's eight at the beginning of the summer, couldn't touch her toes. Now Ron Duan, it took him like four years to be able to find

Paul Daly  18:06

Ron. Ron does the fifth guests of this podcast, amazing is the one one

Kyle Mountsier  18:12

what my daughter, by the end of the summer can now like, like her ability to, to stretch quicker, both physically and mentally is a lot stronger, right? She can move and adjust quicker, and you're doing this thing called Hey, kiddo, I believe is what it's called, right where you are, where you're working with children in their early development and parents to educate and give them the ability to have the awareness of their mind and their emotions, to be able to approach everyday situations. So like, maybe this kind of two part is, is what are you seeing the results out of out of that type of work? And how can as adults, we take the assumption of the mind more of that childlike ability, potentially, are you are you taking some of the learnings that you're coming in, that you're getting from working with kids in that way, and able to pull them pull adults back to that, you know, ability to to be more flexible more quickly? Because, like our physical bodies may be, you know, break down a lot quicker than maybe our mental bodies, you know, and maybe we can be more childlike in that. I don't know. I'm just like,

Dr. Nicole Lipkin  19:20

yeah, no, I like I like how you're thinking like, you know, kids, kids learn like when you give when you teach kids as a language for example, early on, they learn it much quicker than if we learn a second language later on. You know, kids brains are just like, they're just taking in so much information. It's not fixed like it's coming coming coming and their neural connections are so quick, quick, quick, quick, quick, so they can learn this stuff quicker. Seeing what their bodies like Ron Duan also had a longer, longer distance stretch than your daughter, you know, and all of that, but her body like it hasn't been through the the eight aches and pains of aging. Yeah. Right. So she has, she has that ability to flex and move and her, her body is still forming and developing in her mind still forming and developing. So there's so there's so much flexibility and she's learning new things for the first time. Like, I think one of the most amazing things about being a parent is like, seeing life again, through new eyes. Like, that's what that joy is, like, incredible. And it's like, and I'm sure all of us can are experiencing that. Like, it's so crazy to see life again and see the things that you've gotten so used to and are so old to you like, that amazing, magical joy that a kid has. So yeah, the kids have beginner's mind, which is like a whole Buddhism concept, right? Like approaching things with a beginner's mind, like freeing yourself from that kind of judgment and just approaching it. With a beginner's mind. That's kids, like they are learning new things. And so they adapt, and they learn and they haven't learned yet. I mean, they're starting eight years old, you're starting, they haven't learned that fear. Like you look at a kid skiing. They're fearless you looking at adult skating? That's

Paul Daly  21:10

an ACL surgery. Right? Yeah. Terrifying.

Dr. Nicole Lipkin  21:14

Because of, again, our experiences, and we're applying the things we've learned, like all of that they haven't learned that yet.

Paul Daly  21:20

Probably makes you more prone to get injured anyway. If you're overthinking it.

Dr. Nicole Lipkin  21:25

1,000% 1,000%. So yeah, and like, Hey, kiddo, yeah, that's my startup. And it's like, super exciting. And we're really at the beginning of it. And it's, it's like a coaching app for parents. It's getting parents in that mindset. Again, it's getting giving parents that coaching and those tools to open up the lines of communication with their kids. So kids are more comfortable opening up. Because somewhere along the line, we have to change the dialogue around mental well being mental agility, like all of our lives have been an our generations have been all about like, even though things are starting to open up and okay, like that, you know, we should talk about that stuff, or it's a weakness or whatever. dialogue needs to change. And he needs to start at home with parents opening up the lines of communication. So it's not weird, and it's okay.

