Rubina Chadha

Actually, I just won this top visionary award [music] with International Association of Top Professionals. It was in the NA on the NASDAQ billboard in Times Square. Thank you very much.

Wow.

Corporate well for being [music] top in corporate wellness and so corporate well-being is really coming to the forefront.

I had a very emotional response and I'm not proud of it. I thought that one person disrespected me. And I think this is something that men in particular in business struggle with a lot when we feel that we're disrespected and your entire nature wants to fight back, you know. So,

it's natural and we're not taught how to handle our emotions. It's all [music] [music] [music] [music]

Hi folks, welcome to One Thing That Work. Today my guest is Rubina from Inner Design. Rubina, welcome.

Thank you so much. I'm so happy to be here.

Uh my pleasure. So tell us about Inner Design.

So inner design began with the realization that you know leaders and organizations um are under stress. So I'll say it this way when we are under constant stress we cannot have success where it is not sustainable and if the person that's creating is living under that constant state of stress and so that's what was the birth of inner design. I began in my career in art and design myself where I learned how to shape what people see on the outside and at the same time I had been surrounded by meditation and yoga since my childhood and also as you know my my work with art of living deepened my understanding of breath awareness and service and over time these two parts of my life came together and I realized we spend so much energy designing our businesses our career career, our public identities, but very little time learning how to design the internal conditions from which we lead. So yeah, that was my realization.

So help me understand it better. You uh you're like a coach or what do you do specifically for for people?

So specifically now at this point we are inner design is providing corporate well-being programs and so not that it's coaching but there is a proprietary program methodology of inner design we call it the R3 method and what that looks like is bringing to leaders and organizations nervous system regulation mindfulness and creative expression to move from their reactivity to greater clarity greater connection ction and sustainable performance.

How does that go?

How does it go? It's amazing. So, can I share a little bit with you?

Yeah, you can you can actually brag uh because then after you

I love it.

Yeah. Tell [laughter] tell us what are the results of your work.

The results actually I just won this top visionary award with international association of top professionals. It was in the on the NASDAQ billboard in Times Square. Thank you very much.

Wow. Wow.

Corporate well for being top in corporate wellness. And so corporate well-being is really coming to the forefront and inner design's R3 method is regulate, realign and rewire. And so first when you regulate their nervous system so you're not making decisions from the place of survival or fight or flight or stress, right? That stress response. And then you realign with what actually matters. This is what we're all looking for in our businesses.

Yeah.

And [clears throat] then finally rewiring the habits and patterns that keep creating the same results. And so I can give you a little one pause practice for your listeners.

Let's do that. Yeah,

let's do that. So just before your next important email or meeting or decision, just pause, take one slower breath. Just naturally let the exhale be comfortable and unforced. And then ask yourself, am I responding to what is happening or am I reacting to what I fear might happen?

Oh my god, I got goosebumps because just before this call, I had a very emotional response and I and I and I'm not proud of it. You know, so I thought that one person disrespected me. And I think this is something that men in particular in business struggle with a lot when we feel that we're disrespected and your entire nature wants to fight back, you know. So

yeah, it's natural. And we're not taught how to handle our emotions. It's all in our physiology. We come prepared with this. If you watch small children, you see they move through their emotions so fast. One minute they're tantruming, then they're crying, then they're laughing. and you know they don't get hung up but we do get stuck and we don't know how to handle the mind that we have and uh all the stressors that we have. And so this small little pause you just realize creates space between the pressures or the decisions and just gives you this you know this realignment back into yourself of what you already know that you're best in doing and so that you can shine.

you mentioned that uh oh my god you won an award you were on on the big screen on time square. So yeah so how in the world because you gave me a little a little a little uh sort of uh uh inside look into the answer of your to this question. Okay. So first I'm going to ask you so what helped you to get on the screen on on time square? What is the one thing that worked for you and how did it manifest itself in your business?

It really is this. You know, I myself went through so much stress and was struggling with success in my career and I realized it's not just what I'm able to build, but it's who I have to become and how I affect others. And that has been the core principle underlying all the work that I do with inner design. And that has reached me so ironically in a way when I could let go of of the chase. We all go through this, right? And just really be like how your show is. Be yourself. Be within yourself. Being connected to yourself, connected to your breath. It's the thing that brings us life quite literally. It's measured from the very first breath we take all the way to the very last breath that leaves us. And so while we are alive we just think we are walking around thinking oh everything is up here and everything I do comes from the space of here and we forget that we have the rest of this beautiful being the physiology I'm not even talking about something like you know energy or anything vague the actual physiology that's keeping us alive sustaining us is also what's bringing us through to our success. And so learning how to tap in and stay connected with that body, the being that you have gives you an opportunity to come from that place of authenticity and bring everybody is passionate um wants to bring something beautiful into the world. You know, we're all really attached to that, our successes, our achievements, and there's nothing wrong with that. But coming from a less disjointed place, a more connected place.

Yeah. Um but but how about how about some real uh real real life examples from maybe from your clients. So uh how exactly you know being present and taking a pause helped maybe you work with seale executives like so it's just some interesting cases from your um business journey and your clients journeys.

