+ Episode Transcript

Thor Challgren 0:00
Welcome to Your Turn To Fly, the empty nester living show. Thank you so much for listening. I am excited for you to hear today's interview. My guest is Katya Nicholas. Katia is a certified Clifton Strengths coach. The Clifton Strengths Assessment process, if you haven't heard of it has been used by over 26 million people to discover their unique personal strengths and to maximize their potential in work and in life.

Thor Challgren 0:31
I thought it would be an interesting conversation to have, because empty nesters are starting a brand new chapter in life moving into new directions. So having an understanding of what you're actually good at what are your strengths can be tremendously helpful in deciding what to do next. In my conversation with Katya, we talked about the origin of Clifton Strengths, we discuss what the assessment process is like. And we talked about how to interpret your results, both in work and in relationships. We also talk about how this is not limiting you with a label. In fact, the odds of someone else having your exact sequence of strengths is one in 33 million. So if you've ever wondered about taking this kind of assessment, I think you'll really enjoy this conversation.

Thor Challgren 1:24
Discovering your unique strengths is a great starting point when you set out on a new adventure. If you would like to have some encouragement and support in this transition in your life, this is something I specialize in. I am a certified life coach and I work with parents just like you. If you're in that season of life, I'd love to talk with you. Let's do our first call for free. Just go to discover.yourturntofly.com and schedule your free call. That's discover.yourturntofly.com. All right, let's jump into today's episode. I hope you enjoy my interview with Katya Nicholas.

Thor Challgren 2:06
Katya, welcome to the show. Thank you so much for being here today.

Katya Nicholas 2:10
Oh my god, I'm so excited to be here with you today Thor to help you understand your own Clifton Strengths and hopefully also your audience.

Thor Challgren 2:19
I love it. Yes, I can't believe I'm so excited to have this opportunity. One of the reasons that I wanted to have this conversation was a lot of people find themselves in a season of change. Now, I just was talking to someone earlier today. And we were talking about this idea of the great resignation. So there's so much change going on. And with empty nesters could be they're looking for what's next in life. But it could also be looking people that are changing jobs, or even careers and so many people as a result of that pandemic, looking at their life and saying, Is this really what I want to do? So when you're deciding what's next, it seems to me and I think you too, it's a good idea to have some assessment to what your natural talents are like, what you're good at what you like, I know there are a lot of diagnostic tools out there. Clifton Strengths is one of the most well known you're a coach, you work with the Clifton Strengths process. Tell me a little bit about Clifton Strengths, what's the origin of it?

Katya Nicholas 3:23
Okay, I'm glad you asked this question because I feel it is very important that people understand the history behind this assessment. And I am a complete 100% convert, I do not consider myself what some people refer to themselves. As you know, personality assessment junkie, I definitely focus on Clifton Strengths, because it's such a wonderful instrument. So Clifton Strengths was developed by Don Clifton, sometime after the Second World War, when he came back home from the war and he was thinking to himself, I do not want to see pain anymore. I want to see what people excel at. And so he gathered a small team. And they started studying truly what makes people excel at what they do. And they didn't just, you know, focus on people who are in some sort of leadership positions. They really look at everyone, nurses, teachers, all sorts of professions. And they were truly trying to understand what makes them great, what makes them excel at what they do. And what they found out during this research was that first of all, all of us manually and present probably take our natural talents, our natural gifts for granted. And it's so important that I always remind my clients, it's so important to recognize your own talents and learn how to capitalize on them to reach your potential. So like I said, the Clifton wanted to study human excellence. And so this whole idea this assessment was developed around the same time when the idea of the positive psychology was born, when psychologists realized that, up to that point, psychology was sort of half baked, we were studying what is wrong with people. And then they switched to let's see what is right with people. And so don Clifton and his team, as they they were doing this, this research, they collected a lot of data points they interviewed over the years, I believe it's around 2 million people if I'm not mistaken. And so with so much, so many data points, they then identified 34 buckets of talent, we refer to them as buckets, because each one of those 34 talents actually shows up differently in different people, depending on what else you have in your top 10. I personally, like when I work with clients to look at top 15 towers. And so when you take the assessment, you receive your report, and the report, the algorithm will figure out a way to all of the 34 talents in your unique sequence. And it's also important to remember because because there's so many different combinations, the odds that you will meet your quote unquote, talent, twin are in one in 33 million, which is another evidence right another piece of evidence to show you that you are absolutely unique. And so the secret sauce of this report, is that for you to read it right, and then try to figure out how your talents playing to each other to understand your personal secret sauce, your own genius, right?