Michael Cirillo  22:16

Yeah. Can I ask you this? Yeah. You mentioned the word projection earlier how, what kind of project? You know, do you find? Speaking for myself, you know, and I've opened up about it a lot in, in more recently in, in the last few years, my own challenges with mental health and my journey to recovery, and all of those sorts of sorts of things. One thing that I've found is that today, we have individuals with very strong opinions, who seem to have all the answers, minus the nuance minus the context of our own individual circumstances. So you go on to, let's say, you go on to YouTube, and it's expert being interviewed about their mental agility, their toughness, etc. And their answers are typically like this. I don't think about it, I just do it. Do you find that that's caused a challenge for people, whether it's in the workplace or personally, where now all of a sudden, we are accepting somebody else's own expectations of themselves and then judging ourselves against that grin, then all of a sudden, we're like, like, and I love by the way, let me preface what I'm about to say by I love the guy. But I know when Gary Vee first came out, documenting his life, which is 18 hour days, and, and he loves it. And he taught even though he's talking about happiness, and fulfillment and things of that nature in the context of documenting his day. An army of hustles Zombies was created who believe you know, and I've had conversations with many people who are like, I saw his 18 hour days and believed that if I didn't work 18 hour days, I was not measuring up I was not doing enough. And then that's caused all sorts of mental anguish on workplaces and environments, co workers saying you need to Gary Vee it. And you know, like that sort of thing. Gary Vee is not the reason for that. I do think it's their own.

Dr. Nicole Lipkin  24:24

I know exactly what you're talking about. And it's such a great observation. And I'm about to go down the rabbit hole with you. There we go.

Kyle Mountsier  24:32

I'm ready. I got my hold on

Dr. Nicole Lipkin  24:34

as humans. One of our one of the truths about human beings and our nature and our psychology is we engage in social comparison. It's not a bad thing. It's just natural. So we are social beings. So we look around social, we look around at others to gauge how we're doing. When people are doing better. We were like, oh, okay, I might need to like you know, I I might need to push harder, if people are doing worse helps us understand, Okay, I'm at a place where I'm okay. So we socially compare. It's just natural. Now, you take our world we used to socially compare on the school in the school yard. Now you take our world today, and everywhere you look with social media, with video, YouTube, all of this, the ability to social compare, has become so intense, and constant, and global, and fake. As you can, you can fake anything you want. And you can Photoshop anything you want. That our social comparison is on speed. It's on crack cocaine. And the result of it like I don't know how else to describe it. The result of it is our mental health crisis has escalated among kids and adults to such an extreme point. Because we don't know how to handle it. I want to tell you a study that you probably have heard of. That is so insane. It's so true. It's so insane. Do you know the study that Facebook did that was so unethical. Do you remember where they

Kyle Mountsier  26:25

were they were they basically move people's moods by manipulate Yeah,

Dr. Nicole Lipkin  26:29

they manipulated the feed, without telling people I'm sure it wasn't the thing we signed, whatever. What they found, right, put more negative feed, people became more negative and started posting more negative, more positive, posting more positive. This is emotional contagion. This is something that happens as humans we and this is something I'll be talking about. This is something that happens like that. You smile, I smile, you frown, I frown we mimic one another. And it can happen in our electronic communication, it can happen in our face to face communication. This is one of the reasons why you know we are having global contagion right now from the pandemic like this is one of the reasons why we're seeing a rise in road rage, a rise in domestic violence, crazy fights on airplane, like all of that stuff, I'll talk about that stuff at the conference. But when when celebrity celebrities or famous figures stand up and make claims, the potential, it can be very motivating. But the potential damage that it can have, because of that social comparison thing is so profound. That yeah, you can create cultures of zombies, that are like, I have to work 18 hours. And if I don't, I'm a bad person. Because the way our brains interpret it is, that's good. I'm bad. If I'm not achieving that on that. Just look at just look at our, you know, the body image problems in this country. It's, it's at that and it escalated significantly during pandemic, with adults getting more plastic surgery now than they've ever had, because they were staring at their faces teams, staring at their faces on Zoom. All of a sudden body image problems escalating like because we're comparing we're looking, yell and we're so quick to say that's good. This is bad.

Paul Daly  28:33

So when so what do we do about it?

Kyle Mountsier  28:40

So what you're telling us

Paul Daly  28:48

he's like, these are all good questions, and I'm gonna leave them to you. And so, like, I'm going to try to kind of, like bring this to a point. And saying, like, you're highlighting all these social comparison escalations that are happening now. And you're saying that social media, the pandemic have really just exacerbated a situation and mental condition that already existed, right? But now, it's like, on steroids

Dr. Nicole Lipkin  29:20

on credit, not a mental condition, a normal human psychological behavior. Okay.