Yeah, from a business perspective, you know, the problem that many entrepreneurs are having is the fact that they are treating their experiences as separate parts of their identity. You know they are maybe they are sea sweetite and then in one setting and then they go home their mother or father and they're struggling to find this connection where they are just like [gasps and laughter] in one setting who they are completely instead of somewhere else they're here and somewhere else they're there and that causes that fracture that fra you know that fissure and it really just comes back to simple things like this um you know people all have problems they all come and Oh, right. And I personally had a valuable experience and I hadn't brought this together in one clear body of work so people could understand it. But all along I knew I'm trying to look for access to creative expression. Creativity is everything about right especially coming from a designer perspective for me.

Yeah.

And so why is it that when I'm under a deadline I cannot create what I want to create right? So this again it was like such a fissure of who I am, what I'm supposed to be doing and we live in this fragmented way and what really connects so many things is just coming to this moment like you had a pause realizing that we're breathing. That's the simplest thing. It's not like breath work is some far out experience we have to keep accessing or we have to sit down on a yoga mat and we have to do these things right. That's really hard when you are in a seauite position where you you know your position is right there in at the conference table and you're under pressure. You're not going to roll out a yoga mat and say, "Oh, let me start to breathe or chant or right all the things that bring us peace. But it's with you. You can even be in that experience of just the awareness. Oh, yeah. You know what? I'm tightening up my body." Like for you, you had this reaction. It comes to all of us. It's very natural because we have these instinctive things like one at one point we were all cave people running from a saber-tooth tiger. So this is wired into our neurology into our physiology. We just have to learn how to tame it. We have to learn how right now I'm not being chased by a tiger. This person is yelling at me or whatever your situation was in that in that moment. And to be able to have that awareness takes a moment to just witness yourself. And witnessing yourself brings you back to this moment. the present moment where you have your breath and you can relax your body. You can loosen up maybe the stomach or the chest or wherever you know in the head the pressure wherever we're holding that and it instantly gives us an [clears throat] access to something. And so this is what it is for me. I've seen so many people again like I said in conferences in the boardrooms where while they are there doing the passionate work that they have and they are you know falling off the edge of the the cliff of stress they can catch themselves and so giving them those tools of how to realign regulate rewire so that this becomes this becomes second nature because like our first nature is that instinct that we were cave people in survival Right? And so you need to create a second nature that your body and your being and your mind and everything can go and attach on to. And that's what I was able to create with uh you know our proprietary methodology and um it's what the inner design trademark is all about.

I think I understand what you're talking you know for me the the tabulasa you know the clear consciousness is when I I mostly experience it when you know after I went for for a run or um you know yeah after maybe just staying in in a quiet room for whatever time. Uh so and uh this is like a superpower because you whatever happens you don't you don't you're not in the fly. What is the what is the flight of

Yeah.

And you kind of and and even this interaction with this woman that I just had. She's she's definitely not trying to offend me. Right. It's just me perceiving this because right now maybe I'm uptight, you know, maybe I've been sitting all day, not doing breath work.

Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. And like you said it, you know, we feel it as runners. I also love to run. Uh I love to do yoga. I love to do. We feel it in all of these moments, but we can't stay in those moments all the time at seuite. We we sometimes we'll sacrifice that and say, you know what, I have this important meeting. I'm at the top. I'm running this business. All the burdens of other people are on my shoulders. I just can't run to yoga or I just cannot go to my running class or whatever it is. you know I need to do it now right here in any moment without any tools or any other you know requirements and that is really what I was able to bring and see the results for people instantly you felt it right now just here and we are you know thousands of miles apart from each other and just this one little pause this little glimpse so you can imagine the whole process the whole workshop the whole program that we have um really does help you to rewire out of the fight orflight nerv and regulate your nervous system and understand what's happening in my nervous system when that person says something you know my eyes are getting dilated and fixed and all of these things. So really learning what's happening with our body nobody teaches that.

Nobody teaches that now.

Yes.

So you so you kind of you work with organizations and uh you're like you're like you're like HR superpower like like an additional force to h for in a HR department right something like that.

Exactly. Exactly. And that's what I do. I basically certify them in their HR department so that you know people who are helping other people can bring the program in. And so that's what we're doing and we're training within that as well and large corporations and so inner design is really growing and thriving in the corporate well-being and it's something of course everybody can take home as well you know everyone can do this from anywhere.

Who do you as we're wrapping up who are your ideal clients and how people can connect with you?

You know, my absolute ideal client is anybody who's breathing. I know that sounds really silly.

It's it's it's a big total addressable market. It's [laughter]

fully 100%. 100%. And so, just, you know, anybody who feels your business is feeling fragmented or you're feeling yourself like you're hitting a wall. You know, we all go through burnout. Everybody goes through burnout in different ways. Sometimes it's unfortunately takes a toll on health or family or relations or in the actual business. And so those things come and go. Nobody is free from those kind of stressors in life. They come and they go and so when you are facing that or to prepare and to avoid those kind of stresses, you know, either side, if you're on the preventative side, then inner design programs are for you. If you're already in the middle of it, let me help you to save yourself.

Yeah. Okay, guys. So, help yourself work with Reubina. And thank you, Reubina, for joining me today.

Thank you so much, Sergey. This has been really pleasant. [music]