Thor Challgren 6:57
And well, let's talk a little bit about the actual process of taking a test because I'm sure people are curious about that. So I took it. I don't even remember how many questions there were. But I remember it wasn't it didn't take that long. But tell me what's the process of taking the test like?

Katya Nicholas 7:15
So you take this assessment online, on the gallops website, Gallup is one of the companies that Don Clifton partnered up with at some point. And so Gallup is now administering the test. So you take it online, there are 177 statements that will show up as you take the test as statements, they can be there. So you see two statements with each column board question. They're not actual question, right? And so you get about 20 seconds to respond to pick one of this statements. And the reason we only give you 20 seconds is that we don't want you to overthink, we really want your gut reaction. Because this assessment, first of all, let me also define how we talk about the talent within Clifton Strengths community. So we define talent as your naturally recurring patterns of thought, feeling, and behavior productively applied. And so with that idea of we want your gut reaction to what you see on the screen, because we want to see how you feel about a certain statement, what you think about it, how would you behave in certain situation? So once you go through this 177 statements, sometimes though, it happens, that sometimes the statements are so similar to each other, that it's really difficult to pick one, right? And so don't worry if this happens to you, and you didn't have enough time to click on, you know, whatever, answer don't worry about this, because the system will ask the same question, we will still get what we need from you to understand your natural recurring patterns of thought, feeling and behavior, it will come back to it but in another way to make it easier for you.

Thor Challgren 9:09
Yeah, that was interesting. Because when I took the test, I remember thinking at first, like, the curious part of me, was like, Oh, I wonder if I can guess what the intent of the question was, like, what are they trying to get at here? But then, like you say, there are so many different combinations of statements that I just sort of accepted that, alright, they're gonna it's gonna do what it is. And I didn't really worry about trying to game the process or come up with a certain outcome. So after I take the assessment, I'm going to get back a report that's going to have all 34 of my strengths. And I love how you framed that you said it's my natural talents. Mm hmm. Not because I think sometimes people hear this and they think strength and weakness and so it can feel pejorative, like it's a judgment about you, as opposed to just saying, Hey, this is an error. where you have natural talent, and so that you're aware of that so that you can apply it? Yeah, if you're working with a client, they're going to get this report, you're gonna see it with them as well, then what's the next step, you will look at this and you're going to interpret the results. In fact, the report sort of gives you an overview. But let's talk about how those 34 talent buckets as you called it, are broken down. Clifton Strengths and air report they call the top 10. They say strengthen, and then the rest are called navigate. Tell me what that means.