Paul Daly  29:25

Okay. Yes. Like, not like thing clinical, not in condition, right? Human Condition, right.

Dr. Nicole Lipkin  29:30

It is human condition.

Paul Daly  29:31

And so, to me, one of the things that helps me get through that is, is being very resolved in what I'm heading toward, like it's an identity issue. How do you reconcile that for people like how do you give people like, how do you help people get through that with a sense of healthy identity and a sense of healthy purpose?

Dr. Nicole Lipkin  29:52

Narrative? Wake up.

Paul Daly  29:57

Question. I just do it. But I think like I think I want to tell us how

Michael Cirillo  30:03

he did it, Ron Duan counter.

Dr. Nicole Lipkin  30:07

But I think there's like, that is a huge question. But I think, look, I think that our identities that we create our psychological identity to create the goals that we create need to be our own stuff. It can be inspired from other people that we watch, it can be molded, we can be motivated and like, learn new things from other people. But someone's you know, someone's 18 hour day might be another person's six hour day, because that's what they're, that's what their psychology and brain is capable of. And it's amazing what they're capable of. And I think someone's goal like, Okay, what gets me, Paul, what gets you going is like having that direct goal that's awesome for you. What might get me going is, you know, I don't know, like working toward vacation, I don't know, it's like, I think we have to social comparison, all this stuff is going to happen. I think we need to talk about it more. I think the more people know about this stuff, than

Paul Daly  31:12

being aware that it's happening, right, the awareness of when you step, when you

Dr. Nicole Lipkin  31:17

have awareness, you can be agile, like my life goal is to get it's a big one. Every single person I ever talked to knowing about this stuff, because the more we know about this stuff, the more we know about psychological biases, the more we know how our brain works. And when we know, the kind of social comparison all this stuff, the more we can choose how we're going to function with it. When we don't know it's happening. We don't have a choice. Like that. 

Paul Daly  31:46

We don't know what's happening, you don't have a choice. That's just the current of social comparison is just carry your way basic. Yeah. And I think it's just

Dr. Nicole Lipkin  31:54

like, you know, okay, you know, even like, as we all learned, like, what was that? What was that movie, the kind of movie about social media where all the tech people spoke about,

Paul Daly  32:08

oh, the like, document social

Dr. Nicole Lipkin  32:10

dilemma, Social Dilemma, like the more we all learned about social media and like the the bad parts about it, then we could make a choice how we monitored ourselves and all of that, the more we learned, like all of us, not all of us, but like eventually, we learned like, how much control our phones have and the dopamine hit, and that that's more powerful. And the novel, novel, novel stimulus in your brain is more powerful than this. Well, then we can make a choice, but we needed to be aware of that. There was a time when we weren't aware of that, and couldn't make that choice. So that's why I think talking about agility talking about mental wellness, all of that I'm putting them together, but they're different. They're just tied intertwine. Yeah, better, the better. Like we should talk about it as much as we talk about our, what we eat and our different fitness crazies and, and what makes

Paul Daly  33:02

one as much as

Kyle Mountsier  33:07

Well, I'll tell you, I just I super appreciate this. I've got just, you know, notes on notes. And I like I feel like I'm more aware at this point. And I can't wait to kind of hear you be a part of ASOTU CON and be in and amongst other auto dealers and industry partners that are that like it's, it's wild to me because if if we start at this base level, like all the things like figuring out if digital retailing, or direct to consumer or like all that stuff just kind of comes comes as it comes. And so I can't wait for you to kind of kick us off. And and thank you so much for sharing your time and your energy with us today. And we'll see you soon. I'm super psyched. Thank you Ron Duan.

Michael Cirillo  33:58

So it's Ron Duan.

Paul Daly  33:59

How do you spell the one I don't think we ever clarified this.

Kyle Mountsier  34:03

D U A N at least that's how I remember it. But I don't know if I've ever had to spell his name. I just know it's gonna be w

Paul Daly  34:09

o n.

