Are you intrigued by a good success story? Inspired by a “rags to riches” narrative in which the entrepreneur overcomes the odds and makes it to the finish line? These tales are captivating because they are so rare. The majority of entrepreneurs do not succeed. But what if the lack of success is due to the operating instructions we are taught to follow? What if entrepreneurs are taught to blindly follow the wrong rule book? Meet Adele Spraggon. Adele teaches a proprietary technique called the 4 Step Repatterning Technique that is sweeping the globe because of its impact. She is an international trainer and speaker, a two-time leadership award recipient, the award-winning author of the book Shift: 4 Steps to Personal Empowerment, and mainly, a guide who helps people to smash through barriers, transform their lives, and reach unprecedented levels of ease and success – from the inside out.
“Start with the question ‘does it work’, and if it doesn’t, have the courage to create from the unknown.”
Below are the highlights of the interview conducted between Insights Success and Adele Spraggon:
Please brief our readers about your journey as a Thought leader.
When I first started as an entrepreneur, all I knew was one business model. I was told success depended on me determining my ideal client and then creating services that fit this client’s needs. This was too confining for me. As a thought leader, I bring my intellectual property to different clients. In my work in behavior change, I work with couples who want to improve their marriages, with entrepreneurs who need personal empowerment, with millennials struggling with anxiety and fears – the same 4-Step Repatterning Technique (same intellectual property) taken to different markets. If a reader is a thought leader at heart, they will be feeling trapped by the standard business model. A thought leader’s job is to advance her field. Creation at this level is a matter of cross-pollination. I use findings from all sorts of areas, the ancient arts of meditation and yoga, from philosophy, the arts, literature. The journey of thought leadership is going beyond to a place where you can reinvent the field.
Being an inspirational speaker, what is your opinion regarding the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the mental state? And what you suggest overcoming this significant challenge?
Every age has its plague, and ours is no different. And, I am not talking about the COVID-19 pandemic. Today’s plague is stress and anxiety. Our collective anxiety is skyrocketing inside this stressful modern world, and COVID-19 is merely shining a spotlight on these mental challenges.
When I work with people’s behaviour patterns, we start with this question. Does what you are currently doing work? I don’t ask them, is it right or wrong, or good or bad, but just does it work? Our current world is not working for far too many of us. Right now, COVID-19 is presenting us with an opportunity that is beyond just fixing a virus – there are much deeper issues that are leading to isolation – problems with wealth distribution, class, gender and race privilege, our divide between humanity and nature. All of this was there before COVID. So along comes COVID, and suddenly, we can no longer ignore these issues. All of us are being called to question who we are being, what we are doing and does what we are doing work or not work for everybody. Now we have a choice, we can use COVID as an opportunity to fix the deep underlying issues, or we can be a victim of our current choices and return to the status quo as soon as this pandemic is over. If we are going to survive our current plague, we need to transform. Perhaps COVID can help us do that.
Describe some of the vital attributes that every businesswoman should possess.
There is a metaphor I can use from white water rafting. Imagine you are in dangerous rapids – there are obstacles everywhere, rocks and chutes and trees. At first, your attention is riveted to these obstacles. A novice will focus on the rocks and, by lending their attention there, is guaranteed to crash. A master will keep their eye on the through-path. Every woman has her internal rocks. Women, for whatever reason, nature or nurture, are often tripped up by other people’s judgements or perceptions; by her inner critic; by her perceived body-image; by situational issues such as money, time, the kids. It is far too common for a woman to silence her voice by listening to these sirens. Be the rapids, be the way-through. I’m not saying ignore these obstacles. I’m saying find a method to flow around them.
What were the past experiences, achievements or lessons that shaped your journey?
For much of my life, I was full of fear and struggled with anxiety — social anxiety, panic attacks, and such. I meditated daily, I did daily yoga, I did talk therapy for a decade, and when none of this freed me from the anxiety, I did a deep dive into my own mind to create a method that works for me. That method is what I teach. Every reader has something in their past that is painful. It is there, in that suffering, that her opportunity lies. Turn towards this suffering and go to the areas that you most want to avoid, and the journey becomes a lot more fun.
What were some of the primal challenges and roadblocks that you faced during the initial phase of your journey?
My biggest roadblocks were quitting and people-pleasing. I had a terrible pattern of quitting. It was my go-to when things got tough. This behaviour was predicated on people-pleasing. Whenever someone had an unfavourable opinion of what I was doing, I would panic and quit. Once I overcame this, it didn’t matter what the journey threw at me. Today, I will always find a way through the problem.
Have you in any ways contributed towards the cause of women empowerment?
My proprietary 4 Step Repatterning Technique is all about transforming the brain patterns that disempower us. It is not uncommon for a woman to feel disempowered. We swim in cultural patterns that undermine feminine values. Values such as relationships, emotional connection, being aligned with nature and so on. Women need to understand that their way of leading is different from men’s, but that doesn’t make the male leadership model correct. Our brain is not shaped hierarchically but heterarchically. Think of a fluid hierarchy in which leadership transfers from one part of your brain to another, depending on the needs of the situation. When women are empowered, this is the leadership model they produce. Feminine values are needed today more than ever, and women can lead the way into a new future by respecting and embracing their way of doing things.
What is your advice for emerging women entrepreneurs?
Our current systems are broken, and just because something has been done in a particular way for millennia, it does not mean it works. Women entrepreneurs have the power to reinvent the systems. So be a changemaker, an innovator, a rulebreaker. Find a coach who will help you identify and follow your inner voice. Then go out and make the changes that are so desperately needed today.