Katya Nicholas 10:39
Of course. So the reason we listen, like I said, I like to look definitely at your top 10 talents, sometimes actual all the way down to 15. Because sometimes I see certain behaviors showing up. And I want my clients to understand what's happening. And so the reason we say strength fun, above the top 10 talents is because these are your natural talents that define, in my opinion, your zone of genius. And so, sometimes people make the mistake when they look at the report, and they say, okay, so, Thor, I'm looking at your report, right now you have number one, you have positivity at number one, somebody may look and edit and say, oh, so positivity is his talent, and sort of stuck there, right? It's his step challenge. But it's not how we look at this, we want to look at what we call talent dynamics, meaning we want to look how your positivity, for example, works with your Maximizer that you have at number three, right. And so this is what I said, I believe that this is sort of your secret sauce, once you start understanding your your personal natural talent dynamics. And then you start understanding where certain talent may be exhibiting itself too much, which may come across to another person as a weakness, right? We refer to them in Clifton Strengths methodology as blind spots, right? So once you have that awareness, right, you can literally sort of dial them up and down, right to bring some particular talent forward, right, or to kind of remove a little bit of that behavior. Again, the reason we say strengthen your top 10, we mean that you need to really study them about yourself, and you have plenty of information in the report, you don't necessarily have to hire somebody like me to help you interpret it, if you didn't have the means right now, right? Like there's plenty of information within the report. But again, what I see with clients sometimes is that, let's say they have taken the assessment, I don't know, five years, they read that. Yes, it's me they recognize themselves, but then then don't like Okay, so what else is new, and then they put it somewhere and collects dust, and they don't define the secret sauce, and then they focus on something else, which can be a little bit more difficult to develop some of the talents, maybe that are not natural for them.

Thor Challgren 13:26
You mentioned that you think of the top five as being your zone of genius that reminds me of that term. And maybe this is how you're referring to it from the big leap by Gay Hendricks that the things that you're just naturally good at. So if you're focusing on your top five, then you are maximizing your natural talents. I love to what you said about calling it your secret sauce, because that suggests to me ingredients, it's not just any one of those in isolation, but maybe it's positivity, like you said, Maximizer intellection, so that you're combining those things to create something that's uniquely you, right?

Katya Nicholas 14:08
For sure. And yes, I'm glad that you brought Gay Hendricks because this is actually I sort of now combine the two methodologist right. So he talks about Zone of Genius, Zone of Excellence, Zone of Competence and Zone of Incompetence, which is obviously the two last ones we don't want to be there ever right? And then what happens with people very often that way they get stuck in the zone of excellence because they even in the name right? It's you are doing something so well you excel at something, but then you may come home and feel still unfulfilled for whatever reason, and you may be afraid to mention it to any of your friends or loved ones. Because people sometimes will say what do you have to complain about? Right But deep down you know that Something is missing. And so, Gay Hendricks talk about how incredibly scary it is to take the leap. That's why the book is called The Big Leap right from the zone of excellence into the zone of genius. And so what I do help my clients realize, as I help them understand on a deeper level, their secret sauce in their top five and 10, Clifton Strengths, talents. So another way to think about this, you're right, the top five is your zone of genius. But the other way to think about this, think like, I am a right handed person, right? So my top five talents is my right hand, right? Every day, I'm using my right hand to do something, right, your six to 10 talents are your left hand. So it's like whatever your right hand is doing. You need the left hand to help it do something. Right. So this is how I looked at them. Hmm, technically you do utilize all of the 10, I would say, almost every day.

Thor Challgren 16:02
Yeah. I love the discussion about that your right hand, your left hand and thinking about all of those top 10 Tell me about where can people use this in a practical way. And I'm thinking about a situation where maybe someone is considering a career option, maybe they're going to move into some new area, and they might have some options of what they're going to do. And they might hear like, you know, it could be things like oh, network marketing, or I'm going to be a teacher or I'm going to go into real estate or maybe become a writer, would you say that? It helps you when you know what you're naturally good at that maybe you shouldn't go into certain areas, because they require things that are outside of your, your zone of genius.