Michael Cirillo  34:10

I had everything from close to Dwayne to like Duon. But I also this is interesting because I just realized his name is Ron Duan.

Paul Daly  34:21

What did you think it was Rhonda? No, I thought it was Juan. Oh, he thought it was Rhonda

Michael Cirillo  34:27

Juan. Juan Dejaun.

Paul Daly  34:30

Oh, man. That I don't know how Ron it's just become the fourth host of this podcast. But without a doubt that was one of my favorite interviews that we've had so far. Dr. Nicole Lipkin is just she's just a boss. She's like her. She's married to a comedian. Right, which really kind of has to lighten the load around the dinner table, especially when dealing with so much heavy stuff. And he's just like, This is my source for all my material.

Kyle Mountsier  34:56

Well, what's so interesting to me about this is that this is not a topic that I feel like we approach in business, let alone automotive, which is how do we approach the every day? How do we approach the psychology of interacting with others or interacting with the way that you think about a meeting or the way that you approach a new problem. And what it really should be is the baseline for every interaction. You know, it's been argued that, like, everybody should see a therapist, whether you think it or not, yeah, and I, you know, whether you think you knew or not, and whether or not that's the that needs to be the case, at least approaching things or having or having an ecosystem in which you can think about things. The way that Nicole has asked us to think about and challenge me to, even in and throughout this interview, is healthy for whether you're a business leader, or you're just getting into a new career, roll it in. And that's why I'm really excited for her to set the tone of our event in that way. Because I think the approach at which people take this myriad of content, especially in event is so important, to the way that it might actually impact our business rather than consumption, that that it's active participation, it takes a lot of mental agility to do that.

Michael Cirillo  36:22

I felt selfish, if I'm being honest in that interview, because I only asked the questions that I felt like I needed help with

Paul Daly  36:30

that kind of why the host is the host, right? They're supposed to feel and kind of like be aligned with like, I think this is what people would want to know. I'm just trying to give you too much credit. Yeah. Like, no, I don't know. It's because I've read all of her literally, he's like, so I know a guy and I'm trying to coach him through this problem.

Michael Cirillo  36:46

I know a guy lives in stock, he's got a beaut, sometimes makes funny noises. People always say we look alike. But um, he's a friend of mine, I'm asking. What I really love is the way she was able to position what I think is the next generation, the upbringing of the next generation of automotive, we're clearly topics like mental health and workplace wellness and things of that nature are important, I would say they're important to me, I know they're important to you. And those were typically topics that don't get discussed a lot, they were kind of faux pas, like, oh, just suck it up, you know, like, don't bring your problems to work. Our relationship ends with me signing your paycheck kind of thing. But now we have operators in the industry, who are our age, and some of them younger. And these types of things are important for us to be able to understand, maybe make a little bit more normal, less like shade on them so that we are as organizations and just as human beings better equipped to help elevate one another.

Paul Daly  37:50

Back in the when she was on the first live stream, the first episode of live stream, she was just starting to think through this topic of mental agility. I'm gonna go back and listen to that. She posed it as being able to hear an opposing view and not react to it. Right with the bias. Right? She said if you want to know how good you are at mental agility watch, and that was obviously there's like a lot going on in the world and election season and all that she goes watch the opposing news channel, and just pay attention to how you react. The second you see the anchor, the second you hear the story she does that's gonna give you an indicator of how mentally agile you are.

Kyle Mountsier  38:30

And think about that when it comes to industry parts, dealer conversations, or OEM conversations. There. There's so much wisdom in that for automotive right now. Right? Unbelievable. It's

Paul Daly  38:44

almost like when I say the three letters, OEM. Everybody has a reaction somehow. Right, right. Somehow pretty wild, pretty wild.

Kyle Mountsier  38:52

Well, there's a lot to think about and we can't wait for you to hang out with Nicole Lipkin at ASOTU CON and just follow her if you're not right now. For Paul J. Daly, Michael Cirillo, and Kyle Mountsier this has been Auto Collabs See you next time.

39:07

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