Katya Nicholas 16:51
Yes, and no, actually. So we, in the Clifton Strengths community, do not tell people what to do. So technically, I wouldn't, you know, make that assumption, oh, four, I'm looking at your strengths and you should be doing X time, right, I can't really say that, you would have to tell me what you really want to do. And then I will help you understand how you can capitalize on your top talents to get there and to succeed at what that thing that you want to do. I will say though, and this is something that I do with my clients is that to help you narrow down what you should be doing. Clifton Strengths definitely can help with that by actually helping you refining or maybe redefining sometimes your personal values, right. And I don't necessarily mean the big sort of large values, I value family of course, we all value family, I value ethics, we all of course, you know, strive to be ethical, what I'm talking about as I'm looking at your talents right now, for example, you have input at number six, and you have learner at number nine. So input is very similar to learner where it's someone who loves to collect information objects, it's someone who is very good at doing research. And what we very often say about people who have input this high is that there is no input without output. Meaning when you learn something, when you gather information, you almost always have to share it. Right? Because it's almost if you don't share it, to me, I haven't put number one, when I don't share information or something that I know I feel like I'm suffocating right? Input and learner very similar. The reason I bring up learner and input here because they're in your top 10 talents is because from those two talents, you can define or refine your personal value of learning. So more as an individual laughs to learn. So or needs to be looking for opportunities that will allow him learning right whatever that means for you. As an example, for example, I used to work for a gentleman who did not value learning as much as I do, I could not work for that person. So anyway, so, all of those talents, I feel like they can help you revisit your values and figure out what the path should be you mentioned something network marketing right. So, if I understand this correctly, right, somebody who will excel in network marketing probably needs to be a little bit more outgoing Write, write, somebody who wants to who can act shall maintain me to conversation with I know 100 People in London room right? So when you look at your Talents, individual's dance. So you have at number 13, which kind of tells me that you do, you can maintain a conversation with 100 people.

Thor Challgren 20:09
So tell me what "woo" is. W-O-O.

Katya Nicholas 20:13
Woo means basically, it's a talent that indicates that a person is very comfortable in social settings, okay? And they actually crave large social settings. And they bring that energy to the room, right? They tend to start a struggle conversation with anyone, right about anything. One of my colleagues, when I was studying to become a Clifton Strengths coach, she has woo at number one. And she struck a conversation with someone also with, you know, one of our students at the buffet line by complimenting her on her teeth, I could never do that, like, I could never do that. But that's whoo for you, right? Okay. They like wooing you, they will try to, they will find something positive about you to compliment you on and then they will woo you to them. So they bring that energy. And so somebody, like I said, right, in network marketing, if you have room somewhere up high, go for it. Right? Right. If you have, for example, for intellection, you have at number five intellection people, I also have intellection, high intellection people, I can be very engaging in social settings as well, but not as much as who would write. So when I find myself in a, at a networking event, right, I probably will only talk to about like three to five people and they will have a deep conversation. intellection simply means thinking, right? So I like to think, right? And then I have to have time to myself, to myself literally for to process whatever was happening, right? And it's just really thinking, thinking, thinking thinking all the time. So maybe for intellection, folks, and that work, marketing is not going to be the best thing to do.

Thor Challgren 22:06
Maybe yeah,

Katya Nicholas 22:07
That's how I look at this.

Thor Challgren 22:09
Well, yeah, no, that's a great point, maybe we should share, one of the things that you get in the report is, with each of your top five, there's a whole list of things that say why your intellection is unique. Mm hmm. And then there's a category called why you succeed using this category. And so intellection it says, You love to think Muse and reflect your powerful mental processing, and intellectual activity, empower you to clarify and explain regardless of the topic or situation. And I look at that I go God that feels like me, in the sense that makes me feel whole. So I guess part of the value of this is when you see this, it tells you reminds you maybe of the things that you were good at. And there was something you said earlier about how we don't reflect enough on the things that we're good at, we don't give ourselves that credit. So this is giving you that credit. And that moment to go yes, this is something you're good at. And since I'm on the same page, I want to go back to what you said about blind spots, because I think this is super fascinating as well. So in my blind spot for intellection. It says some people might think you create needless complexity during discussions and may want you to make decisions faster than you do my wife. Consider tailoring your approach. Sometimes it's better to keep it simple and go in more depth later. So I was just sort of kidding about my wife, but she would look at that go. Yes. So let me ask you this. Once I sort of know some of these themes, and I know where I'm naturally strong at and maybe what some of the blind spots are. Can you share that with other people in your life? And can that be helpful in relationships?

Katya Nicholas 24:02
Absolutely. Absolutely. Oh, I'm so glad you brought this up. So yes, I said, it's super important to recognize those talents as talents. And the reason when you know, Don Clifton and his team, when they found out that so many people take it for granted. It's basically the the metaphor that I like to give is, you don't really look at the tip of your nose, you don't see your nose all the time. It is the same with talent, because they're so natural to us. We sort of expect that. What if I am good at something? This other person is as good as at this as I am but it's not true. We know that right? And so as far as blind spots go, the practical Well, yeah, let me just actually give you a practical idea behind intellection and how it is helpful. And then we will talk about blind spots. So within selection I also have it as one of my top five talents. And I, once I realize how this works, I absolutely love this, especially in the work that I do when I help people, you know, work through their things, when I coach them, so intellection, because intellection is literally like I said, it's thinking, they're always thoughts in your mind, in my mind. And so when I'm talking to someone, as we're having a coaching conversation, and tell me if you recognize this, and you, so when I'm talking to somebody, and they're telling me something, my mind is thinking on their behalf. So intellection makes us an amazing sounding board, right, because as you're telling me your challenges, I'm thinking about them. And with my in my particular case, and it's probably true for you with your input and learner, you have all of the information at your fingertips, you're also have positivity, right? So you can give and you have strategic Oh my Oh, my goodness, you have this amazing combination, where I can see that you would be such a You are such a great coach, because again, with positivity, you can help them see the silver lining, in whatever challenge they have. Right? Strategic you come up with a surgery for them futuristic, you paint this vivid picture for them where they shouldn't doubt like, Oh, my God, of course, I can do that. Right. So but the intellection is what's sort of doing it right in the background. So that's a good, practical part of intellection, the blind spot of intellection is yes, sometimes it will come across to people as if you're overthinking. And what I say to all my intellection clients is that you have to explain to them that you need to be before you make a decision, you need to complete what I call a sinking loop. Because sometimes when intellection doesn't give itself, space to think the quiet time that I was saying about right talking about, right when you're not multitasking when you're just sitting down or walking, taking a shower and meditating and thinking, right. And so when this happens when you give yourself space to sing your intellection it's so magical, it will come up with a solution pretty fast. You just need to give it space, right? And so but what what happens with intellection people very often, they don't realize that they don't give themselves space. So they get their thoughts get stuck. And yes to other people. It looks like they are overthinking things, as far as personal relationships go. intellection is actually a perfect example here. Because my husband and I, we share this talent. And sometimes it feels like we have two separate conversations, right? We're having dinner, we're having two separate conversations, because what literally is happening is that, as I'm saying something he's thinking, maybe that's what I'm saying, hopefully, but he also thinks about something else. And so when I stop talking, and then he opens his mouth, and he says something is completely unrelated to what I was saying, right? And so we used to get obsessed with each other's like, we aren't listening to me what is going on here. And then I forget how this happened. But I must have been preparing for a client or something. And it finally clicked for me. And I was like, oh, it's the intellection. Right, that is sort of making us not seemingly listen to each other. And so once I realized that I wasn't and I told him, so they think this is what is happening. And so now we have this sort of inside joke where if one of us starts kind of site gets sidetracked, so basically either he'll I will tell him, Can you please shut down the intellection for a second? And listen to what I'm saying. So we're going to have this conversation first. Yeah. So this says yes, for personal relation. In your relationships. It's perfect.

Thor Challgren 29:06
Yeah, I'm thinking also in the context of a business relationship. Like if you're working with someone, a partner in business, it would be good for both of you to do this. Because if what your other partners strengths are in the places where maybe they complement you, in an area where they're not your natural talent, then you can both be aware, like where to deploy the right person at the right time for the right effect, as opposed to just going at it blind.

Katya Nicholas 29:35
Right. And I'm also glad that you brought this up. I will give you also an example from my personal relationship with my husband, but it actually can be it's a great example for in your relationship, right. So one of the talents that I have high is activator and activators are just textbook definition of, of an activator, somebody who just started doing things without necessary thinking too much, right? It's they get energy from doing, they just go go go, they are not afraid to make mistakes they learn from doing right. And if even if they make mistakes, like no big deal, right, we'll do something else. And so sometimes I may rush into doing something. And Michael, my husband, who has intellection. And he also has deliberative also sometimes comes across as thinking too long or something like that. But it's not, it's not that it's just like, they love to have all the options possible in front of them to make the best decision. And so this two sort of opposing talents in our relationship work perfectly. Again, when once we realize what's happening, right, because he will slow me down sometimes when it's necessary. I know that he has this natural ability, and he's very good at this, to think through things. So all of the options are actually may go to him and say, Hey, I'm thinking about this, am I rushing into this? So this is how when we talk about Team Talent dynamics, right, so it's good for you personally, on individual level to understand your own personal talent dynamics of your top 10 talents. But then, once you understand your own right, then you're working or whatever the relationship is, once you know their talent, also, you can start seeing the synergies there.

Thor Challgren 31:30
Yeah, we've talked about the talents that are at the top of the list. But let's for a minute talk about the bottom of the list, you gave an example of Tiger Woods and his coach, where they use the 80/20 principle, where they spent 80% of his time strengthening his talents and 20% on you called it appreciating his non dominant talents. So right, so what do we do with those, say those lists ones at the bottom of the list? Like with me, I've got deliberative consistency, harmony, achiever competition that resonated with me, that was number 31. Like, I don't think I'm a competitive person. So that makes sense, why that would be at the bottom. But how do we use those? And what do you recommend to people as how they view the talents that are at the bottom of their list?

Katya Nicholas 32:31
At the bottom? This is a very good question. So yes, the sounds on the bottom basically mean that they, they're not sort of so well pronounced within an individual. But what sometimes very often happens is that when you receive your report, and you start looking at the bottom, because again, we have this tendency, unfortunately, to sort of look at what we think our weaknesses are by comparing ourselves to another person, right? And so sometimes when that happens when the client comes to me and asks, but what about you know, my harmony? Doesn't do who you? Are, you have it at number 29. Right? It's like, can I not be hurt? bring harmony to the world to my relationships? No, it's not what it means. First of all, I'll say, first of all, people sometimes misinterpret what this words mean. Right? So I recommend go to the very end of your report, they have short definitions of each 34 talents. So read about it. Right and And so basically, we say, drop the talent envy, it's not serving you. And what I said in that video, I think you're referring that I am happy to share with your audience like that up yeah, they can get the most out of their report is that the reason I say learn to appreciate what you have on the bottom for that reason, what I was just describing how for example, a deliberative talent to somebody may come across as this person is taking too long to think or they cannot make a decision or something like that, right. So when we do not understand another person's remember the definition of talent, recurring patterns of thought feeling and behavior when we don't own them, ourselves. We tend to attach judgment to that person, right? So it's like, oh, he's overthinking things. Oh, he is too competitive, right competition, for example, and Clifton Strengths. It can mean a person. Surely they can be competitive. They can be sort of competing against someone but mostly what they're doing is actually competing against themselves, right so they achieve a certain result and then they want to do more and more and more and more competition talent also within Clifton Strengths me it's somebody who loves different measurements, they just love numbers, right? So they set one goal and they set another goal is all about numbers. I also have competition very low. So I don't always understand or like, don't give me numbers, I will, I won't stick to them. This is what I'm saying. It's just once you understand, like, the meaning of the of how Clifton Strengths defines them, rightly, you will start understanding how other people think and feel and do things. And it reduces the judgments that we tend to attach to other people. And it brings harmony to all relationships.

Thor Challgren 35:39
Yeah, I want to close with a couple of questions, because I'm sure there will be people that would look at any sort of assessment, and they might be skeptical, like, they think, Oh, this is gonna put me in a box to be thought of a certain way. Now you did say every, the likelihood of someone having my exact set of strings in that order is one in 33 million. So I kind of think it's not a box. But what do you say to people who maybe look at this and think it's gonna force them to act a certain way? How do you talk about that with people when they raise that?

Katya Nicholas 36:16
I'm so glad that you brought this, because what I see quite often, especially when you are taking this assessment, not out of your own volition, right? Not that you decided to see like, Oh, what am I good at. But let's say you are working at a company where they're rolling out this methodology. And so what happens they often is that, and you've mentioned this, you know, I wasn't trying to gain the task, but sometimes people actually do try to gain the task, especially if it was quote unquote, forced onto them. Right? Because, I mean, we had different experiences, of course, was different employers and people sometimes worried that something bad will come out of that. So basically, the objection that I hear I don't want to be psychoanalyzed, which is a very, very valid, valid objection, right. And so what I do like to say to my clients, is that is a reminder, right? Again, the Clifton Strengths Assessment was developed around the same time as the positive psychology was developing, right? So already in that you can be rest assured that we're not looking to find flaws in you, if you compare it to other assessments, for example, Myers Briggs, Myers Briggs was developed way before positive psychology, neither of the two women who developed it actually had training in psychology, there's some, I would be skeptical about that, right. And also, the way they the acronym that you get, which actually is very easy to use to kind of put a label on somebody and then put them in the box, right? Same with Enneagram, I find actually. And so with Clifton Strengths, again, what I am always reminding my clients, I get, especially if somebody is so nervous, and I send reports, when someone is trying to sort of game the system that what report comes back is it will actually say we didn't get enough, we got too many neutral responses, we can't really tell if this is accurate. And so when this happens, you're actually doing your yourself a disservice. Right? So just do it out of your own. Well, I honestly believe in this work, because what I've seen is that whenever somebody receives a report, they do recognize themselves. And as a reminder, again, it's based on so much so many data points, and Gallup continues doing this research. And Gallup also works with companies will help employers understand what makes employees more engaged, happier at work, and this is the purpose of this work. But if you're doing it for yourself, definitely don't try to game the system.

Thor Challgren 39:17
Well here is I'll just close with this because to me, this is the reason why you do it. So for instance, my number one strength positivity. When you get to the end of the page where it's giving you the lowdown on that there's a section called take action to maximize your potential. So these are basically them giving you ways that you can lean in to that particular string so for positivity, it says encourage others to keep their eyes in the positive by helping them see what's going well with for them. Arm yourself with good stories, jokes and sayings. lighten the mood, celebrate, turn small achievements into big events. Get involved in activities where you can inject excitement, drama, humor Avoid negative people who bring you down. It's really giving you like a life lesson in how to take this natural strength and really lean into it so that you make your life something much more meaningful. And you're you're being intentional about it and not just doing it by default for sure. Well, Katya, I so much appreciate you for being on the show today. I loved our conversation we talked about you can work people work with people take them through this process. If people want to know more about Clifton Strengths know more about the work that you do. What's the best way for them to reach out to you?

Katya Nicholas 40:40
It's easy you can find me online Katya Nicholas everywhere. It's my website. All of the social media handles are Katya Nicholas. For I think we said that I will share this short 20 Minutes video with your lovely audience so that they can get out you know, the most out of their reports. And then this thing is more help. I'm happy. I'm happy to help.

Thor Challgren 41:05
Awesome. Thank you all make sure that we link that in the show notes. Well, thank you so much. I really appreciate you being on the show today loved our conversation.

Katya Nicholas 41:14
I am so happy I had this opportunity to talk to you and I'm hoping it will be super, super helpful for the empty nesters. Nicola. Yes. Thank you so much.

Thor Challgren 41:25
Thank you.

Katya Nicholas 41:26
Take care. Thanks. Bye.